Greenwich is moving from planning to action on road safety, with the Department of Public Works drawing up concept designs for 15 high-crash locations across town.
The designs are the first step in the Safe Streets Greenwich plan, a townwide transportation safety strategy the Board of Selectmen adopted in spring 2026. The plan was funded by a $400,000 federal grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation's Safe Streets and Roads for All program, or SS4A, which Greenwich received in November 2023, according to the Greenwich Time.
DPW and its partner agencies also plan to seek additional SS4A grant money to advance the concept plans, according to the town's project page.
How the 15 locations were chosen
The project team built what it calls a Prioritized Investment Network, or PIN, by layering three sets of data: five years of crash records, an analysis of variables that correlate with crash-prone locations and geographic feedback residents submitted through mapping tools at a June 2025 public meeting. The top 15 sites on that ranked list are getting concept designs. The specific intersections have not been publicly identified in the materials available online.
In fall 2025, the project team met with local stakeholders at each of the 15 PIN locations to understand specific challenges. DPW also held a tactical demonstration at Western Middle School on Nov. 6, 2025, where students helped paint temporary traffic and pedestrian safety features during school hours. A walking charrette, a collaborative design walkthrough, followed on Nov. 12, 2025, with the Engineering Division and community members walking through districts to share feedback.
What the plan includes
The action plan pairs the location-specific designs with a Countermeasures Toolbox, a menu of proven safety improvements suited to different land-use settings. The toolbox covers street design changes, technology upgrades and other strategies aimed at reducing the number and severity of crashes. DPW said on its project page that some countermeasures could start as short-term pilot projects before becoming permanent.
The plan also includes policy and process recommendations for individual town departments, drawn from interviews the project team conducted with officials and stakeholders in spring and summer 2025. Those recommendations identify opportunities for better coordination between departments on traffic safety.
Resident concerns shaped the plan
DPW and the Traffic and Pedestrian Safety Taskforce held six public meetings across Greenwich neighborhoods in 2024: Riverside/Old Greenwich on March 18, Cos Cob on April 10, Chickahominy/Byram/Pemberwick/Glenville on April 25, central Greenwich on April 29, a town-wide session on May 1 and back country on May 16. Five recurring themes emerged: speeding and driver behavior, unsafe intersections, inadequate crosswalks, a lack of sidewalks or dedicated space for pedestrians and cyclists, and heavy traffic volumes including cut-through traffic.
A second public meeting on the draft plan took place March 12, 2026, at Greenwich Town Hall. Public comments were accepted through the end of March.
Jim Michel, now listed as DPW commissioner, said in November 2023 when he was deputy commissioner that the grant funding was "instrumental in making necessary upgrades to the town's multimodal transportation infrastructure and improving safety for all."
What comes next
Completing the SS4A-certified action plan makes Greenwich eligible for additional federal, state and other safety funding. Michael Kiselak, a civil engineer in DPW's Engineering Division, is the project manager. No next public meeting has been announced. The town said residents can check the DPW project page and social media for updates.
