San Francisco Car Violence
San Francisco
Car Violence

In 2014, San Francisco instituted a Vision Zero program committing the city to zero traffic related fatalities by 2024. Since San Francisco's Vision Zero program went into effect 10 years ago, 313 people have been killed by traffic violence on its streets and 2,473 have been seriously injured by impatient and distracted drivers. According to data from the San Francisco Department of Public Health, a driver crashes their car AND injures someone in San Francisco approximately every 2.70 hours. That is more than seven times per day, every single day and yet the majority of San Francisco's elected officials refuse to take this public health crisis seriously or even acknowledge when a pedestrian is killed in their district. As San Francisco continues to lose approximately 30 people to traffic violence annually, it is clear that after 10 years its Vision Zero program has failed, despite the city pouring millions of dollars into it.

This project tracks every motor vehicle crash on San Francisco's streets, attempts to identify the victims, analyzes the circumstances surrounding each crash and will soon provide data-backed guidance that will help San Francisco and the SFMTA achieve Vision Zero if they choose to embrace it. We are also actively researching the political response to every fatality on our streets (or lack thereof), promises made to improve safety at a crash site and what each politician has actually done. The goal of this project is to inform you, the voters of San Francisco, of the ongoing violence on our streets, help our elected officials address it and hold them accountable for delays and inaction. San Francisco can achieve Vision Zero but that will only happen if we work together and demand that our elected officials take immediate and aggressive action to slow our streets and prioritize the safety of our most vulnerable road users over the expediency of cars.

Traffic Fatalities Citywide

Since San Francisco adopted its Vision Zero program in 2014, 313 people have been killed by traffic violence on its streets. That equates to a traffic related fatality every 12.20 days. The most recent fatality was on June 17th which was 1 Month Ago. San Francisco was due to experience its next traffic related fatality on June 29th which was 28 days ago. As of today, July 27th, there have been 18 traffic related fatalities so far this year. San Francisco currently averages about 30 fatalities per year and the second chart shows the city's current running average which is calculated by dividing the number of days since the beginning of the year for each fatality by the number of fatalites recorded by that date, divided by 365. As times passes without a fatality, the running average will decrease and conversely rise when someone is killed.

Fatalities Over Time
Fatalities This Year
Traffic Injuries By District

The following two charts breakdown injuries by supervisor district. Fatality data was sourced from here and here. Crash data is released by the San Francisco Department of Public Health on a quarterly basis. 2024 Q2 data (April - June) is expected to be released in August and will be included here as soon as it's available.

Fatalities By District (2014 - PRESENT)
Injuries By District Over Time (2014 - Q1 2024)
Injuries By Elected Office

We believe that safe streets and healthy cities are political decisions. To achieve Vision Zero, we must track and hold our elected officials accountable to everything they say, do and don't do. The following breaks out injuries within each supervisor district and across the city since each elected official has taken office. The first step to achieving Vision Zero is to publicly acknowledge every fatality on our streets. The second is to take immediate action. With few exceptions, the majority of San Francisco's supervisors have failed to publicly acknowledge when someone was killed in their district which is simply unacceptable. Our next step is to research the political response to every fatality since 2014, SFMTA's "rapid response" at the crash site and what, if anything, has changed to make the crash site safer. This work will require a significant amount of time to "sunshine" the city by submitting FOIA requests for public records before we can analyze and socialize that data. If you value that research as much as we do, please support our work.

Dean Preston
Supervisior – District 5
12/16/2019 – 2025
Total Injuries
1,742
Injury Every
1.06 days
1,117
Mild
453
Moderate
152
Severe
20
Fatal
London Breed
Mayor – San Francisco
07/11/2018 – 2025
Total Injuries
21,060
Injury Every
2.70 hours
13,721
Mild
5,411
Moderate
1,735
Severe
193
Fatal
Connie Chan
Supervisior – District 1
01/08/2021 – 2025
Total Injuries
679
Injury Every
2.15 days
453
Mild
171
Moderate
51
Severe
4
Fatal
Catherine Stefani
Supervisior – District 2
01/30/2018 – 2027
Total Injuries
1,666
Injury Every
1.96 days
1,041
Mild
461
Moderate
150
Severe
14
Fatal
Aaron Peskin
Supervisior – District 3
06/09/2015 – 2025
Total Injuries
3,306
Injury Every
1.06 days
2,014
Mild
937
Moderate
328
Severe
27
Fatal
Myrna Melgar
Supervisior – District 7
01/08/2021 – 2025
Total Injuries
701
Injury Every
2.08 days
446
Mild
189
Moderate
54
Severe
12
Fatal
Rafael Mandelman
Supervisior – District 8
07/11/2018 – 2027
Total Injuries
1,453
Injury Every
2.14 days
895
Mild
413
Moderate
137
Severe
8
Fatal
Hillary Ronen
Supervisior – District 9
01/08/2017 – 2025
Total Injuries
3,450
Injury Every
20.33 hours
2,292
Mild
879
Moderate
247
Severe
32
Fatal
Shamann Walton
Supervisior – District 10
01/08/2019 – 2027
Total Injuries
2,135
Injury Every
1.37 days
1,494
Mild
435
Moderate
181
Severe
25
Fatal
Ahsha Safaí
Supervisior – District 11
01/08/2017 – 2025
Total Injuries
1,968
Injury Every
1.48 days
1,393
Mild
425
Moderate
138
Severe
12
Fatal
Matt Dorsey
Supervisior – District 6
05/09/2022 – 2027
Total Injuries
1,199
Injury Every
1.42 days
759
Mild
320
Moderate
109
Severe
11
Fatal
Joel Engardio
Supervisior – District 4
01/08/2023 – 2027
Total Injuries
192
Injury Every
7.61 days
122
Mild
63
Moderate
6
Severe
1
Fatal
Demographics

Gender

Male
Female
Unknown

Age

Under 18
18-40
40-65
Over 65
Transit Mode & Time of Day

Transit Mode

Pedestrians
Bicyclists
Scooterists
Motorcyclists
Vehicle Passengers

Time of Day

12AM-6AM
6AM-12PM
12PM-6PM
6pm-12AM
Sources

This project took over two months to research, design and assemble. The following resources guided our research and we thank the authors for their work.