Title
Consider Directing Staff to Develop an Ordinance Setting Fines for Injury-Collisions Involving Non-Commercial Vehicles that Do Not Meet Federal Design Standards or Have Been Lifted/Altered in a Manner that Increases the Likelihood of Severe Injury or Death in Collisions with Pedestrians and Bicyclists. (Councilmember Knox White) [Not heard on May 3 or 17, 2022]
Body
COUNCIL REFERRAL FORM
The Council can take any of the following actions:
1) Take no action.
2) Refer the matter to staff to schedule as a future City Council agenda item. Concurrence that staff time will be devoted to the item does not signify approval.
3) Take dispositive action only on time sensitive legislative matters if sufficiently noticed such that the public and Council have been provided sufficient information by the published agenda, and no formal published notice of a public hearing is required.
Name of Councilmember requesting referral: John Knox White
Date of submission to City Clerk (must be submitted before 5:00 p.m. on the Monday two weeks before the Council meeting requested): 4/18/2022
Council Meeting date: May 3, 2022
Brief description of the subject to be printed on the agenda, sufficient to inform the City Council and public of the nature of the referral:
Provide direction to staff to develop an ordinance for Council adoption that sets administrative fines of up to $1,000 in injury-collisions involving non-commercial vehicles that do not meet federal design standards for automobiles, have been lifted or altered in a manner that increases the likelihood of severe injury or death in collisions with people walking and biking in Alameda.
The City Council, at its July 25, 2020 Priority Setting Workshop, established the following 5 priorities for 2021:
1. Preparing Alameda for the future
2. Encouraging economic development across the Island
3. Supporting enhanced livability and quality of life, including addressing the housing crisis and homelessness
4. Protecting core services
5. Ensuring effective and efficient operations
Briefly describe which Council priority the subject falls under and how it relates:
Alameda, like the rest of the US, has experienced an increase in fatalities on our city streets and vehicle design is quickly becoming recognized as a significant contributing factor. As consumers shift their selection to SUVs and Pick-up trucks, the vehicle manufactures are changing the designs of these vehicles to become more and more dangerous to people on city streets.
These designs both limit visibility for the most vulnerable road users, children and seniors who walk and bike, but also increase the likelihood of serious injury and fatality when a collision occurs.
This phenomenon has been widely acknowledged and covered as it is here in The Atlantic Magazine at the end of last year.
<https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/12/suvs-trucks-killing-pedestrians-cyclists/621102/>
Additional links:
• Fix the Crash Test, Dummies - Bloomberg <https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-18/fix-the-crash-test-dummies> 
• The Hidden Danger of BIG Trucks - Consumer Reports <https://www.consumerreports.org/car-safety/the-hidden-dangers-of-big-trucks/>
Large pickups and sport utility vehicles, designed for off-road, rural environments have long been more likely to kill people when people driving hit people who walk and bike with them. One study <https://www.monash.edu/__data/assets/pdf_file/0016/1045222/Pedestrian-crash-risk-and-injury-outcomes-relationship-with-vehicle-design.pdf> of vehicle type and crash-fatality risk found that a large pick-up that is not designed for urban driving is three-times as likely to kill a pedestrian that a passenger vehicle that is designed for city streets.
Unfortunately, national regulatory agencies, at the behest of international corporations that manufacture vehicles, have refused to take action, despite the clear call for them to do so by transportation professionals, including NACTO and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. As such, cities and states are left trying to navigate an environment that allows for unsafe vehicles to be operated in the same spaces as school children, shoppers, commuters, seniors and people with disabilities who are walking, rolling or on bicycle.
A 2018 Special Report from the National Transportation Safety Board found <https://www.ntsb.gov/safety/safety-studies/Documents/SIR1803.pdf>:
As a City, Alameda cannot determine the consumer’s vehicle of choice when they purchase a new mode of transportation, but we can ensure that there are consequences for purchasing vehicles that are ill-equipped for safe operations on our local streets. As such, this referral would put in place an administrative fine for driving a vehicle that is designed to increase harm to our residents, workers and visitors and causing harm with that vehicle.
A final ordinance will provide a simple way to avoid any penalty by allowing people who drive less safe vehicles to take responsibility for their choice of vehicle by ensuring that they operate in a manner that doesn’t cause harm and injury in our community. It will also set clear criteria for assessing a set fine based on objective standards including bumper height exemptions, Front-end heights, etc.
Licensed commercial vehicles, including public transit, will be exempt in order to allow businesses and transit agencies to provide needed access and mobility for passengers, business needs, construction, etc.