48th Street Safety Project: why the delay?
I wrote a whole post about this, but just scroll to the bottom if you want to read the 800+ pages of emails the City produced in response to my Right-to-Know Law request for all the community feedback on the 48th Street redesign.
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Two years ago, in early 2022, I signed a neighborhood petition asking the city to redesign 48th Street to make it safer for pedestrians/bikers and put those changes in when they repaved it after doing a bunch of digging for a PGW project. There have been a ton of car crashes on 48th Street in recent years, only getting worse since the pandemic made everyone drive like maniacs. Over 500 people in my neighborhood signed on to this petition. Two years later, and 48th Street is only more dangerous - it’s been repaved, without any safety features added, and it’s still missing basic things like crosswalks and stop bars in a bunch of places.
This Garden Court Community Association website has a lot more details about the history of this - https://www.gardencourtca.org/single-post/48th-street-greenway-spring-2024-newsletter
https://www.gardencourtca.org/single-post/48th-street-greenway-june23-update
Around June 2023, the city repaved 48th Street. And instead of putting in any of the safety features the community requested (protected bike lane, curb bump outs, etc.) they did… nothing. It was turned into a smooth highway with no crosswalks or stop bars.
In September 2023, the city finally held two community meetings where two proposals for safety plans were presented. I went to one of these meetings, and at the end I filled out the following exit survey. It basically asked people to say whether they wanted a “light touch” or “complete streets” approach to traffic safety. Why something so fundamental as making our roads safe is put up for community debate is beyond me. But I and many other neighbors filled out the form.
The City later released the “results” of the community survey, which showed that the “option 2 - complete streets” choice was heavily favored. But they didn’t release anything about question 5 on the survey (“Is there anything you want to share with the project team?”). So I requested that via a Right-to-Know Law request. Turns out, almost everyone wants the city to know that 48th Street is dangerous and they want it to be safe.
(The City gave me an excel sheet that had all the survey results - I took out the numeric scores so it would all fit on one page, and somehow turned it into a PDF which I did not realize you could do accidentally.)
A few weeks later, I and many other neighbors sent in the following form email reiterating my support for the safest option.
Finally, after all the emails and surveys, in February 2024, the city made their big announcement: they were going to have more meetings!
I didn’t go to the February meeting. The City still hasn’t announced what plan they’re actually going with. It’s clear there’s overwhelming support for the safer option, so it’s frustrating they won’t just announce a decision.
Again, I think it’s insane to make infrastructure design choices based on community opinion, but that’s apparently how Philadelphia works. Back in 2021, when a developer was trying to get a variance for the “poop building”, Councilmember Gauthier formally opposed it, writing this statement explaining that even though the development was a good idea and would add badly needed affordable apartments to the neighborhood, she had to oppose it because enough people were complaining. Here, there are way more people in support of the 48th Street redesign, so even if it was a bad plan (it’s not!) she should support it. Democracy?!
The decision making is apparently more chaotic than “go with what most people want even if their opinion on this technical issue is based on vibes only.” It’s more like “we cannot have a single person be upset.” Some selections from the emails about opposition to this project follow -
Have they actually ever done polling on this? Or do they just conclude parking is untouchable because a small group go nuts in a very loud way?
i am just a mom who doesn’t want her family to die crossing the street but if there was a dark money pac involved i would 100% accept their money lol
what if she looked both ways and just crossed the bike lane…
they want the street to be quieter but making it quieter by having more people safely bike is not the way, ok
And here’s the full set of 800+ pages: