Concerns are growing over pedestrian safety among Medford residents and elected officials after two elderly men were fatally struck by vehicles in recent months.
Dan Dill, a professor at Boston University, passed away in January after being hit by a car on the Mystic Valley Parkway while walking his dog in December 2024. More recently, Arthur Webber died in February when he was struck by a vehicle in the Salem Street rotary near Medford Square. Both men were crossing the street legally, according to Medford City Councilor Emily Lazzaro.
On Feb. 11, the Medford City Council unanimously passed a resolution honoring Dill and expressed their “hope that this senseless tragedy will not be in vain and will not be repeated.”
Lazzaro, the resolution’s sponsor, has taken up traffic safety as a key issue and says simple additions like speed bumps and crosswalk signs could go a long way in curbing the number of vehicle-related accidents.
“It’s very fixable. … We can put a flashing sign, we can put a cone, we can put a sign in the middle of a crosswalk. It’s crazy how much that does to slow people down,” she said.
A letter from many of Dill’s neighbors was attached to the resolution and asked the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation — which maintains the parkway — to “urgently and meaningfully fix the safety gaps without further delay.”
Residents have called on the state to make several safety improvements, including implementing speed limit enforcement signs, adding road markers and increasing speed enforcement by state police.
“It’s a life and death issue,” Lazzaro said. “We can prioritize this above a lot of other things where death is not the result of inaction.”
She added that improving safety on Medford’s centuries-old roads is challenging, particularly with vehicles that are built to protect drivers over pedestrians. The Department of Conservation and Recreation’s limited budget and cautious spending can prove especially difficult for the city’s many state-controlled streets like the Mystic Valley Parkway, Lazzaro said.
“It is still a road that is managed by a parks department when it should be managed by a transportation traffic department, or if the city could manage it, we have a traffic department that would happily make some changes to intersections and road design to make it safer,” Lazzaro said.
Nonprofit organizations are aiming to use public improvement projects as mechanisms for advocating for and bettering pedestrian infrastructure. The Mystic River Watershed Association launched the Mystic Shoreline Initiative, which plans to enhance pedestrian areas along the Mystic Valley Parkway by constructing footpaths and upgrading crosswalks.
The current parkway’s wide design — which weaves through the wooded and residential bank of the Mystic Lakes — makes it easy for drivers to pick up speed and fail to see pedestrian crossings, according to Karl Alexander, the senior manager of Greenways Programs at MyWRA.
He said that when it comes to pedestrian safety, the MyWRA’s project centers around two goals: safe routes to schools and parks.
The initiative must receive approval from the Department of Conservation and Recreation , which will fund the project to begin development and construction. Alexander adds that the cost and amount of work to be done have slowed the process.
“It's gonna be a $10–15 million project. That’s not something they can just snap their fingers and do, and they’ve yet to adopt it formally” he said. “They need to take responsibility and say, ‘We’re going to adopt it as a project in our capital plan.’”
The department plans to improve the area near the accident involving Dill, but Alexander hopes that efforts to improve pedestrian safety will become more proactive. “They’re reacting to death right now,” he said.
Locals are also sharing their fears online about the safety of the Salem Street rotary, which provides access to Interstate 93 and Medford Square.
Katie Montgomery, a Medford resident, started a Facebook thread that became an outlet for neighbors’ outrage over the fatal February accident. Her husband, Christian Nachtrieb, has been injured in multiple vehicle-related incidents while walking and on his bike.
“There have been so many times where I’ve been mid-crosswalk, and I’ve had cars angrily swerve around me and honk as if I had the audacity to be crossing the street,” Montgomery said. “Having more pedestrians and cyclists lessens the amount of vehicular traffic on the street, so let’s all share the road. There’s such a ‘me, me, me first’ mentality in this state.”
She says the area lacks sufficient signage and information for both pedestrians and drivers. “There needs to be a sign that says stop for pedestrians,” she said. “We need to make sure that pedestrians and drivers alike know the rules of the road.”
A lack of oversight of state resources and the city’s makeup makes it difficult for local resources to be fully utilized, according to Alexander.
“The tax base is largely residential. There isn’t much commercial tax base and as a result, you don’t have a lot of money to work with as a municipal budget,” he said.
The city of Medford has made several efforts, however, in its partnership with the Massachusetts Legislature to implement pedestrian-friendly safety measures. More pedestrian signals, including countdown signal heads and flashing beacons, as well as a raised crosswalk and speed tables, have been installed throughout the city.
“It can be pretty complicated to make changes, but I do think progress is being made,” Lazzaro said.
