As part of its commitment to Vision Zero, an ambitious national effort to eliminate traffic fatalities, Lackawanna County has begun to solicit input from residents for its Safety Action Plan.

At La Festa Italiana over the Labor Day weekend, staff from the Lackawanna County Department of Planning and Economic Development asked visitors to take a survey to help identify major traffic safety issues countywide.

Now, that survey is available to all county residents on the Safe Streets Lackawanna website, tinyurl.com/SafeStreetsLackawanna, under the heading, “How To Get Involved.” In coming months, the county and its Safe Streets consultant, Bowman Consulting Group, will conduct in-person events in each section of the county to help identify problem areas and hear ideas to fix them.

Some of the safety program’s goals and projects will be informed by crash data. Of 11,761 crashes in Lackawanna County between 2019 and 2023, 45% resulted in a reported injury – including 87 fatalities and 312 serious injuries.

Crashes involving pedestrians and bicyclists are a particular problem. About 25% of all fatal crashes involve a pedestrian or bicyclist. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has reported that pedestrian deaths increased 57% from 2013 to 2022, from 4,779 to 7,522. A major part of the local initiative is pedestrian safety, in terms of engineering streets and intersections for pedestrian and bicyclist safety, and educating drivers, pedestrians and bicyclists about safety.

In addition to the information on the project website, more information on Vision Zero and the Safe Streets for All Program is available at:

Safe Streets and Roads for All Program: www.transportation.gov/grants/SS4A

What is Vision Zero?: visionzeronetwork.org/about/what-is-vision-zero/

Above, Representatives of Lackawanna County’s Safe Street Program asked visitors to La Festa Italiana on Courthouse Square to complete a survey for the project. From left: Jacob Siegel and Andrew Schwartz from Environmental Planning & Design; and Jessica Edwards and Mary Liz Donato from the Lackawanna County Department of Planning and Economic Development.