Making San Jose more walkable, one step at a time.

Since 2012, California Walks has worked to develop, better coordinate, and strengthen pedestrian safety efforts in neighborhoods across San Jose. Over the last decade, pedestrian fatalities continue to increase in San Jose, accounting for nearly half of all traffic fatalities in the city.

Walk San Jose is a project of California Walks that launched in 2017 to locally uphold California Walks’ vision to create safe, just, and inclusive streets and public spaces. We aim to build relationships with City and County staff, partner organizations, and community members to bolster local pedestrian safety efforts.

Since 2017, we have: 

• Co-hosted San Jose’s World Day of Remembrance memorial event with Bay Area Families for Safe Streets; 

• Advocated for complete streets funding to make walking and biking safer citywide; 

• Supported local safety advocates on diverting funding from the San Jose Police Department to community programs; and

• Held walk audits and community meetings to co-create solutions to pedestrian safety issues.

What we were working on in 2023: 

• Advocating for the City of San Jose to fund pedestrian safety projects;  

• Launching our Spare the Air Youth workshop series;

• Connecting safe streets issues with other health and environmental policy areas; and  

• Supporting the City of San Jose’s Downtown Transportation Plan. 

This report summarizes the state of traffic safety in San Jose in 2020 and what we hope to see moving forward.

A helpful tool for leading an assessment of the pedestrian and bicyclist safety environment in your community.