Data from the Fort Worth Police Department shows the majority of car accidents in 2021 occurred inside Loop 820.

The most prominent areas were the north side, southeast, and southwest Fort Worth.

This follows a December 2021 report from the city’s department of transportation and public works listing the top 10 roadways for vehicle, bicycle and pedestrian accidents.

Faded lane lines, few sidewalks, and limited street lighting were common features among these streets.

Oscar Sutphen has lived at the corner of Glen Eden Drive and South Riverside Drive for the past 13 years.

“From Campus to Berry Street it’s a raceway,” Sutphen said.

The stretch of South Riverside from Rodeo Street to East Berry Street has had 17 vehicle collisions in the past five years, according to data from transportation and public works. This includes an August 2019 crash that took the lives of three Trimble Tech High School graduates.

The intersection at Glen Eden Drive and South Riverside Drive is tricky because of the convergence with Rodeo Street. Sutphen said drivers will often fly through a stop sign on Rodeo Street and wind up crashing into traffic from either Glen Eden or Riverside.

“They’re trying to beat the traffic, and try to avoid hitting somebody coming down the street and they end up in my yard,” Sutphen said. He said this has happened at least three times.

District 8 council member Chris Nettles, whose district includes South Riverside Drive, said car accidents have been a big issue for his constituents. He wrote in an email that the city’s infrastructure has not kept up with its explosive growth, and this has been an issue for a lot of council members going into the May 2022 bond election.

“We need to do a thorough traffic safety investigation of the streets notorious for vehicle/auto crashes. It’s ridiculous that we have residents dying every week just because we don’t have the money,” Nettles wrote.

In the north side, Rafael Hernandez works at his family’s car lot on the corner of Northeast 28th Street and Oscar Avenue. He said neighbors will drive their cars to cross the street to use the laundromat rather than chance it by walking across.

Northeast 28th Street between Main Street and Interstate 35W technically is a state highway, and Hernandez said motorists treat it as such. He said there will often be accidents at the traffic light outside his family’s car lot from people speeding and not paying attention.

“I know we’ve had this fence taken down at least three times since we’ve been here,” Hernandez said.

District 2 council member Carlos Flores, whose district includes Northeast 28th Street, said the city is looking at the use of speed tables to slow down traffic. These are wider versions of the traditional speed bump that slow down traffic while doing less damage if a car hits them slightly too fast.

Flores said speed tables could also be used to protect pedestrian crosswalks either by framing a crosswalk with two speed tables or making a crosswalk out of a speed table to raise pedestrians up so they’re more visible to oncoming traffic.

The council is getting briefed on this and other speed control measures during Tuesday’s meeting of the Mobility: Transportation and Infrastructure committee, a transportation and public works spokesperson wrote in an email.

The city adopted a policy in 2007 to phase out speed bumps except in neighborhoods that chose to keep them, Mayor Pro Tem Gyna Bivens said.

She said the city needs to do more to address resident concerns about road conditions.

“We have to figure out something to make people at least know that we’re acknowledging their concerns and not always be so defensive about what we already have in place,” Bivens said.

The city launched the MyFW app in 2019, where citizens can report issues with roads, streetlights and other code violations. Bivens said she advises residents to copy her on emails to city staff to get expedited responses to their problems.

The city last evaluated its 8,000 lane miles of road in 2016, according to transportation and public works. The city uses this data to make decisions about how to maintain or rehabilitate the roads.

The city is in the middle of a new assessment, a TPW spokesperson wrote, and expects to have complete data this fall.

Here are the top 10 streets for injuries involving vehicles over the past five years, according to the city of Fort Worth:

1. Northeast 28th Street from North Main Street to North Freeway: 18 crashes (at least one fatal)
2. South Riverside Drive from East Berry Street to Rodeo Street: 17 crashes (at least one fatal)
3. Main Street from East Long Avenue to Northwest 28th Street: 15 crashes
4. University Drive from Jacksboro Highway to West 5th Street: 12 crashes (at least one fatal)
5. Altamesa Boulevard from Woodway Drive to McCart Avenue: eight crashes
6. Southwest Loop 820 Frontage Road from Granbury Road to Westcreek Drive: eight crashes
7. Henderson Street from White Settlement Road to West Belknap Street: six crashes
8. Miller Avenue from Eastland Street to Killian Street: five crashes (at least one fatal)
9. McCart Avenue from Park Hill Drive to West Berry Street: five crashes (at least one fatal)
10. McCart Avenue from Sycamore School Road to Columbus Trail: five crashes (at least one fatal)

This story was originally published January 11, 2022 at 5:00 AM.

Harrison Mantas

Fort Worth Star-Telegram

817-390-7040

Harrison Mantas has covered Fort Worth city government, agencies and people since September 2021. He likes to live tweet city hall meetings, and help his fellow Fort Worthians figure out what’s going on.