My Father Died Biking in Cambridge. We Can Build a Safer City By Voting on Nov. 4.

The summer after my graduation looked a little different than I had expected at the beginning of senior year. Like I had envisioned, I spent time traveling and unwinding. But I also co-wrote a Boston Globe opinion piece on bike lanes and spent hours in Google Sheets co-managing a bike safety election organization’s finances.

I never would have imagined I would be a bike safety advocate until it affected me personally. I remember when biking was just a form of exercise for me; occasionally a means of transportation, but mostly a way to connect with my dad.

My dad was my champion and my hero. He was my biggest advocate — affirming when I was doing well and correcting me when I strayed. He called every day he was away, and he made a point to say that he loved me each night.

Cycling was my dad’s favorite hobby, and he biked from our home in Newton to Cambridge along the Charles almost every day. Like me, my father graduated from Harvard College, but our shared love of biking connected us just as much. Even when we were apart, I thought of him almost every time I took a ride. I certainly do now.

My father was struck and killed while biking on Memorial Drive on September 23, 2024, a few weeks into my senior year. As my family marks the one-year anniversary of our loss, I look back and can’t help but think that my father’s death is, among so many other things, political. The stretch of Memorial Drive where he was hit was known to be dangerous; 14 months before his death, nine local and state elected officials asked the state — which is responsible for Memorial Drive — to make the segment safer.

My father was one of three people to be struck and killed while cycling in Cambridge in 2024, alongside Minh-Thi Nguyen, a 24-year-old MIT graduate student killed near Kendall Square, and Kim Staley, who was killed near Quincy House. Unlike my father, Nguyen and Staley were hit on roads managed by the city.

In spring 2024, before these deaths, a slim majority of the Cambridge City Council voted to delay installing critical safety infrastructure, including separated bike lanes, by 18 months. After the deaths of Staley, Nguyen, and my father, the Council moved the project’s deadline up last October, but the vote had already resulted in a months-long delay.

Having grown up in Newton, just a short drive from Cambridge, I had every reason to engage with local politics. City policies directly affected my life as a Cambridge resident during my time at Harvard even before my dad’s death, but like most students, I just didn’t think about them. I voted in state and national elections, I kept up with current events, but I mostly focused on my studies. I didn’t understand just how large a role local politics plays in the day-to-day life of Harvard students, and why I should have voted in local elections. I wasn’t alone. Only 70.6 percent of eligible Harvard students voted in the 2020 election, and I’m confident that like Cambridge residents overall, a far smaller percentage of students vote in municipal elections.

It took three deaths for me to start paying attention. It took three deaths for me to research that separated bike lanes save lives, to learn about those two City Council votes, to understand why local elections matter, to begin working to elect pro-bike safety councilors. It shouldn’t have taken even one.

As Harvard students, we make Cambridge our home, and we have a civic duty to make Cambridge safe for all. This fall, we can help elect a City Council that supports proven street safety measures. Nearly two-thirds of this year’s candidates have committed to completing Cambridge’s separated bike lane network on schedule — including six incumbents, four of whom have consistently voted to promote bike safety. But some of the remaining candidates are actively working against safe streets.

Harvard has almost 25,000 students, most of whom live in Cambridge and are eligible to vote if they are United States citizens. With only 23,339 total valid ballots cast in the 2023 municipal election, the political participation of Harvard students can make a real difference. The deadline to register to vote in the upcoming election is Oct. 25, and you don’t need a Massachusetts driver’s license to register by mail. The Institute of Politics’ Harvard Votes Challenge has helpful online registration resources.

The loss of my father left holes in so many areas of my life, and no matter how much time has passed — a day, a month, a year — these holes can never be filled. It’s been a little over a year since my mom woke me up in my room in Pforzheimer to tell me that my father died just a few hours earlier. I learned the hard way that bike and road safety, and the local politicians we elect, impact everyone.

These are issues that affect Harvard students and our neighbors every day. Lives are at stake. No other families need to be destroyed. What greater impact could you make during your time at Harvard?

Jack B. Corcoran ’25 is an organizer with Cambridge Bike Safety.