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Council adopts Vision Zero annual update and adds enforcement-focused amendment to protect pedestrians
Summary
The council received the city’s annual Vision Zero/Comprehensive Safety Action Plan report and approved an amendment to add a pedestrian- and enforcement-focused strategy after staff showed a decline in most crash categories but an increase in vulnerable-road-user incidents.
The Midland City Council approved the city’s annual Vision Zero — Comprehensive Safety Action Plan (CSAP) update on July 22 and voted to add an amendment focused on enforcement and safety for vulnerable road users (pedestrians and bicyclists).
Staff presentations showed the CSAP baseline was set using 2022 crash data and that a one-year comparison to 2024 indicates an overall reduction in serious injuries and fatalities across the city’s high-injury network. Planning and engineering staff and police credited an array of interventions, including signal upgrades, reflective backplates at intersections, new bike-lane installations and targeted enforcement programs.
However, staff noted an increase in crashes involving pedestrians and bicyclists between the baseline and 2024. Because that vulnerable-road-user metric rose, staff recommended adding a focused strategy to the CSAP to “create and implement policies and procedures to enhance enforcement and promote safety” for pedestrians and bicyclists. Council approved the amendment unanimously.
Staff described implementation work already under way: improved signal and pedestrian infrastructure at key intersections, new traffic detection systems capable of real-time counts, added pressure to pursue multimodal improvements in high-crash corridors, and a range of police community-enforcement efforts. Staff also said the Vision Zero effort and CSAP helped the city secure grant funding (staff noted a federal grant of approximately $8.6 million to support safety projects) and made the city eligible for additional state/MPO funding.
Council action and next steps: Council adopted the CSAP annual implementation report and approved the enforcement-and-vulnerable-user amendment. Engineering staff said next steps include further intersection safety work, expanded traffic-count hardware and the continuation of enforcement programs coordinated with police. Staff said they will return with project-specific timelines and funding requests as grant and local matching funds are identified.
