A woman was killed by a driver Saturday evening while waiting at a bus stop in the Sunnyside neighborhood.
Police say Jean “Jeanie” Diaz was at the bus stop on the west side of Southeast Cesar E. Chavez Boulevard at Taylor Street around 6:20 pm. At the same time, 48-year-old Kevin Michael Scott was driving southbound and failed to control his vehicle. When police responded, they found Scott’s car had rolled over and slammed into the bus stop on the sidewalk. Scott showed signs of impairment and was ultimately arrested for Manslaughter in the First Degree, Driving Under the Influence of Intoxicants, and Reckless Driving.
According to a GoFundMe set up by her family, Diaz was a loving mother to two young girls ages 5 and 8. She worked as a youth librarian for Multnomah County for nearly eight years. She was currently employed at the Belmont Library branch, just across the street from where she was hit.
This is the seventh traffic death in Portland so far this month, and the fifth in the last 10 days. According to the BikePortland Fatality Tracker, we are at the same level of traffic deaths so far this year as in 2022.
This crash is especially troubling for many of our readers because it happened at a major cycling intersection. SE Taylor is a popular neighborhood greenway route that crosses Cesar Chavez right where this happened. And as vulnerable road users, many people in the community have reasonable fears of drivers on Cesar Chavez due to its inherently dangerous design.
The cross-section of Cesar Chavez is very driving-centric: Four lanes, no center median, no shoulder, very narrow sidewalks, and a 30 mph speed limit. Drivers come just inches away from people on foot and bike. There is no room for error. But despite the stressful profile of the street, it is smack-dab in a neighborhood full of homes and destinations. The Belmont Library is just across the street.
“I always hated waiting along Cesar E Chavez. Always seemed like just a matter of time before some driver jumped the curb,” one person shared online in reaction to a BikePortland tweet this morning. “That stretch of Chavez is a death trap for pedestrians. I hate driving it and refuse to ever walk it,” said another. “I bike there… and always have a knot in my stomach about the drivers on Chavez not stopping,” shared someone else.
As drivers have gotten ever more selfish and reckless in recent months and years, we seem to have more rollover crashes in places where they should never occur. The amount of speeding and dangerous driving is, anecdotally at least, at an all-time high. That means we are all at risk, not just when we are driving (even police officers are getting slammed into!) but when we are anywhere near cars.
It hasn’t even been one year since another person was killed by a reckless driver while standing at a bus stop. The location where 26-year-old Ashlee McGill was killed by a speeding driving on SE Stark has as similar design and context as the section of Cesar Chavez Blvd where Diaz was killed: little to no shoulder, no buffer between sidewalk and high-speed drivers, and a well-known pattern of dangerous driving.
It’s almost as if we know exactly which roads are ticking tragedy time-bombs, yet we are unable and/or unwilling to defuse them.
According to the Oregon Library Association (OLA), Diaz was born and raised in Portland and has been working in public libraries since 2008. In October 2022, OLA Quarterly noted that Diaz, “Especially enjoys providing storytime, working with her amazing colleagues, and encouraging kids to be creative. When she’s not at the library, she can be found petting her cat, loving on her family, poking fun at life, making art, taking naps, and reading.”
If anyone has information about this crash, please e-mail crimetips@police.portlandoregon.gov attn: Traffic Investigations Unit and reference case number 23-186008.
Mother.of.two.kids. Waiting for the bus. When is enough? Where is the outrage? It does not have to be like this.
Her name will be read at JPACT, probably not until next month when the crash data gets updated. Along with all the others. The committee will take a few seconds, then move on. And it will continue as it does every month. Is it time?
I live on Yamhill street, on the same block as the library. EVERY SINGLE DAY that I leave my house, my life is threatened while I’m biking or walking by distracted and/or impaired and/or reckless and/or aggressive drivers. Not to mention the “car share,” food delivery, and online retail delivery trucks/vans that double park mid-block, obscuring anyone’s ability to see oncoming traffic while also forcing bicyclists and cars to cross into oncoming traffic to pass. My housed neighbors are constantly complaining because unhoused people are visibly present in our neighborhood. But none of them has ever threatened my well being, unlike the drivers. Portland did not have a housing crisis when I moved onto this block. Nor did we have such dangerous drivers. Instead of railing against the poor, let’s rail against those who are ACTUALLY KILLING PORTLANDERS at such a terrifying rate. The statistics cited in this article should be a call to action. How many more children’s librarians, or children should be killed?
