Streetsblog Capitol Hill

The impaired hit-and-run driver who struck and killed her son on a metro Atlanta road in 2010 has been released from prison by now, but Raquel Nelson is still being prosecuted for her purported role in the tragedy.

The Georgia Court of Appeals upheld the homicide conviction of Raquel Nelson, whose four-year-old son was killed by an impaired driver in 2010. Photo: MyFox8

The single mother of three was injured trying to prevent the collision that killed four-year-old A.J. Newman. That didn’t stop an all white jury from convicting the African-American woman of vehicular homicide last year. Prosecutors brought charges on the grounds that Nelson and her children were not in a crosswalk, though the suburban arterial that separated her apartment complex from a bus stop had no crossing nearby.

Nelson faced three years, while driver Jerry Guy, who has glaucoma and admitted to drinking and taking pain killers before the crash, was sentenced to just six months. After the trial attracted national media attention, a Cobb County judge offered Nelson a reduced sentence of one-year probation or a retrial.

Wanting to clear her name, Nelson chose a retrial. She has since teamed up with high-profile Atlanta defense lawyer Steve Sadow, who took on the case pro bono. Sadow asked an appellate court to throw out the conviction for lack of evidence. But late last month the Georgia Court of Appeals upheld the decision, according to legal website Law.com. “[We] conclude that the evidence presented at trial was sufficient to support the jury’s guilty verdict,” wrote Judges Charles B. Mikell, M. Yvette Miller and William M. Ray II.

The court cited a state law which “says that any person who causes the death of another, without an intention to do so, by violating traffic laws commits the offense of homicide by vehicle in the second degree,” according to Law.com. Sadow argued that the driver of the vehicle, not Nelson, caused A.J.’s death.

“While we have the greatest sympathy for [Nelson's] plight, this court must interpret the law and apply it with an even hand; the appellate process affords us no latitude to make adjustments for the ill-earned good fortune of the lucky, or as in this case, the heart-rending misfortune of the unlucky,” the judges said.

Cobb County Solicitor General Barry Morgan has said he will continue to prosecute Nelson. In a brief filed with the Court of Appeals, Morgan wrote: ”When a pedestrian chooses to cross a divided highway … outside the protection of a crosswalk, she risks her own safety [as] well as the safety of those with her.”

According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the case will likely end up before the Georgia Supreme Court.

Yesterday, the city of Chicago rolled out a sweeping new plan for pedestrian safety [PDF]. With some 250 recommendations — including traffic-calming measures like pedestrian islands, chicanes and midblock curb bumpouts — Chicago joins cities like New York and Portland in formalizing a plan to meet targets for reducing pedestrian injuries and deaths.

Chicago is getting serious about pedestrian safety. Photo: CDOT

Chicago Department of Transportation Director Gabe Klein aims to bring the total number of pedestrian fatalities down to zero in 10 years time. Currently about 50 pedestrians are killed annually on Chicago streets.

“We want pedestrian safety to be at the forefront of everything we do,” Klein told the Chicago Tribune. “Everyone in the city is a pedestrian.”

The plan was developed after a series of public meetings. It calls for identifying and repairing two high-collision corridors and four dangerous intersections annually, basing the interventions on crash data. Chicago also aims to improve driver education, conduct police crackdowns on dangerous drivers, and implement tougher safety mandates for taxis.

A wide variety of street infrastructure treatments are listed in Chicago’s toolkit, including road diets, roundabouts, speed humps and pedestrian scrambles — a signal phase for pedestrians only. Even nagging headaches like snow removal lapses and sidewalk closures for construction — treated as a fact of life in most places — are addressed.

Better connectivity for walking trips is another goal. CDOT recommends filling in gaps in the pedestrian network, improving walking routes to transit, and enhancing pedestrian wayfinding systems.

Each recommendation contains a timeframe for implementation, and the plan calls for CDOT to evaluate its progress at regular intervals.

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The NHTSA wags its finger at distracted (and drunk) pedestrians but doesn't look too deeply into deadly driver behavior. Photo: Flickr / Alejandro Monsalve

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reported last December that while overall traffic fatalities in the United States dropped in 2010, pedestrian deaths rose higher – up four percent in 2010 over 2009. Yesterday, the agency released some more detailed statistics about those crashes [PDF], but the report includes scarcely any data or analysis about the underlying causes of pedestrian deaths.

