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 9 years ago, 272 people have been killed by traffic violence on its streets and 2,108 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 3.74 hours. That is eight 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 8 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, 272 people have been killed by traffic violence on its streets. That equates to a traffic related fatality every 12.23 days. The most recent fatality was on February 10th  which was a month ago. San Francisco was due to experience its next traffic related fatality on February 22nd which was 30 days ago. As of today, March 24th, there have been 6 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. Q4 data (October - December) is expected to be released in March 2023 and will be included here as soon as it's available.

Fatalities By District (2014 - PRESENT)
Injuries By District Over Time (2014 - 2022 Q3)
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.

London Breed
Mayor – San Francisco
07/11/2018 – 2025
Total Injuries
15,220
Injury Every
3.74 hours
9,834
Mild
3,935
Moderate
1,302
Severe
149
Fatal
Connie Chan
Supervisior – District 1
01/08/2021 – 2025
Total Injuries
384
Injury Every
3.80 days
240
Mild
104
Moderate
37
Severe
3
Fatal
Matt Dorsey
Supervisior – District 6
05/09/2022 – 2023
Total Injuries
248
Injury Every
23.62 hours
151
Mild
67
Moderate
26
Severe
4
Fatal
Joel Engardio
Supervisior – District 4
01/08/2023 – 2027

crash data is not yet available

0
Mild
0
Moderate
0
Severe
0
Fatal
Rafael Mandelman
Supervisior – District 8
07/11/2018 – 2027
Total Injuries
1,061
Injury Every
2.92 days
646
Mild
305
Moderate
103
Severe
7
Fatal
Myrna Melgar
Supervisior – District 7
01/08/2021 – 2025
Total Injuries
308
Injury Every
4.74 days
182
Mild
92
Moderate
30
Severe
4
Fatal
Aaron Peskin
Supervisior – District 3
06/09/2015 – 2025
Total Injuries
2,782
Injury Every
1.26 days
1,680
Mild
787
Moderate
291
Severe
24
Fatal
Dean Preston
Supervisior – District 5
12/16/2019 – 2025
Total Injuries
966
Injury Every
1.92 days
605
Mild
271
Moderate
74
Severe
16
Fatal
Hillary Ronen
Supervisior – District 9
01/08/2017 – 2025
Total Injuries
2,733
Injury Every
1.07 days
1,839
Mild
693
Moderate
178
Severe
23
Fatal
Ahsha Safaí
Supervisior – District 11
01/08/2017 – 2025
Total Injuries
1,514
Injury Every
1.93 days
1,053
Mild
331
Moderate
120
Severe
10
Fatal
Catherine Stefani
Supervisior – District 2
01/30/2018 – 2027
Total Injuries
1,229
Injury Every
2.66 days
761
Mild
341
Moderate
116
Severe
11
Fatal
Shamann Walton
Supervisior – District 10
01/08/2019 – 2027
Total Injuries
1,463
Injury Every
2.00 days
1,007
Mild
288
Moderate
148
Severe
20
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.