In The News – Page 14 – WalkMassachusetts

Boston Globe – Chain-reaction crash that killed toddler in South Boston leaves residents reeling

By WalkMassachusetts | July 27, 2018

Boston Globe: “Chain-reaction crash that killed toddler in South Boston leaves residents reeling”

[Six] pedestrians including the toddler in South Boston, have been struck and killed in Boston this year, according to WalkBoston, a pedestrian advocacy group that uses news reports to track such crashes.

Wendy Landman, the group’s executive director, said people pushing strollers are “certainly are one of the groups we think about when we think of sidewalk accessibility.”

Posted July 27, 2018

WalkBoston’s statewide crash tracker can be accessed on this page under “Crash Monitoring”

SAMPAN – Everett becomes first local city to speed bus commute with raised platforms

By WalkMassachusetts | July 18, 2018

SAMPAN: “Everett becomes first local city to speed bus commute with raised platforms”

“Fixing the ‘last mile’ is often cited as an important goal for transportation agencies and advocates to improve how people get from their transit stop to final destination. Adding boarding-level platforms in Everett shows a commitment to the ‘last six inches,’ too,” said Wendy Landman, Executive Director of WalkBoston. “These last six inches are critical elements of age and disability-friendly communities, growing bus ridership, and improving mobility for all community members.”

Posted July 17, 2018

PBS NewsHour – Pedestrian deaths are up nationwide, fueled by people who walk while drunk

By WalkMassachusetts | July 6, 2018

PBS NewHour: “Pedestrian deaths are up nationwide, fueled by people who walk while drunk”
By Jenni Bergal

Some pedestrian advocates caution that officials need to be careful not to send out a message that blames the victims, who have tried to do the right thing by not getting behind the wheel when they’ve had too much to drink. Instead, the priority should be on designing safer roadways, which will influence drivers’ behavior and curb speeds where people are walking, said Brendan Kearney, a spokesman for WalkBoston.

Posted July 5, 2018

We encourage you to read the Detroit Free Press/USA TODAY NETWORK investigation “Death on foot: America’s love of SUVs is killing pedestrians” [posted July 1st but not referenced in above piece] as a complementary report:

…the SUV revolution is a key, leading cause of escalating pedestrian deaths nationwide, which are up 46 percent since 2009.

Commonwealth – For walkers, the last six inches are important

By WalkMassachusetts | June 25, 2018

MassINC/Commonwealth: “For walkers, the last six inches are important”
By Wendy Landman and Brendan Kearney

WalkBoston has been talking about transit as the middle leg of a walking trip for many years. We understand that even the most avid walker or walking advocate knows that many trips are too long to make a single-mode-walk trip possible. Now, the transit and active transportation worlds have become more attuned to the facts that buses serve the broadest network of transit riders, are often the transit mode that serves low-income riders, and are the transit mode that can be modified most easily. For American communities – urban, suburban, and rural – to become truly walkable, they must also be served by transit. Understanding how the bus and walking networks must be linked is critical to shaping investments in transit and the built environment.

Posted June 25, 2018

Bloomberg Baystate Business – Self-Driving Cars

By WalkMassachusetts | June 22, 2018

Bloomberg Radio: “Bloomberg Baystate Business: Self-Driving Cars”

We also talked about self-driving cars in the wake of the decision to allow Nutonomy to test its cars throughout the city of Boston. Nutonomy President Karl Iagnemma joined us to give us the details. We also spoke with MIT research scientist Bryan Reimer about the technology. Taking a more cautious tone was Wendy Landman of Walk Boston.

(Wendy’s segment is on the broadcast from 00:44:03-00:51:50)

Originally aired June 22, 2018