The report provides a set of tables about the prevalence of pedestrian fatalities under certain conditions — different times of day, different types of weather — but the only causal factor the NHTSA discusses is drunkenness. And remarkably, the agency implies that drunk walking, which is perfectly legal, is a bigger risk factor in pedestrian deaths than drunk driving:

Of the pedestrians involved, 33 percent had a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 grams per deciliter (g/dL) or higher. Of the drivers involved in these fatal crashes, only 14 percent had a BAC of .08 g/dL or higher, less than two-fifths the rate for the pedestrians.

In the agency’s consumer advisory, released along with the new numbers, the NHTSA warns both pedestrians and drivers to avoid travel while under the influence of drugs and alcohol.

And in keeping with recent national coverage about the hazards of “distracted walking,” the advisory only mentions distraction by electronic devices in the pedestrian section, despite the fact that ending distracted driving is the signature cause of the current transportation secretary.

Certainly, it’s everyone’s responsibility to be safe, no matter what mode they take. But the stakes for pedestrians wouldn’t be so high if people weren’t driving around at high speeds in heavy cars on roads designed with little regard for the different ways people get around.

In fact, speed is the key factor — not just in pedestrian injuries and fatalities — but in discouraging walking. “The majority of crashes [resulting in] fatalities and serious injuries are related to high speed streets,” said Scott Bricker, director of America Walks. “In the National Walking Survey that America Walks did in partnership with Hunter College [PDF], we found that distracted driving and the speed of automobile driving were the two top concerns of people walking, and are what limits their walking.”

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Rep. James Lankford, a Tea Party Republican representing Oklahoma City, probably wasn’t responsible for any of the 118 pedestrian deaths in his district between 2001 to 2010. And it’s unlikely Rep. Steve Southerland of Panama City, Florida was behind the wheel when any of the 164 people were killed while walking in his district during the decade.

From 2001 to 2010, 118 people were killed while walking in Rep. James Lankford's district -- a death toll he can reduce with one vote. Photo: U.S. Congress

But they are two of eight freshmen on the transportation conference committee, and their vote over the next few days could mean that those appalling numbers go up — or down.

To remind members of what’s at stake with this transportation bill, Transportation for America has released an addendum to its groundbreaking “Dangerous by Design” report, this time quantifying the death toll by Congressional district. Everyone who cares about safe streets can now be very specific when asking their representatives to support a transportation bill with the Cardin-Cochran amendment to keep at least some bike-ped funding control at the local level.

“Having saddled communities with unsafe streets, it would be the height of cruelty for Congress now to take away resources and latitude from local communities trying to improve those conditions and save lives,” said James Corless, director of Transportation for America, in a statement.

Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett has taken a different position than his representative, James Lankford. Cornett is a vocal supporter of local control over funding for bicycle and pedestrian projects. He co-authored an op-ed recently asking Congress to restore Safe Routes to School and Transportation Enhancements funding. “Many of the more dangerous roads for motorists, pedestrians and bicyclists alike in our communities are federal-aid highways,” he wrote. “House leaders have said fixing these unsafe conditions is a local problem, or a frill we can do without. We strongly disagree, and we urge them to restore dedicated funds for this purpose.”

Last January, a retired minister was killed while crossing the street after attending a college basketball game in Bethany, Oklahoma. He was one of Rep. Lankford’s constituents.

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Image: Operation Lifesaver

The Federal Railroad Administration doesn’t call people walking near railroad tracks “pedestrians.” It calls them “trespassers.”

True, a person walking on railroad tracks is often, by definition, breaking the law, since the tracks are private property. But the nomenclature gives the impression that the agency might be somewhat less sympathetic than they should be about the 427 people who lost their lives last year walking on or near railroad tracks. And last year was a good year – the FRA estimates the average to be about 500 deaths annually [PDF].

The FRA just issued Guidance on Pedestrian Crossing Safety At or Near Passenger Stations [PDF]. This document deals with “pedestrians,” not  “trespassers,” because it deals only with officially sanctioned crossings, and only those at or near stations. “It’s a guide to best practices in crossing engineering, warning devices, markings, signage, that kind of thing,” FRA spokesperson Rob Kulat told me.

The document was released in compliance with the Rail Safety Improvement Act of 2008, which mandated that such guidance be issued within a year of enactment.

OK, so it’s two and a half years late. It’s still a useful resource for the municipalities and states that want to build or improve rail crossings at or near stations – after all, according to Kulat, the FRA isn’t the one responsible for these crossings.

