‘It’s a real concern’: Portland on pace for record number of fatal crashes in 2023

There have been 66 traffic deaths so far this year,

PORTLAND, Ore. ( KOIN ) — Portland is on pace to set another deadly record in 2023.

Currently, the city is on track to have the highest amount of crashes since 1987 — there have been 66 traffic deaths so far this year, without known suicide/medical events.

Despite the City of Portland’s Vision Zero initiative, which was put in place seven years ago, the trend of rising traffic deaths continues.

The city hopes changes like the ones on SE Hawthorne St, which include adding a bus lane and putting parking between the bike lane and vehicular traffic, will help combat the crashes.

According to the Multnomah County Health Department, driver behavior has been alarming.

“It’s a real concern for us is that the trend is going the wrong way,” said Brendon Haggerty with Multnomah County Public Health. “When we talk to transportation departments and law enforcement, they’re saying they see an increase in reckless behavior...We have basically a transportation system that doesn’t protect us even when people make mistakes.”

Nearly two-thirds of the 68 crashes in 2022 happened on 8% of Portland’s roads. In 2023, roads like North Lombard, Marine Drive, and Southeast Powell are leading the death count — five of the total crashes involved suicidal or medical events.

“Most of the injuries and fatalities happen on the fast-moving arterioles, the big fast-moving arterioles,” Haggerty said.

In 2016, Portland signed onto Vision Zero to make infrastructure changes in problem areas to reduce traffic deaths.

Chunks of Hawthorne St. and other high crash corridors have started to be addressed. All of Division St. has changed, but the rest of the improvements remain piecemealed, with several sections of the dangerous roadways yet to be addressed.

“We are seeing incremental changes as we make incremental changes to our infrastructure,” said Hannah Schafer with the Portland Bureau of Transportation. “We know there’s a lot more work to do. And we don’t necessarily have the resources in order to make all those changes at once and we are you know, slowly and steadily trying to make those investments. It should happen faster.”