Just horrible and heartbreaking!
I know you are using the word “Crash” (a violent collision, typically of one vehicle with another or with an obstacle.) because you are doing your best to be precise and a better word hasn’t been invented yet, but we really do need to come up with a word for when a mass of steel crushes a person to death as a person isn’t much of an obstacle to a vehicle.
“Collision,” “assault,” “battery,” “manslaughter,” and “murder” work pretty well as terms of art. And I think crash works just the same as a baseball bat crashes into a ceramic knicknack (shout out to Smash PDX Rage Room on NE Sandy), sustaining little to no damage itself while delivering catastrophic damage to the tchochkie.
Re: “Four lanes, no center median, almost no shoulder”
Correction: absolutely no shoulder. The width between curbs is 40 feet at this location according to aerial imagery, so there are four 10-foot lanes and no shoulder. The sidewalks are also quite narrow: on the west side it appears to be only 5 or 6 feet wide with no separation from the street other than a 6 inch high (mountable) curb. The east side sidewalk by the library is wider, but on the south of this intersection it is also only 5 or 6 feet wide and immediately adjacent to the right lane.
yes I should change that. I actually had “no shoulder” first but figured someone would complain that that wasn’t technically correct!
The westside sidewalk is even narrower now than those photos above show.. Vegetation encroaches signficantly and pushes people even closer to high-speed, no-shoulder traffic. (Photos taken about 2 weeks ago.)
That is a hellscape not a streetscape! PBOT should be ashamed. There is not room for 4 lanes of car traffic here- we should immediately jersey barrier off enough pedestrian space on each side of the street and the stripe the remaining space for cars. Designing crap for cars then forcing pedestrian to make do with the leftovers is a disgusting way to manage ROW
I believe this one is on ODOT.
It’s PBOT. Cesar Chavez has always been a PBOT street
Not that it matters much for the mom who was killed but it is a PBOT facility.
PBOT knows
how many more human sacrifices do we need until we prioritize pedestrian safety over vehicle throughput
Putting up bollards along the sidewalk like they do in Europe wouldn’t even impact vehicle throughput.
In this particular case, it’s a pretty narrow sidewalk, so bollards strong enough to stop a speeding car driven by a distracted, impaired, or malicious operator would likely run into accessibility issues. The alternative then requires narrowing or removing lanes to install bollards, which certainly would affect vehicle throughput. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing! But it’s certainly not as simple as, “throw down a few bollards around bus stops and beg buttons to solve pedestrian deaths.”
There is no room for that on 39th. Doing so without affecting vehicle throughput would basically eliminate the sidewalk. 39th needs a road diet. One turn lane and one lane in each direction. Then we’d have space for bollards.
An infinite number. They’re not going to do it all of a sudden just because one more person dies. We have to make it happen some other way.
That wasn’t true for 82nd. Apparently you just need enough to die in the same area in a short enough time and to have a city commissioner, state representative and governor that care. I’m not sure we have all that right now.
I have always thought that Cesar Chavez was a prime candidate for a 4-3 road diet. Most of the delays are cars turning left from one of the driving lanes. With only two lanes of traffic and a center turn lane, the buffer between cars and sidewalks could be enlarged. in fact, the sidewalks could actually be made a useful width so 2 people could walk side by side and talk.
I also think post of the issue with Cezar Chavez and other North South routes is that there isn’t an efficient one. On bike or car going this direction is difficult. It seems to make people aggressively seek to go fast on roads very much not good for it. I don’t know where you’d put it, but a more efficient route might minimize “desire highways”.
Bonus, a 4-3 diet would make the traffic circle at glisan less ridiculous.
Yep, no great routes for any mode north south. I live in Woodstock around 60th and going north on a bike I’ve basically only use 52nd, which is a neighborhood two lane treated like a major arterial. Driving I’m usually on Chavez or 82nd, and while 82nd is its own issue, oddly seems better than Chavez, which is so narrow and potholed I truly loathe driving it. Even in a compact car it is tight next to a bus or the ubiquitous individually owned lifted monster truck. If I’m biking north to a more western destination I can also go up 28th but between that and 52nd you’re basically gonna have to zigzag neighborhood streets, which is very inefficient.
