Recently, the Wilmington StarNews and Cape Fear Collective dug into Wilmington, N.C.’s life-expectancy gap. It turns out there are similar disparities regarding the city’s pedestrians. “Wilmington consistently has one of the highest annual pedestrian crash rates in NC. From 2011–2020,” says the 2023 Walk Wilmington Pedestrian Plan. The majority of crashes involving pedestrians occurred in areas with higher concentrations of minority residents and higher poverty rates compared to the county average.”
Abby Lorenzo of the Wilmington Urban Area Metropolitan Planning Organization and Justin Carter, assistant director of engineering for the City of Wilmington, explain what’s called the “pedestrian high injury network” and what’s being done about it.
Learn about this work and about the Coastal Journalism Hub at http://www.coastaljournalism.org
