A public record, not a complaint hotline.
DangerousDC documents specific, photographable failures on DC streets that put pedestrians, cyclists, wheelchair users, and transit riders at risk. Each entry is tied to a location, a date, and (when applicable) the law or rule that should have prevented it.
- Coverage
- All 8 wards. Both DC and federal land within DC.
- Cadence
- Updated as photos come in. No fixed schedule.
- Run by
- A DC street safety advocate, current chair of the Mayor's Advisory Committee (MAAC).
- Funding
- None. No ads, no trackers, no donations accepted.
// 01What this site is
A photographic log of street-safety violations in the District of Columbia. Illegal signs in the public right-of-way. Vehicles parked inside the 40-foot daylighting zone required by 18 DCMR 2405.2(c). Sidewalks closed without a signed pedestrian detour. Curb ramps that fail PROWAG tolerances. Crosswalks faded to invisibility on corridors that have already killed people.
It exists because roughly 40% of DC residents live in zero-car households and have to walk through these conditions every day. It exists because Vision Zero is a policy commitment the District has made, and the gap between that commitment and the corner outside your house is what this site measures.
// 02What this site is not
- Not a complaint hotline. We do not file 311 reports for you. The Submit page tells you how to do that.
- Not anti-driver. It is pro-not-getting-killed-while-walking. The two are not in tension.
- Not a movement, a campaign, or a community. It is a record.
- Not anonymous reporting. Every entry has a verifiable address and date.
// 03Editorial policy on license plates
License plates are public information. They are issued by a government agency and displayed by the operator on a public road, on equipment that is operated in public space at speeds capable of killing a person. A plate visible in a photograph of an illegal act is not private information. Treating it as private would be treating the violator's convenience as a higher priority than the safety of the people the violation endangers. We do not.
We do not publish the names, addresses, or identities of registered owners. We do not lookup, scrape, or cross-reference plate data. The plate appears in the photo because it appeared on the vehicle.
// 04Fatality context
When a violation occurs on a corridor or at an intersection where a person has been killed, that history is named in the entry. Mohamed Samura was killed on the sidewalk near 6th and Fairmont Streets NW in April 2024, when a speeding driver mounted the curb. Kathy Tanner, 74, was killed at 6th and M Streets SW in April 2025. These are not generic statistics. They are conditions that produced a specific death at a specific corner, and those corners do not stop being dangerous after the news cycle ends.
Naming the connection is not editorializing. It is the reason the entry exists.
// 05Sourcing and verification
What we publish
Photographs taken by the site author or submitted by readers, with a verifiable address, date, and (when applicable) the rule or law cited. Submissions are checked for location and date before they appear.
What we do not publish
Photographs of identifiable bystanders, of children's faces, or of crashes in progress. Photographs without a verifiable location. Anything that looks like a personal grievance against a named individual.
// 06Corrections and removals
If a published entry is factually wrong (wrong location, wrong rule cited, wrong date), email safety@dangerousdc.org with the photo UUID and the correction. Corrections are dated and noted on the entry.
We do not remove entries on request from the violator. We do remove entries on request from a verifiable bystander whose identifying information appears in the frame.
// 07Contact
safety@dangerousdc.org for submissions, corrections, and press. Please put the photo UUID or the cross-streets in the subject line.