Southbound from I-84 on Cesar Chavez, the right lane becomes a right-turn-only onto Glisan westbound, and the left lane handles both southbound and eastbound traffic at the roundabout.
Meanwhile, Glisan (one lane eastbound) expands as it approaches Cesar Chavez to add a right-turn-only lane at the roundabout. Why?
Maybe there’s a reason to have an extra lane for traffic exiting the freeway, but is there any reason at all to have two southbound lanes on Caesar Chavez south of Glisan? It would take only a small tweak to merge all traffic into a single southbound lane at the roundabout, and keep it at one lane all the way to Clackamas County.
That road needs a lane removed. It’s terrible. There is no excuse to have any roads through town going 30mph, nor any four lane roads at all. You go slow or you move to a highway, of which we unfortunately have many options.
And of course, that should be reinforced with infrastructure (speed bumps, chicanes, and the like). But at the very least, lets not paint a skinny road like Chavez with lines for four lanes.
I live near one of the more dangerous parts of Cesar Chavez, by the Trader Joes near Holgate. Whenever I bike through there, I have this feeling that one day some pedestrian or cyclist will die there.
OMG yes. The race to get to the merge from 2 lanes to 1, combined with turning in and out of TJ’s and the bus stop…it’s terrible!
Agreed, I lived near there just last year for a spell, certainly a perfect storm for an incident.
For those not familiar hop over to street view to see:
-The roadway expanding from 2 lanes to 4 with a center turn
-The only two parking lot access points for TJ’s, abutted by the intersection for Schiller and parking access for Holgate House Apartments
-Zero shoulder, with a narrow sidewalk for the busses and non-vehicle traffic
-All of which is on enough of an elevated slope to make for difficult sight lines.
There are many simple changes that could be made to calm the driving here, possibly the most simple would be to add a row of wands down the center so that vehicles could only enter and leave in one direction, although that would divert a great number of annoyed drivers onto the narrow side streets just to flip around.
The whole length of Chavez is rife with similar issues, it would do well with some change.
It seems the formatting did not make it, here’s an edit for improved legibility:
The roadway expanding from 2 lanes to 4 with a center turn.
The only two parking lot access points for TJ’s, abutted by the intersection for Schiller and parking access for Holgate House Apartments.
Zero shoulder, with a narrow sidewalk for the busses and non-vehicle traffic.
All of which is on enough of an elevated slope to make for difficult sight lines.
There are many simple changes that could be made to calm the driving here, possibly the most simple would be to add a row of wands down the center so that vehicles could only enter and leave in one direction, although that would divert a great number of annoyed drivers onto the narrow side streets just to flip around.
This incident and the ambulance that couldn’t get to a downed motorcyclist because 500 motorists were doing a street takeover in N Portland, makes me really wish PPB would do a better job prioritizing traffic enforcement
Several years ago on a icy snowy day, I had to jump out a way of an out of control car that wiped out the bus stop I was waiting at, just one stop south of this location.
I have a photo of the aftermath but can’t figure out how to upload/add it here…
When we see deaths on Powell or 82nd we are quickly reminded that ODOT controls these roads and there is little PBOT can do. Can someone remind me what the City’s excuse is for having a fast four-lane road with absolutely no margin for human error?
this is 100% PBOT, not ODOT. The difference between ODOT and PBOT is in the past, currently there is little difference except ODOT actually builds things.
Yes, really awful pedestrian facilities in this stretch of Cesar Chavez! I occasionally need to walk to the south from there toward Hawthorne, and every time I worry that an errant vehicle could take me right out – the sidewalk feels like it’s barely three feet wide, and cars tend to go very fast through there. What a needless tragedy for the family and the community.
I hope TRIMET leadership and board of directors writes a public letter protesting this facility.
It is not a good long term business plan for your customers to die while standing at your bus stops…that is assuming your focus is moving people versus moving buses.
But if it is still all about moving buses, then the status quo works just fine, as long as those FTA grant funds and local employer taxes continue to roll in.
I noticed the bus stop at Lincoln and Chavez on the east side of the street was also destroyed by a car this weekend. I’m guessing no one was waiting for the bus. But it shows how commonly cars leave the roadway.
