A Portland woman whose son was killed by a drunk hit-and-run driver has proposed a new method to apprehend motorists who flee the scene of a deadly collision. She hopes to bring an Amber Alert-like notification system to Portland to help nab the bad guys. The proposal is based on a system that's already up and running in Denver, reports Michael Andersen at Bike Portland:
Portland's Kristi Finney, whose son was killed by a drunk driver who fled the scene, is pushing for an Amber Alert-like notification system to catch the perpetrators in hit-and-run crashes. Photo: Bike Portland
Last week, Colorado's governor signed a statewide rollout of apparently successful pilot programs in Denver and Aurora.
"The notification goes to all patrol cars, cabdrivers, news outlets, truck drivers and pedicab operators. A message is displayed on traffic reader boards and on Crime Stoppers' Twitter and Facebook accounts," adds the Denver Post.
That paper reported last year that seven such alerts had been issued in the area in 2012-2013, and "some have resulted in arrests."
It also takes advantage of existing regulations that gather the contact information of professional drivers.
There's a discussion in the Bike Portland comments about how effective this system would be and whether it could safely alert people who are behind the wheel. What do you think?
Elsewhere on the Network today: PubliCola at SeattleMet reveals that a "coalition of groups" opposing a Seattle transit ballot measure appears to be composed of phantom organizations. Portland Transport says that in order for transit to function well on routes that include transfers, service needs to be relatively frequent. And Rails-to-Trails reports that an international working group on cycling safety is calling for a mix of speed control and protected bike infrastructure in cities.
Angie is a Cleveland-based writer with a background in planning and newspaper reporting. She has been writing about cities for Streetsblog for six years.