Southbound 23rd St., between Ocean Park Blvd. and Dewey St., is the most dangerous Santa Monica street for bicyclists and electric scooter riders, in the opinion of the attorneys at our Santa Monica personal injury law firm.
Southbound 23rd St. has a bike lane, which can give bike riders and scooter riders a false sense of security. In the evening rush hour, southbound 23rd gets clogged with stop-and-go traffic. Southbound 23rd is a sloped roadway with a fairly steep descent as it approaches Navy St. and Dewey St. Bicyclists and scooter riders go flying down the bike lane, past vehicles that are crawling or stopped in traffic.
There are two very foreseeable types of accidents here:
- A driver who is northbound on 23rd St., turning left onto Dewy, Navy, Marine, or Pier, (or the alleys between them) will not see a bike rider or scooter rider who is in the southbound bike lane, because the rider is hidden by the bumper-to-bumper vehicles. Drivers who are southbound on 23rd may leave a gap and allow the left-turning driver to make the left turn. The left-turning driver assumes the coast is clear and begins the left turn, only to smash into the downhill rider.
- A driver who is eastbound on Pier, Marine or Navy, intending to turn right onto southbound 23rd St., inches out into the bike lane and collides with a southbound bike or scooter rider.
Our personal injury law firm is aware of many accidents that have happened exactly this way. Twice a week, I personally drive northbound on 23rd St., past the backed up southbound cars, and each time I think – a rider is going to get killed on this street.
Santa Monica residents have brought this problem to the attention of the City of Santa Monica traffic engineers many times, to no avail. The city must do something to lesson the danger posed to bike and scooter riders.
