Wakefield's Downtown Needs Safety Improvements

Dear Wakefield residents,

As a citizen advocacy group dedicated to improving street safety for all users, we would like to clarify and elaborate on some of the safety information presented at the Town Council meeting on September 14 during the discussion about the Envision project. Downtown improvements would benefit the safety of all road users, but this information focuses on pedestrian safety. The downtown “crash cluster” is for pedestrian accidents that occurred between 2014-2023 on Main Street from Crescent Street to the Americal Civic Center and on Water Street from Main Street to Vernon Street. Most of this area, with the exception of a portion of Water Street, is part of the Envision project. In that time frame, there were 17 pedestrian vs car accidents, 3 of which involved serious or fatal injuries. Per MassDOT, this puts Wakefield in the top 5% for worst pedestrian crashes in the Metropolitan Area Planning Council (the 101 cities and towns of Greater Boston). While the map shown during the Town Council meeting showed that the surrounding towns (Lynnfield, Saugus, Melrose, Stoneham, Reading) also have pedestrian crash clusters, none of those towns are in the top 5% for worst pedestrian crashes.

A study cited during the meeting is the Road Safety Audit (performed in 2019 by VHB for MassDOT) evaluating 3 years of crash data and contributing factors in this same area. Specific recommendations were made and incorporated into the Envision plans to improve safety for all road users downtown. These include changing angle parking (a known contributor to many car and pedestrian crashes) to parallel parking, as well as increasing lighting at crosswalks and installing pedestrian bump-outs and a median island to shorten crossing distance and improve the visibility of pedestrians.

We started our group after multiple pedestrian and bicycle accidents around town, with the goal of preventing these in the future. Envision is a great place to start addressing these issues in one of the areas of town with the greatest number of pedestrians. Even if you drive into this area, you are a pedestrian once you leave your vehicle. This plan will help improve the safety of everyone in Wakefield.

Please continue to support Envision for a better downtown Wakefield. If you'd like to know more about our group, please join us at our next meeting on October 28, 2026. To show our Town councilors your support, send them a message here: wakefieldma.gov/formcenter/Town-Council-30/Contact-The-Town-Council-202

Thank you,

Safe Streets Wakefield

www.safestreetswakefield.com