County Executive Crowley Administration Signs Resolution to Combat Reckless Driving; Bolster Vision Zero Initiative

MILWAUKEE – On February 24, 2025, Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, alongside state, municipal, and community partners, signed a resolution to adopt Milwaukee County’s Comprehensive Safety Action Plan (CSAP).

The Plan is key to the County’s Vision Zero commitment to combat reckless driving and eliminate traffic deaths by 2037. It outlines strategies to address safety on Milwaukee County’s 25 Corridors of Concern and paves the way to unlock new federal funding to support these strategies.

“Today is an important milestone in our commitment to enhance the safety of our roads. Collaboration and partnership are key to increasing multimodal safety and reducing reckless driving, and I want to thank all who have worked with us to support safer neighborhoods, enhance the quality of life for working families, and save lives in Milwaukee County” said Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley. “Moving forward, my administration will implement a unified strategy for Milwaukee County and our municipal partners to eliminate traffic fatalities and serious injuries, while improving overall health outcomes for our residents. Let’s get it work.”

Since 2014, fatal crashes have increased drastically throughout Milwaukee County at a higher rate than a majority of the country. Overall, fatal and serious injury crashes increased 42% in 2020-2022 compared to 2010-2012.

The Comprehensive Safety Action Plan lays out a menu of 522 potential Safety Project Opportunities in Milwaukee County that could reduce fatal and serious injury crashes by 38% on average at the locations where they are implemented, and 18% in the County overall. Potential projects include a wide range of strategies and treatments, such as road diets, slow zones, signal improvements, and intersection daylighting.

From the group of 522 potential projects, 142 locations are identified as priority projects. Additionally, an array of municipal, county and state-level policy change recommendations are included in the Action Plan, all with the express intent of improving multimodal transportation, reducing speeding and saving lives.

“The leadership, collaboration and commitment of County Executive Crowley, the Board of Supervisors, and our municipal partners, got us here today” said MCDOT Director Donna Brown-Martin. “I’m looking forward to working with our municipal partners in the months ahead as we develop plans at the local level. This work moves us closer to our goal of zero traffic fatalities and serious injuries by 2037.”

Adoption of the Comprehensive Safety Action Plan qualifies Milwaukee County and its 19 municipalities for eligibility to apply for federal grants to fund a selection of the highest priority projects. It also marks the completion of Phase Two of the Complete Communities Transportation Planning Project, MCDOT’s safety initiative to increase multimodal safety and address reckless driving across all Milwaukee County municipalities. The Plan will now go to the U.S. Department of Transportation for certification.

MCDOT will initiate Phase Three of the Complete Communities Transportation Planning Project later this week when work begins with each of the County’s 19 municipalities to create their own action plans.

About The Complete Communities Transportation Planning Project

In 2023, Milwaukee County launched the Complete Communities Transportation Planning Project, a new safety initiative to increase multimodal safety and address reckless driving across all 19 municipalities in Milwaukee County. As part of this effort, Crowley and MCDOT published the first-ever Transportation Safety Assessment Report in February 2024 to listen to residents and analyze historical crash data to determine which streets should be considered “Corridors of Concern” across Milwaukee County and where resources should be focused to keep drivers, bicyclists, transit riders and pedestrians safe.

In March 2024, Crowley and the Milwaukee Area Safe Streets Taskforce (MASST) released the Motor Vehicle Collision (MVC) Dashboard to advance comprehensive, data-driven solutions to increase safety for all who use local streets and roadways. In addition, Milwaukee County is utilizing federal funding to demonstrate temporary street safety improvements in Greendale, Shorewood, South Milwaukee, Wauwatosa, and West Allis, as well as in partnership with the City of Milwaukee on a critical segment of the 35th Street corridor, to combat reckless driving, calm traffic, prioritize transit and create safer streets for all.

In August 2024, Crowley signed legislation affirming Milwaukee County’s commitment to Vision Zero by the year 2037 in combatting reckless driving, traffic violence, and fatal and serious injury crashes.

More information about Milwaukee County’s efforts to combat reckless driving is available HERE.

NOTE: This press release was submitted to Urban Milwaukee and was not written by an Urban Milwaukee writer. While it is believed to be reliable, Urban Milwaukee does not guarantee its accuracy or completeness.