At a May 19 meeting, Denton City Council adopted the Vision Zero plan, a strategy that aims to cut the number of traffic deaths by 50% by 2035 and eliminate traffic deaths and serious injuries entirely by 2050.
The details
The plan includes several countermeasures that could be implemented along the city’s most accident-prone roadways. Some of those measures include adding sidewalks, raised medians, pedestrian bridges and mid-block crosswalks, according to a presentation from Farhan Butt, Denton’s deputy transportation services director.
City staff identified six roadways with a high frequency of traffic deaths and injuries to make safety improvements for, Butt said. The roadways include:
- West University Drive from North Bonnie Brae Street to Old North Road
- North Carroll Boulevard from US 380 to West Highland Street
- East Sherman Drive from North Bell Avenue to East Windsor Drive
- Dallas Drive from Johnson Street to Rio Grande Boulevard
- Malone Street from US 380 to Panhandle Street
- East McKinney Street from Audra Lane to Loop 288
“These are the pain points; these are the critical corridors where we have to make interventions,” Butt said.
Some background
City officials started developing Vision Zero in 2022. The plan’s development came from a traffic study and community survey, where residents could highlight areas of the city where they felt traffic was unsafe.
City staff conducted a traffic study and identified what they call a high-injury network, a series of roadways where about two-thirds of all traffic deaths and serious injuries take place within Denton city limits.
“It provides us [with] the road segments with a high density of fatalities and serious injuries,” Butt said.
Butt said identifying the high-injury network is a prerequisite for applying for grants from other government agencies.
Looking ahead
Butt said the plan’s approval will create more opportunities for the city to obtain grant money from other government agencies, such as the U.S. Department of Transportation, to implement the safety improvements.
At the May 19 meeting, council also submitted a grant application to DOT requesting $9.6 million to implement safety improvements on Hickory Street and Eagle Drive, as well as for improvements on the high-injury network roadways.
