Warsaw. Accident on Woronicza. Officials knew that the crossing was dangerous. Why didn't they react?

– Fortunately, children do not go to school now, because this would be the stop where they either get on or off the bus – says Magdalena Przybysz, the principal of Primary School No. 205 named after the Soldiers of the Warsaw Uprising. The stop at Woronicza, where On Tuesday there was a tragic accidentis rarely empty. It is used by students from this primary school, but also children from a nearby kindergarten and their parents, and local residents. It is easy to get to the metro from here, for example by line 218. The stop is on the roadway (without a bay), the lanes start where the bus “ends”. It is not safe.

“This accident was big, fatal, but drivers don't follow the rules every day and minor collisions happen. Sometimes a fender bender happens, sometimes someone doesn't have time to brake or falls on a scooter. There's a straight two-lane section there, two pedestrian crossings and no lights. It's scary to walk there,” one of the residents wrote on Kontakt 24 right after the accident. “I can see one of these crossings very well from my balcony. Just stand there for 30 minutes and you can see that every other car ignores pedestrians and is definitely not driving 50 km/h. Nobody does anything about it, and there have been many incidents at crossings,” he noted.

Did the councilors know that the accident site was dangerous? Yes. Did the officials know? Yes. At least since 2017. We checked why safety on Woronicza had not been improved before the tragedy.

– This tragedy could have been avoided. There is a high probability that it would not have happened. Warsaw, as one of the few cities, has a fairly good audit of pedestrian crossings, which it is gradually rebuilding. This one, in particular, has not been rebuilt for seven years – notes Łukasz Zboralski, editor-in-chief of the portal brd24.pl.

What did the auditors say about the crossing on Woronicza? – They wrote exactly the scenario that played out. They wrote that it was a crossing across multiple lanes, for 13 meters, and that drivers were exceeding the speed limit. Pedestrians sometimes had to run to escape them. I think that's exactly what we saw: someone driving very fast, someone trying to get away from the car. It didn't work, so the worst-case scenario that local government officials were warned about came true – said a journalist specializing in road safety.

In his opinion, when it comes to safety, infrastructure is key. – We can chase drivers, there has to be supervision. But if we build roads well, without such traps, there will be fewer accidents. Drivers will not speed up – said Zboralski.

We are reviewing the interpellations from the previous term. Councillor Monika Czerniewska (Civic Coalition) has repeatedly indicated that this section of Woronicza is not safe. She considered it necessary to install traffic lights there. She had been calling for this for a decade. When these requests did not bring any results, she appealed: we will install a speed camera.

Mayor Rafał Miastowski wrote in response that the General Inspectorate of Road Transport, the Centre for Automatic Road Traffic Supervision, had received as many as 26 similar applications from people living in the area. However, as he added, the analysis of data from the traffic police did not justify “making a decision regarding the installation of recording devices in this location”. Now the councillor is throwing up her hands: – What have I achieved? Nothing. I feel like a total failure. Yesterday I completely broke down.

– Law and Justice councillors also intervened in this matter. It was a problem beyond political divisions. We prepared positions during the session, unanimously. We asked for increased security at unguarded crossings, pedestrians, through Woronicza – Czerniewska recalls.

The situation worsened when Woronicza was extended to Żwirki i Wigury.

– Traffic has increased significantly. It has become dramatic. Parents with children cross the two unattended zebra crossings between Woronicza and Spartańska. There is a primary school, a kindergarten, and a nursery there. There is also the Institute of Rheumatology on Spartańska. There is a lot of traffic on the crossings, these are not the outskirts of Mokotów like they used to be, we are already in the center of Mokotów, in the center of Warsaw – he describes

As she says, she made her last phone call on the matter to the Municipal Roads Authority before the holidays. – There was no response, nothing helped. We summoned the director of the Municipal Roads Authority, Łukasz Puchalski, to the committee. On his behalf, a clerk came, holding a list of 30 points. She said: all of them are dangerous. Then I asked where Woronicza was. She admitted that it was quite high – Czerniewska reports. – We, the councilors, know our homeland, we know where it is dangerous. However, there was no weapon to fend off arguments – she adds.

