City of Lancaster, PA

About Vision Zero

Vision Zero is making Lancaster City streets safer for everyone in our community, including pedestrians, cyclists, and motorists!

What is Vision Zero?

The City of Lancaster has joined cities across the world in the Vision Zero movement to eliminate traffic-related deaths and serious injuries. To achieve this ambitious goal in Lancaster, we developed a Vision Zero Action Plan with our community and partners to make our streets safe for all people in Lancaster. Now, we’re working to implement that plan!

A New Way of Thinking

At the center of Vision Zero is the recognition that humans make mistakes and streets should be designed to minimize the impacts of those mistakes. This is a fundamental change from the traditional traffic safety approach.

How is the Vision Zero approach different?

Vision Zero Action Plan

The Vision Zero Action Plan was adopted by City Council on November 24, 2020. The Action Plan provides a summary of the goals of the plan, citywide crash data, the public input process and a set of comprehensive recommendations to move Lancaster towards its vision of zero fatalities and serious injuries on its streets by 2030.

Vision Zero Action Plan (PDF)

Goals of the Lancaster Vision Zero Action Plan

Equity

Committing to equity in Vision Zero acknowledges that streets belong to everyone and that changes to our streets and sidewalks must be made safe for all people. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case today. Lancaster’s crash data tells us that there are more frequent crashes and more serious crashes in low-income communities, in communities of color, and/or in communities with low car ownership. The most vulnerable road users – people walking, biking and riding motorcycles – are also more likely to be involved in serious and fatal crashes than people driving cars.

Key Actions: Direct more resources to the areas of the city experiencing disproportionate impacts from crashes and improve safety for the most vulnerable road users.

Culture Change

Safety-focused street improvements and slower speeds will contribute to safer streets. However, the dominant culture around travel also needs to be examined so that people understand the role they have in the safety of other road users. Street design cannot force someone to eliminate distractions while driving, buckle their seatbelt, or choose not to drive under the influence.

Key Actions: Leverage partnerships with like-minded organizations and the strong community bond within the city to shift thoughts and actions regarding traffic safety.

Safety and Slow Speeds

Designing streets to operate more safely and at a slower vehicle speeds is critical to achieving Vision Zero. Street designs that result in slower travel speeds, slower turning speeds, better visibility, and more logical operations will passively encourage people to be ‘good actors’ on the street. This minimizes the likelihood of a crash happening, the impact of crashes that do happen, and the need for active enforcement activities.

Key Actions: Although many streets would benefit from traffic calming and slower speeds, Lancaster will focus on its most dangerous streets and intersections first.

Data

Building from the findings of the analysis conducted for the Vision Zero Action Plan, Lancaster must continue to improve, collect, and analyze crash and speed data while evaluating the safety impacts of future projects. Improving data quality and transparency is essential to a greater understanding of the street designs, human behaviors, and other factors that lead to fatal and severe crashes. In addition, the City must continue to broaden data sources and quality. Crash reports don’t often tell the whole story and the City must use other data, such as hospital records, survey data, and demographic data, to broaden understanding of the street environment.

Key Actions: This plan outlines methods for continued analysis, improved data quality, and data-driven project prioritization.