What the document doesn’t do is give guidance about when and where crossings should be added to prevent injury and increase mobility. In a 2008 fact sheet [PDF], the agency explicitly says, “The FRA’s focus is on preventing rail trespassing, not enabling it by making the behavior safe.” The safety document released this month features a wide range of recommendations for enabling safe crossings, but only where they’re currently sanctioned. The people who cross the tracks to get to school or their aunt’s house or the post office are still just trespassers whose injuries are their own fault.

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On our walk down the memory lane of 2011 so far, we’ve talked about some downers, some inspirations, some triumphs, and some struggles. Check out our first two installments of year-end Streetsie award nostalgia. Here’s some more.

Best Obama Plan That Died a Slow and Horrible Death This Year: How to choose, when there were so many? The president laid out a big, bold, ambitious transportation plan for the next six years but then stayed mum on the all-important question of how to fund it, and so, predictably, it died. His American Jobs Act included $50 billion for infrastructure projects, including at least $13 billion for rail and transit. It, too, went nowhere fast.

Obama's high-speed rail plans took a fast train to nowhere. Photo: America 2050

That wasn’t Obama’s fault, but if you’re looking for a reason to be angry at him, look no further than the ozone pollution rules the EPA was going to strengthen. The president froze at the last minute and decided to hold off another couple years, to give the economy a chance to recover (or business interests a chance to vote for him). The new ozone standard would have saved an estimated 12,000 lives and made transportation reforms essential.

But who could blame the 47 percent of you who awarded the Streetsie for saddest death of an Obama program to high-speed rail? Congress takes every opportunity to yank money away from the program, three Republican governors have very publicly thumbed their noses at federal funds, and the only true high-speed rail line with the potential to be truly transformative is in deep doo-doo in California. So much for 80 percent access in 25 years.

Non-Presidential Vices: Yes, we had our share of letdowns from President Obama this year. But not all our disappointments were related to him. We were also bummed to see plans scrapped for the Woodward Light Rail line in Detroit, and the failure of the Seattle car tab fee, which would have gone to transit, bike/ped and road maintenance. And certainly we were disappointed that the Senate transportation bill, in the end, didn’t keep dedicated funding for bike/ped. But the Streetsie for the biggest letdown has to go to the bait-and-switch the House Republicans pulled about funding their transportation plan.

It was simple enough when they were threatening to cut spending by a third so as not to overspend Highway Trust Fund receipts. Just about everyone hated the idea. But then the GOP said they’d match current levels and it seemed the best of both worlds – reasonable spending levels and a longer-term bill than the Senate was offering.

Hallelujah! So what’s the catch?

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Leave it to the Brits to create an incredible tool for examining America’s own crisis of traffic fatalities. Behold this somber map, made by ITO World, a UK-based transportation information firm. Each dot on the map is a traffic-related death. The entire eastern United States is blanketed with them.

The purple dots represent vehicle occupants – not necessarily drivers – who were killed. It may look like a lot of purple, and it certainly is, but when you zoom in closer you see a lot of blue dots, for pedestrians, as well as an awful lot of yellow dots, for motorcyclists. The green dots for bicyclists are fewer and farther between, but if you zoom into the cities, you’ll find them. Each dot even lists the year of the crash and the victim’s age and gender.

ITO World got their fatality data from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. It appears they’ve captured not just fatalities on highways but on local streets as well.

The World Health Organization reports 12.3 annual traffic deaths per 100,000 inhabitants in the United States. Compare that with 3.85 in Japan and 4.5 in Germany. If the U.S. achieved similar rates, more than 20,000 deaths would be prevented each year.

This map is a useful way of visualizing the terrible consequences of our auto-addicted culture. Beyond that, it can be an indispensable tool for community transportation advocates to show local officials where problem spots are and how their community compares to others.

Bike/ped funding is pitching a perfect game in the Senate after Republicans swung (and missed) at the popular Transportation Enhancements program for the third time in two months. The final strike came this morning, when Kentucky Republican Rand Paul’s amendment to divert all TE funds to bridge repair failed spectacularly, garnering only 38 votes in favor, with 60 senators voting against.

Sen. Paul's amendment to divert bike/ped funds to bridge repair failed this morning. Photo: Run Rand Run

Paul continually asserted that the Transportation Enhancements program funds “beautification projects – such as movie theaters, squirrel sanctuaries, turtle tunnels and flower beds,” despite the fact that the program largely funds life-saving and pollution-reducing projects facilitating bicycle use and walking.

Paul had tried to present bike/ped programs and bridge safety as mutually exclusive by trying to shift money from the TE program to bridge repair. Transportation reformers (and mainstream reporters) cut right through that, showing that the money needed to fund bridge repair far outstrips what’s available in the modest TE program — and making the case that increased cycling (and decreased driving) does more to help keep bridges in good shape than this misguided amendment could ever do.