Councilwoman Czerniewska maintains that the most effective solution would be to install speed cameras on Woronicza. – I was at the crossing at 12 o'clock. Drivers drive scared. Is it possible? It's possible. It's a pity that only when the tragedy happened. Radars would be the cheapest and most effective solution. We don't have to spend 300 thousand zlotys on traffic lights. Speed ​​cameras can be installed in places where drivers speed up, and every councilor and resident who is interested in it knows where such places are. Only no one uses this knowledge – she claims. – Now, even if traffic lights appear quickly, I won't be satisfied. I won't have the impression that the councilors helped – she admits.

Maciej Saja, a member of the Miasto Jest Nasze association, also spoke about the 2017 audit. – The city hall knew perfectly well that the pedestrian crossing on Woronicza, where the first victim died, is extremely dangerous. In an internal audit conducted in 2017, seven years ago, this place received, attention, a zero rating! I remind you that this is about the safety of people, your family, friends, neighbors – he told.

Activists organised a press conference regarding the accident. They recalled the reaction to the tragedy of President Rafał Trzaskowskiwho wrote that “even the safest infrastructure may not protect against thoughtlessness on the road and road pirates.”

Warsaw councillor Marta Szczepańska emphasised that the infrastructure in this place was not safe at all. – Road bandits are on our streets because they know that they are unpunished. The perpetrator of the accident in Woronicza had his driving licence withdrawn a year ago, yet he continued to speed through the streets of Warsaw. He was even driving 100 kilometres per hour when he killed a pedestrian. Why? Because he could! Traffic police are a fiction, there are no speed cameras. These are also cases in which the city authorities have done nothing – she accused.

– There are many such places, such intersections in Warsaw, and each of them is a ticking bomb. The responses to councilors' interpellations, the demands of residents and the lack of response to the positions of district councils clearly show that improving safety is not at the top of the city's priorities. – The councilors from MJN: Łukasz Porębski (Żoliborz) and Jacek Grzeszak (Mokotów) summed up.

We asked the Municipal Roads Authority about the matter.

– In the middle of the last decade, we realized that we needed specific and objective information about dangerous places in the capital. We focused on pedestrian crossings. Hence, a comprehensive audit of all (4,092) unsignalized pedestrian crossings on roads managed by the Municipal Roads Authority was conducted in 2016-20. The audit gave us a clear basis indicating which crossings should be improved and how. And year after year, dozens, sometimes a hundred zebra crossings in Warsaw undergo changes. Sometimes small, sometimes complete reconstruction – replies Jakub Dybalski, spokesman for the Municipal Roads Authority.

And he admits that the crossing where the tragedy occurred was audited and rated zero, i.e. as the most dangerous. The spokesman announces that it will undergo changes. – For the intersection of Woronicza and Spartańska, the contractor is finishing preparing the design documentation, which assumes, among other things, full signaling of this intersection. We will accept this project in September and we plan to rebuild it – if we obtain financing – next year – announces Dybalski.

When asked why the road workers did not act earlier, he informs that the first tender for investment documentation in 2022 ended in failure. The bids significantly exceeded the budget planned for this purpose.

– In the audit, nearly 500 crossings received the lowest ratings (0 or 1). None of these lowest rated crossings are more important than another, equally low rated crossing. We will introduce changes to all of them. So far, as a result of the audit, we have introduced changes to 542 crossings in the capital, including 231 “zeros” or “ones”. So we are halfway to eliminating crossings with such ratings from the streets of Warsaw – enumerates Jakub Dybalski.

– As a city, we do what is within our capabilities, which means introducing comprehensive changes to the infrastructure. We have probably all seen the CCTV footage and the driver clearly driving well above the speed limit and not realizing what was happening around him. It is difficult to point out the infrastructure that would have stopped such a driver, since he was not paying attention to the infrastructure or pedestrians at all. The tools for speed control and enforcement of traffic regulations are unfortunately beyond the local government – sums up the representative of the road workers.

As we have established, from January to August 2023, there were 31 collisions on Woronicza, three people were injured. In the same months of 2024, there were also 31 collisions. However, seven people were injured – two died.