January 16, 2007
Blogger Hit and Run on the LES
All too often we write about hit and run incidents, but this past weekend, blogger, friend of Gothamist and many others, John Carney, was hit at 5:30am in the Lower East Side. The intersection is one we've crossed often, Allen and Delancey. From dpstyles Flickr:
"The whole thing happened late Saturday night (around 5:30am???) down on Delancey + Allen...walking west crossing Allen and John got clipped out of nowhere as a car took the corner too fast (if you've ever crossed this intersection you'll know what I'm talking about).Carney is in the hospital with a severely broken leg (and no wifi according to the official report); doctors are performing surgery today. We hope you get better soon, John!The car threw him in the air and into the street (hence cuts to the face) and the driver just took off. Luckily people on the street (at 5am!) were able to help out."
The New York Post recently reported on hit and run accidents, stating there were around 40 accidents and 42 deaths last year in the city. Experts say drivers "run" because they are drunk or lack insurance or a license. Even if all of the most dangerous intersections seem to be in Queens, an insurance-less driver without a conscience can hit you anywhere. Even the Lower East Side. So be careful out there - and perhaps add Delancey and Allen to our most feared intersections list.
Related: Park Avenue shot down a proposal to put barriers at the medians, to give pedestrians more protections from cars, and Brooklyn's Community Board 7 is holding a public forum to discuss truck routes tonight, in the wake of a casket truck fatally hitting a child.
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Two Fridays ago I was crossing Allen at Delancey whe a driver turned off Delancey and slipped between some crossing pedestrians. I had been crossing a little ways down from the painted white lines of the pedestrian crosswalk and he slowed his car down as he approached me and then hit the gas, gunning the car and braking just in time to hit me and knock me over but not run me over. It was a frightening experience - that intersection is a liability.
Two Fridays ago I was crossing Allen at Delancey whe a driver turned off Delancey and slipped between some crossing pedestrians. I had been crossing a little ways down from the painted white lines of the pedestrian crosswalk and he slowed his car down as he approached me and then hit the gas, gunning the car and braking just in time to hit me and knock me over but not run me over. It was a frightening experience - that intersection is a liability.
I think people need to be more aware of license plate numbers. i saw a car take off after hitting someone and the first thing i thought of was the plate number.
i'd say crossing a street not in the crosswalk is more of a liability.
but still, that intersection can get pretty gnarly.
Tumbleweed it sounds like he hit you on purpose.
Yawn. Old News. This story broke on WordHumper yesterday.
Yawn. Old News. This story broke on WordHumper yesterday.
I live on Allen below Delancey and have almost been hit so many times at that intersection (particularly crossing Delancey on the East side of the street). What's even more amazing is that there are now one or two traffic cops guiding traffic at that intersection during the morning and evening rushes, but even then they do nothing to stop reckless driving.
Anyone who knows this area should know better. You need to be very careful, or better yet, don't cross there!
Doesn't matter where you cross Delancey. If westbound traffic is turning right onto any of the intersecting streets, 3 out of 5 cars will come blazing through the turns as if there is no pedestrian right-of-way. The number of times I've almost been run down at Delancey and Bowery is appalling, and it's a shame that you can't bust people for driving poorly and almost hitting people...
wisdom or sadism, which are we?
hit and run drivers run for the same reason kids in trouble run from angry adults: we are a punitive society not a problem-solving society. And as long as we want (or believe we need) vengence more than solutions it will continue to be that way.
In Bloomberg NYC this is all entirely acceptable. There is no penalty for driving like a sociopath. There is no attempt made to make people stop. The guiding directive is "keep the traffic moving." Nothing more.
There are hit and runs in Manhattan all the time, FYI. I was run over by a truck in Chinatown three months ago and only just got off of my crutches. When ten bones in your foot are broken when you were crossing with the light, in the crosswalk, your number one concern is not plate number. It's getting out of the street before another driver runs over you and drives off too.
"And as long as we want (or believe we need) vengence more than solutions it will continue to be that way."
Yeah, we need to ban all cars. Oh, I know, lets ban dodgeball, and then, using abortion, we can breed the aggressiveness out everyone (except the social engineering czars like you who will lead us to paradise).
It is not wrong to punish appropriately for mistakes or for intentional law-breaking.
Sort of like you being verbally slapped around for not using a spell-checker. (It's VENGEANCE). See, you are more likely to use one next time.