Plus, as Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) said on the Senate floor, Paul’s amendment could actually prevent some bridges from being fixed.

“The amendment prevents a bridge from being fixed if it is a historic bridge,” said Boxer. “There are thousands of those in this country, including the Brooklyn Bridge.” She also spoke in favor of keeping critical safety funds for bicycling.

Sen. Paul remarked after the vote that he was “disappointed” that his colleagues “failed to see” crumbling bridges, including two major ones in his home state of Kentucky, as a priority. But supporters of biking and walking infrastructure — as well as people who just care about smart funding decisions in Washington — are relieved that senators didn’t fall for the false choice Paul put before them.

Transportation for America will have a vote count online soon, so you can see how your senator voted.

The first shocking thing about Raquel Nelson’s conviction for vehicular homicide was simply that it happened at all. After all, the mother of three wasn’t even driving a car — she was crossing a wide street with poor pedestrian infrastructure when her four-year-old son was killed by a hit-and-run driver.

Image: The Today Show

The second shocking thing about the case was that it captured so much media attention. Sure, Streetsblog was going to cover it. But the Today Show? Fox News?

As encouraging as it was to see so much mainstream broadcast media focused on Nelson’s case — and all in a sympathetic light — little of that coverage got to the root of the problem: dangerous street design in auto-centric communities.

So we’re glad to see the Washington Post remedying that situation by printing an op-ed by David Goldberg, communications director at Transportation for America. In his piece yesterday, Goldberg said:

Nelson was found guilty of killing her son by crossing the road in the “wrong” place. But what about the highway designers, traffic engineers, transit planners and land-use regulators who placed a bus stop across from apartments but made no provision whatsoever for a safe crossing? Those who ignored the fact that pedestrians always take the shortest possible route but somehow expected them to walk six-tenths of a mile out of their way to cross the street? Those who designed this road — which they allowed to be flanked by apartments and houses — for speeds of 50 mph and more? And those who designed the entire landscape to be hostile to people trying to get to work or carrying groceries despite having no access to a car? Are they not culpable?

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UPDATE 7/27: Raquel Nelson has, in fact, chosen the option of a new trial.

The last thing the jury heard from Raquel Nelson’s defense lawyer, before they convicted her, was the tape of her frantic 911 call after her son, A.J., was hit by a car. “1-2-3-4-5-6, doing chest compressions on her son, screaming,” recalls attorney David Savoy. “There was not a dry eye in that court room.”

The jury then decided to convict her of vehicular homicide, jaywalking, and reckless conduct.

A.J. Nelson, age 4, was killed while crossing the street between a bus stop and his home with his mother and two sisters.

The jury, as has often been noted, was all white and not transit-dependent. Indeed, Savoy said, the entire pool of 15 jurors they had to choose from was white. And Cobb County jurors are selected for service based on drivers license information.

While certainly many car-free people have drivers licenses – Raquel Nelson included – it’s a symbol, at least, of the auto-centrism of the entire process that convicted Ms. Nelson.

At sentencing, Judge Kathryn Tanksley handed down a relatively light sentence – involving no jail time, at least – but also granted a motion for a new trial before the defense even made a motion asking for a new trial. “We had motion for a new trial ready to file,” Savoy said. “I didn’t even need to pull it out of my briefcase.”

“It’s one of the most shocking things I’ve ever been involved with,” Savoy said. “A judge, on her own motion, granting a new trial.”

He wouldn’t speculate as to why the judge was moved to do so. But he did mention that the jury had made its decision based on the evidence that the judge allowed, indicating that there was other defense evidence that the judge did not allow. Perhaps she regretted that decision, disagreed with the jury’s harsh verdict, and thought a new trial would wipe the slate clean.

Despite the trauma that the case has caused Nelson and her family, Savoy is “pretty certain” she’ll take the option of a new trial. “Three misdemeanors, for crossing the street,” Savoy said. “That doesn’t sit right with her, or with me.”

Given the avalanche of negative attention the case has brought upon the Cobb County court system, the county may decide not to re-try the case at all. Indeed, although judges are supposed to be immune to public opinion, Judge Tanksley must have been aware of the packed courtroom, full of reporters, that greeted her on the day of sentencing. Even if she hadn’t watched the broadcast coverage, seen the petitions, or read the blogs about the case, she must have known the case was attracting major national attention.

“I’ve never understood the power of the blogosphere,” Savoy told me, “and now, I’m humbled.”