[ This piece appeared in the
Windsor Journal in February of 2025 ]

The mid-air collision over the Potomac River this week is an unmitigated tragedy. As of this writing, all 67 people aboard both American Airlines Flight 5342 and the Army helicopter are presumed dead. The sudden loss of so many lives is horrifying and deeply saddening.

Tragedies like this—and far less severe aviation incidents—are always followed by rigorous investigations that lead to safety improvements. In South Korea, a recent crash that killed 179 people prompted the removal of many concrete structures near runways throughout the country. After the 2009 crash in Buffalo, New York, which killed 50 people, the FAA implemented sweeping changes, including stricter pilot fatigue rules, higher experience requirements, improved stall training, and a national pilot record database. Following last year’s Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 decompression incident, the FAA grounded all Boeing 737 MAX 9 aircraft, and the NTSB launched a full investigation.

Because of these rigorous investigations and strict accountability measures, air travel remains remarkably safe, even in spite of high-profile disasters like Flight 5342. The death rate per mile traveled by air is thousands of times lower than that of passenger vehicle travel. It’s a modern marvel that people can spend a lifetime flying and experience such negligible risk. In fact, the paradox almost explains itself: air travel feels scary, so we refuse to accept injury and death as inevitable—and we go to enormous lengths to make it as safe as possible.

But this raises an important question: if we refuse to accept death and injury as a normal part of air travel, why do we accept it as a normal part of automotive travel?

The comparison is striking. I recently drove through Windsor Center and saw the aftermath of a serious crash at the intersection in front of Geissler’s. The car’s hood was caved in, windows shattered. No emergency responders remained. Traffic flowed around the wreck, drivers adjusting slightly to navigate past it. I did the same. It was a relatively unusual sight—but not shocking. There was no media coverage of the crash. If a public figure had been involved or if the crash had caused a major traffic jam, maybe the news would have paid attention. But as it was, the incident passed unnoticed. Perhaps police issued a citation, but no one examined whether the intersection’s design played a role, whether vehicle visibility issues contributed, or whether both drivers had a clear instruction on right-of-way rules during their driver safety course. There was no systemic review—because we, as a society, don’t expect one. Car crashes are just a fact of life: they are banal.

The U.S. sees 46,000 auto-related deaths per year—the equivalent of an American Airlines Flight 5342 disaster happening every 12 hours. Every two months, we lose as many Americans to car crashes as we did in the entire Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Vulnerable populations—children, the elderly, the unhoused, and people with disabilities—are disproportionately affected. The deadliest day of the year for children, by far, is Halloween as hundreds of kids are hit by cars while trick-or-treating in their own neighborhoods. But these tragedies rarely make the news. The NTSB does not spring into action every time someone is struck in a crosswalk. Departments of transportation do initiate systematic reviews when people die in car crashes. We simply mourn, care for the injured, and move on.

Connecticut is not immune. As of this writing, someone has died on our roads every single day of 2025. Windsor is no exception either. According to the Connecticut Crash Data Repository, we experience traffic accidents almost daily and lose roughly one resident per year to auto-related deaths. The most serious crashes happen on four-lane arterial roads, but even local streets see their share of serious injuries. The sections of Poquonock Avenue and Broad Street under consideration in the Broad Street Safety Project have seen more than one crash per month over the past decade.

We do not accept this level of risk in any other part of our lives. And what makes our indifference even more striking is that these crashes don’t happen in private spaces. They happen on our roads—our public property. The only comparable cause of accidental death in America is gun violence. Unlike many states, Connecticut has taken a common-sense public health approach to gun regulation, leading to lower firearm deaths per capita than many other states, and less than half that of our automotive death rate.

Windsor has a rare opportunity to take meaningful action. Every design element in the Broad Street Safety Project is backed by decades of research showing benefits across the board. These projects have been proven to increase property values, boost sales tax revenue, spur development, lower municipal maintenance costs, reduce fuel consumption, lower insurance costs, reduce harmful air particulates, and shorten driver travel times. Towns from Pasadena to New Britain, Grand Rapids to Edgewater have demonstrated that well-planned traffic calming and pedestrian safety improvements lead to more vibrant, resilient, and economically sustainable communities.

But ultimately, this is about saving lives. If we do nothing, more people will be severely injured—or killed—on Broad Street, given the current crash rate and the decades-long lifespan of projects like this.

Do I wish the NTSB took automotive deaths as seriously as plane crashes? Yes. Do I wish the Connecticut DOT was more responsive to local safety concerns? Absolutely. But the reality is that these improvements happen at the local level. I trust the FAA and NTSB to take the tragedy in Washington seriously, and to take meaningful action to keep such tragedies from happening in the future. But if we want the same consideration for the tragedies we experience on our own roads—if we want a safer Broad Street and a more vibrant Windsor Center—we have to make it happen ourselves.

Please join me in taking this small step toward a safer country—and a huge step toward a safer Windsor.