Why this matters
Encinitas has had more than double the traffic fatalities in a year than it should have had, based on its population, a traffic safety official said.
Encinitas is in a traffic safety emergency, according to the city’s Mobility and Traffic Safety Commission, which is urging city leaders to declare a state of emergency to address traffic fatalities.
The city should have an average of one to 1.5 road deaths per year, based on the size of its population, Commissioner James Gross said at the commission’s Sept. 8 meeting. But this year, the city has had four deaths already.
“This is not normal. The data does not support this being normal at all, and we should not accept this rate of death in our city,” Gross said at the meeting, before the commission voted to send city leaders a letter recommending action.
The move is the latest in residents’ repeated calls for increased traffic safety in the wake of four pedestrian and bike deaths this year. The city previously declared an emergency for bicycle, electric bicycle and motorized mobility device safety in June 2023 in response to a growing number of bicycle crashes.
From the Documenters
This story came in part from notes taken by Roman Fong, a San Diego Documenter, at an Encinitas Mobility and Traffic Safety Commission meeting earlier this month. The Documenters program, run by inewsource, trains and pays community members to document what happens at public meetings. Learn more about the Documenters here.
One recent death that has garnered attention was Emery Chalekian, 12. In April, she was hit while crossing Encinitas Boulevard by a driver who was allegedly running a red light.
Since her death, her friends and fellow parents have fought to improve traffic safety in Encinitas. At the Sept. 10 City Council meeting, several adults and children showed up in yellow shirts with her name on it and urged the council to improve the traffic safety conditions.
Two of Chalekian’s friends presented a video in which many young people said that they did not feel safe crossing roads in Encinitas. The students closed by asking the city to take action to make the streets safer.
Ron Medak from the Traffic Safety Commission also told councilmembers about an electric bicycle crash that left a man with four broken ribs, a chest tube and blood thinners.
There were 905 total traffic citations issued in August, according to San Diego County Sheriff’s Office data. The month had 20 crashes and 15 DUI arrests.
Type of Content
Brief: An account of a public government proceeding, written and edited by the San Diego Documenters.
