Pittsburgh outlines Vision Zero first-year results, ramps up automated enforcement and neighborhood toolkits

Pittsburgh city officials presented the Vision Zero annual memo to City Council on April 8, 2025, saying the city reduced traffic fatalities to 17 in 2024 and describing a package of enforcement, engineering and education actions aimed at eliminating deaths and serious injuries on city streets.

The presentation outlined an interdepartmental working group and four staff subcommittees—enforcement, budget, education and engagement, and a fatal-crash response team—and described immediate and planned steps such as automated red-light enforcement, a community traffic-calming toolkit, a community ambassador program tied to a federal Safe Streets for All grant, and expanded site visits after serious crashes.

Why it matters: City officials said traffic deaths and serious injuries are a public-safety priority, and that progress depends on combining roadway design, education and enforcement across agencies. The memo frames Vision Zero as a cross-departmental program and describes funding and staffing steps intended to move projects faster and at lower cost.

Angie Martinez, assistant director of the Department of Mobility and Infrastructure (DOMI), said the administration and council “committed to Vision Zero” by passing local legislation last March that created a formal working group. Martinez said the city averages about 20 traffic deaths per year and that “the only acceptable number is 0.” The working group brings director-level representatives from the mayor’s office, council, DOMI, public safety, the police, public works, the law department, innovation and performance, the office of management and budget, city planning, the Pittsburgh Parking Authority, Allegheny County, PennDOT, Pittsburgh Regional Transit and the Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission.

Enforcement: officials said a DOMI-led enforcement subcommittee has prioritized automated red-light enforcement. The council heard that legislation authorizing local automated red-light enforcement passed last fall and that the city is in an active procurement to select a vendor for a fixed-camera program this year. DOMI staff said locations have been identified in collaboration with PennDOT and other partners based on crash factors, but final locations will be set after a vendor completes required traffic studies and the 60–90 day public warning period before citations begin.

Education and neighborhood programs: the education-and-engagement subcommittee reported examples of school-focused outreach, including Vision Zero pledges distributed during Safe Routes to School activities and a pilot historian of “walk and roll” events. City staff said they have launched a community safety agreement and are planning a community ambassador program tied to the federal Safe Streets for All grant; that grant agreement must be executed before the city issues an RFP for projects in the grant. Council members and DOMI staff said they are drafting a Vision Zero budget request for 2026 that will cross departmental lines rather than rely on a single department’s budget.

Community traffic-calming toolkit: DOMI described an effort to create a menu of low-cost “quick-build” interventions that residents could apply to install—planters, temporary paint, cones and sandwich boards—pending technical specifications, liability terms and either grant funding or internal support for materials, storage and review. Staff said they have applied for a grant to fund the toolkit; if that application fails, they will seek other funding and refine an internal review process, including DPW and Law Department specifications to limit added hazards.

Fatal-crash response and examples: the fatal-crash response team meets after each fatal crash to perform a standardized site visit and data collection. Staff reported conducting six site visits in 2024 and four so far in 2025. DOMI showed two local examples where low-cost changes followed site visits: at Boulevard of the Allies and Marion Street, the city worked with PennDOT to add yellow hatching and increased signage to clarify an emergency-only left-turn lane after two fatalities; at Paulson and Rowan Street the city added curve-warning signage. Staff said no additional fatal crashes have occurred at those corrected sites since the work was completed.

A reactive example in which city staff removed a marked crosswalk and relocated a bus stop to a signalized intersection was discussed in the context of a head-on, alcohol-related fatal crash on a four-lane corridor that carries about 29,000 vehicles per day; staff said roadway factors did not appear to have caused that specific crash and that available low-cost countermeasures would not have been effective on such a high-volume corridor. The removal and relocation were described as a proactive measure intended to reduce exposure at a crossing with very low ridership and where a near-term, durable safety fix was not feasible without larger reconstruction.

Crossing guards and school-bus enforcement: Donna McManus, supervisor for the city crossing guards, told council that the city is hiring crossing guards, that applicants must live in the city, and that the department recently removed the requirement that guards hold a driver’s license and vehicle. McManus said the city has more crossing-guard slots than persons currently serving and that a new “neighborhood guard” option will allow hiring from local neighborhoods for unsatisfied vacancies. On school-bus enforcement, staff said Pittsburgh Public Schools has used stop-arm cameras; school system data cited during the meeting said roughly 9,000 citations were issued for passing school buses and that most disputed citations were upheld. Presenters said PennDOT or other processing agencies handle ticketing and that fines reported in the meeting were about $300 per validated citation.

State coordination and limits: presenters and council members repeatedly raised PennDOT and state-level constraints: DOMI staff said state-owned roads account for roughly 44–48% of city crashes in recent years, and that interventions on state routes face additional procedural requirements and higher costs. Automated speed-enforcement authority at the state level remains limited; staff said Philadelphia was authorized under prior state legislation but Pittsburgh is not currently permitted to deploy automated speed enforcement without further state authorization.

Budget and staffing: presenters said Vision Zero has improved cross-departmental budgeting and internal grant tracking (a shared SharePoint tracker), and that the administration used the initiative’s momentum to hire in-house staff to design and build more projects internally, saving money on external consultants and accelerating delivery. Staff and council members described signal upgrades as a high-impact investment; one presenter cited research saying upgraded signal infrastructure can reduce crashes by about a third where installed.

What’s next: city staff said planned near-term items include launching the automated red-light camera program after vendor selection, issuing an RFP tied to the Safe Streets for All grant once the grant agreement is executed, piloting education-and-enforcement materials in zone-council meetings, piloting community traffic-calming toolkit installations if grant funds arrive, hosting a Vision Zero summit with Bike Pittsburgh in fall 2025, submitting a cross-departmental Vision Zero budget ask for 2026, and expanding fatal-crash reviews to serious-injury crashes beginning in Zone 2 with the intent to scale citywide.

Quotes used in this story are attributable to speakers listed in the meeting transcript. Angie Martinez said, “We know this number is unacceptable, and the only acceptable number is 0.” Donna McManus said, “The safety of the children in this city is, is most important.”

The memo and the Vision Zero community safety agreement are available on the city’s Vision Zero engage page, staff said. Council members encouraged more outreach to Harrisburg on automated speed enforcement and asked staff to continue coordinating with PennDOT on state-owned corridors and with Pittsburgh Public Schools on bus-stop and stop-arm enforcement.