That’s such a great point about how commonly cars leave the roadway. I’ve noticed the same thing – almost everywhere I bike or walk I see evidence of cars leaving the roadway, which just goes to show that *every* roadway should be designed with the assumption that a car will leave it, in every location. Our roadscapes need to be “hardened,” especially near bus stops.
On Holgate in the 70s, and this happened a few weeks back for sure, someone left the street and crashed into a fence and then into a minivan in a driveway. Seems to have totaled the minivan. On Holgate at the 205 ped crossing someone took out the ped/walking guy sign that sits at the raised median. That just happened. I think you’re right, cars probably leave the roadway more than we realize.
That stop isn’t much different from the NE 90th & Halsey stop (ID 2459) that I use on occasion. Halsey is only 3 lanes at this point, but the tradeoff is there’s no sidewalk. I avoid using it when I can, but when the stop a block east is blocked from construction and the MAX is shut down for A Better Red, what can you do? I keep complaining to Trimet about these dangerous stops, and I hope they take action to make them safer.
I live across the street from where this happened, and heard the crash. Just awful. It’s terrifying walking along Caesar Chavez there, just moved to this area and walked it a couple of times but I won’t be doing it anymore!
I will say a lot of folks came out to help, 911 was dialed right away, people made room for emergency services.
The librarian that was hit had helped my little sister with the copier machine just a week or so ago. Really seemed like a kind person, such a shame.
Don’t drink and drive please. It’s not worth it.
No enforcement equals traffic violence
Jeanie was amazing at library storytime. We will miss her.
Not this one, but many news outlets are reporting that the driver “remained at the scene”. So infuriating because first of all, cool reporting that the driver did the bare minimum after literally killing someone and second of all, witnesses from the scene commented that he actually tried to walk away before being stopped by people that got out of their cars to help after seeing the crash. Unverified perhaps but still to the point that he could have tried not even to do the bare minimum and reason to stop reporting it that way.
The one that makes my blood boil is “the driver stayed at the scene and was not cited or arrested, but initial reports say that the (insert unverified victim blaming statement here)”
Nothing screams Portland more than drunk driving. For all of the damage it causes, this town has s**t for answers.
PBOT talks a big game about Vision Zero right up until the point where it’s time to start doing Vision Zero shit.
I think it is worth noting that in 2007 Our City and PGE retimed the lights on what was then still SE 39th to ostensibly help the climate. I found the climate benefit highly dubious then and still do, but the fact that it allowed those in cars to drive faster seems beyond doubt.
From the Oregonian:
How it’s done
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Here’s a look at how Portland transportation managers cut greenhouse gases by adjusting traffic signals, using Southeast 39th Avenue as an example:
They tracked traffic around the clock at 14 spots on 39th and cross streets along the nearly two miles between East Burnside Street and Southeast Powell Boulevard. They also counted cars turning at three major intersections.
The counts showed that an average of 28,543 cars travel the corridor each day, with northbound traffic dominating in the morning and southbound cars in the evening.
City officials created three timing plans for signals, which shift through the day with the traffic patterns. The goal is to align green lights with the heavier traffic, so cars spend less time at red lights. The timing allows for heavy cross traffic on Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard.
A computer program examines the old timing plans against the new ones. It shows that all the drivers on an average weekday will now stop 5,051 fewer times at red lights and will together spend 210 fewer hours driving the section of Southeast 39th.
The average speed for cars increases by 1 mph. That means all the cars burn 246 fewer gallons of gas on that stretch each weekday. Counting all weekdays (savings are less on weekends) it adds up to 61,472 fewer gallons of gas each year. That keeps 541 metric tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere.
Mayor Wheeler, Commissioners Mapps, Rubio, Gonzalez and Ryan AND Chief Lovell have shit for answers. They are feckless, cowards who have abdicated their authority for public safety.
Nope it’s the voters of Portland that have done this. In a democracy leader la reflect the will of the people. If you want change, contact your elected officials and vote carefully.
elected council leaders in Portland are responsible for the way our streets are improved. People voted for Hardesty and Eudaly, they did not vote for PBA and a bunch of NIMBY dipshits…. Here is the Oath of Office for the Mayor, Commissioners and City Auditor: I , (name), do solemnly (affirm or swear) that I will support the Constitutions of the United States and of the State of Oregon and the Charter of the City of Portland and its laws; I will faithfully, honestly and ethically perform my duties as (Mayor/Commissioner/City Auditor);… The city charter states: The Council hereby is authorized: to order from time to time all or part of the streets of the City to be improved; to determine the character, kind and extent of each improvement; City Charter states: The Council hereby is authorized: to order from time to time all or part of the streets of the City to be improved; to determine the character, kind and extent of each improvement; to levy and collect an assessment upon all lots and parcels of land specially benefitted by the improvement to defray the whole or any portion of the cost; and to determine what lands are specially benefitted by the improvement and the amount to which each parcel or tract of land is benefitted.
