The city of Carlsbad launched a pledge campaign Wednesday, asking the community to come together for traffic safety.
The goal of the “Safer Streets Together” pledge campaign is to keep Carlsbad’s streets safer for drivers, bikers, and pedestrians.
The pledge comes after the city declared a local emergency last year, due to the increase in collisions involving bikes and e-bikes.
The city council approved $2 million in emergency funding last August — money left over from the previous year’s budget — to pay for police overtime, street projects and a public outreach campaign.
“Since we declared the emergency in August, you probably have seen an increase in police presence here around the schools. But that's not gonna do all of it," said city council member, Melanie Burkholder.
She says enforcement has helped, but engineering is also a part of the solution. "We've also made improvements to the roads, that's the engineering arm," she said.
The city has added new lanes to over 90 miles of roadways.
"Engineering and enforcement are great, but that's not going to fix the problem. We also need your help," Burkholder said.
The city is partnering with the San Diego County Bicycle Coalition and Circulate San Diego for outreach and education.
“We're always excited to work in Carlsbad. North County especially has seen an influx of new ways to get around. That includes e-scooters and e-bikes. All those things are good things, anything that gets people out of their cars and gets them to where they're going in a different way," said Kevin Baross with the San Diego County Bicycle Coalition.
Baross says any new mode of transportation or change to infrastructure requires education. "In the future, every street isn't going to be twice as wide as it is now to accommodate everybody," he said. "So we're going to have to find new ways to get around and to do that people are going to need to interact a little bit more, communicate more, and slow down a little bit.
The city will be partnering with the San Diego County Bicycle Coalition and Circulate San Diego for education workshops for the community. The first workshop will be held on February 9th.
The “Safer Streets Together” pledge can be taken on the city’s website.
