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BY ALAN PITTMAN
Crossing Bailey Hill Road near Churchill is
now safer following a fatality
Classic
Comfort
Follow your feet to Footwise
The Zurich
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Walkability
Will Eugene prioritize humans over cars?
E
ugene ranks as one of the best cities
in the nation for bicycling, but for
pedestrians the city is mediocre.
Eugene’s 11 percent bike commute rank
is the highest among U.S. cities with more
than 100,000 people, but the city’s 6.7
percent pedestrian commute rate is only
about half the rate in Boston.
Walk Score, a website that ranks cities’
by pedestrian friendliness, places Eugene
well down the list of larger cities at 76th out
of 280. Eugene’s score rates as “somewhat
walkable,” just above “car dependent.”
Walkable cities have less obesity, are
less polluting and have greater livability,
sense of community, home values and
attractiveness for job creators, the website
and research have shown.
They also have fewer people run over.
Eugene-Springfi eld recently ranked as the
most dangerous metro area in the state for
pedestrians with 63 human road kills in
the last decade, according to a study by
Transportation for America (TforA).
The city’s new Pedestrian and Bicycle
Master Plan could make the city a lot
more walkable, but pedestrian advocates
expressed disappointment with a draft last
month.
“There’s no priority list of sidewalk
improvements,” said Eugene Bicycle and
Pedestrian Advisory Committee member
Judi Horstmann. “That’s a huge omission.”
“It didn’t come out the way I wanted it to
be,” responded the city’s top transportation
planner Rob Inerfeld. But Inerfeld didn’t
say whether the city would change the
draft plan.
UO planner and BPAC member Fred
Tepfer called for the city to prioritize
walking over driving and include detailed
requirements in its plan. For example,
he said the city should limit the greatest
allowable detour to a pedestrian crossing
measured in feet.
“I think this plan has got to have teeth in
it,” Horstmann said.
The Ped/Bike plan calls for doubling
the share of trips made by foot by 2031.
But the document is vague on how to pay
for and prioritize pedestrian safety projects
to achieve that goal.
Much of the plan, public comments
on the plan and media coverage of the
plan has focused on bicycle projects.
Cyclists are more organized and active in
advocating for improvements in Eugene
than pedestrians. Unlike cities such as
Portland, Eugene has chosen to lump
together its bicycle and pedestrian planning
and advisory committees.
But city staff have at times appeared
resistant to walkable change. Rather than
admitting that the city has a pedestrian safety
problem in response to the TforA study,
Inerfeld wrote on op-ed for The Register-
Guard calling the statistics “debatable,”
claiming city “leadership on this issue,” and
declaring that when it comes to pedestrian
safety, “ultimately it is the responsibility
of every one of us,” apparently letting city
planners off the hook.
But the city’s own statistics included
in the Ped/Bike plan show a large number
of pedestrian accidents. In Eugene, drivers
have struck and injured 141 pedestrians
in the last fi ve years, killing 11 people,
according to state data gathered by the city.
Despite the carnage, the Eugene police
haven’t prioritized pedestrian safety.
Drivers routinely ignore laws requiring
that they stop for pedestrians downtown,
while seven new police offi cers hired for
the area have focused on a crackdown on
the homeless.
The city identifi ed 11th, 18th and
6th avenues as the most dangerous for
pedestrians. City planners have designed
many urban city streets as one-way
thoroughfares with a priority on vehicle
speed rather than human safety. On south
Willamette, pedestrians have for years
complained of narrow sidewalks blocked
by telephone poles.
But there are indications that the city is
changing its attitude. In the past, the city
resisted crosswalks or took years to build
them. In one of the largest pedestrian safety
projects in years, the city just completed 18
improved crosswalks serving kids trying to
get to seven local elementary and middle
schools. Four of the crossings include pe-
destrian-activated, rapid-fl ashing warning
lights to get drivers to stop.
The city and the Eugene Safe Routes
to School program won a federal
grant of $500,000 to pay for the safety
improvements.
Earlier, the city installed a “stutter fl ash”
crossing at Bailey Hill Road near Churchill
High School, but that only happened after
a driver ran over a child.
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EUGENE WEEKLY AUGUST 25, 2011 9