City charter also states: When the Council determines that a local improvement as defined by this Charter or by ordinance affords a special and peculiar benefit to property within a particular district different in kind or degree from that afforded to the general public, the Council may classify it as a local improvement and provide for the payment of all or a portion of the cost thereof by levy and collection of local assessments on the property benefitted. The procedure for street improvements shall be followed. Jurisdiction of the Council shall depend upon the extent and strength of remonstrance; provided, however, if the Council determines that the public health or public safety demands immediate construction, the Council may overrule any and all remonstrances and shall proceed as provided for sewer improvements. The Council may combine in one proceeding a street improvement, sewer improvement, street lighting improvement, and any other improvement allowed by this Charter.
I typically just bike, but had the misfortune of waiting at that bus stop and others on Cesar Chavez. Even on a day where you’re not getting mowed down by a drunk driver, you definitely inhale a LOT of car exhaust as you wait. I
I typically just wait far from the bus stop and around the corner until the time when the bus is supposed to come by.
FX treatment for that street?
Would love to see Ceaser Chavez Blvd narrowed to one lane in either direction with some strategic turning and bus lanes for another FX line. Use the extra space for wide, comfortable sidewalks.
I think it would need to be paired with some diversion and traffic calming on parallel N/S streets to discourage drivers cutting through the neighborhoods.
There are selfish and reckless drivers all over the world. The US is the only wealthy country where they are killing people at an increasing rate.
http://web.archive.org/web/20221127102113/https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/27/upshot/road-deaths-pedestrians-cyclists.html
But Portland has had a disproportionate increase. It’s NOT like this everywhere. We need to stop the minimization of Portland’s problems. Until we own then we can’t fix them.
Police were able to arrest and charge the driver in this case b/c he was drunk. But if he had not been drinking – if it were a “normal accident” in which a “responsible driver” had *accidentally* “lost control of the vehicle” and then “stayed at the scene of the accident and cooperated with investigators,” the driver would not have been charged with anything more than a traffic violation like leaving the lane of travel.
That’s b/c we in Oregon have no law like “Causing death by dangerous driving,” which the UK and other advanced nations have. In those countries, you have a responsibility to every other person on or near the road, whenever you get behind the wheel. Here almost every driver-caused death is just a sad “accident.”
This situation needs to change. We need a law that criminalizes “Death or injury by dangerous driving.”
Reckless driving can send you to jail for up to a year even if no one gets hurt.
The bar for Careless Driving is even lower. The laws aren’t the problem.
https://oregon.public.law/statutes/ors_811.140 [Reckless Driving]
https://oregon.public.law/statutes/ors_811.135 [Careless Driving]
Oregon has a vulnerable road user law that assesses enhanced (but anemic) penalties for careless driving that results in the death of a person walking or rolling. This law is essentially never used due to the rampant car-centrism of our society. Why on earth would you believe that a law that criminalizes careless driving would be any different?
Oregon’s blasé attitude towards carnage is not a legal problem — it is a moral crisis.
It’s not Oregon, it’s all of America.
Americans are culturally indifferent to needless death.
Met with the money guy – on track to be able to retire somewhere else – but will have to wait 8 years for my GF to turn 62.
Now, if I can just stay alive that long.
How do people crash on a straightaway? Does their tire hit the curb causing it to quickly turn the steering, which is known to flip a car?
The city (or other concerned citizens) should put up a plaque with the names of the individuals and companies, including the PBOT director at the time, that are responsible for this death-trap-stroad.
Maybe all of the high-fatality corridors need these plaques.
I thought renaming 39th after Cesar Chavez was going to make it better. I was wrong.
I’ve never understood why we name the shittiest roads after the people we want to honor.
I think the roads that get renamed (MLK, Chavez, Rosa Parks) are the major ones, and the major ones are major because they carry more cars, and they are shitty because of so many cars.