@ReporterJenna writes that there was another pedestrian injured today, this time near the Burr School in Auburndale. The dog the woman was walking was killed. This time, the driver was cited for failure to yield at a crosswalk.
Another pedestrian struck by motorist near a school
by Adam Peller | Jan 27, 2020 | Newton | 20 comments
We need Newton Police to conduct enforcement. I was struck a few years back in the pedestrian crosswalk on Beacon Street outside the Bank of America in Newton Centre. The motorist was cited. We also need to more clearly mark our crosswalks in our Village Centers.
@Peter Karg, not just the crosswalks in our village centers but especially those on our straightaways, where vehicles have a head of steam as they approach the crosswalks. And at dusk and in the evening, it is dicing with death to cross on underlit crosswalks. It is quite terrifying, and appalling that this poor woman was injured and her poor dog was killed while she was legally crossing the road on a pedestrian crossing.
We all need to slow down and look out for each other. Some people when they drive, act as though the roads of Newton (Brookline and Boston) are their own personal speedway and anything in their way gets mowed down.
Slow down
Allow extra time to get to your destination
Anticipate pedestrians at crosswalks
Stop at stop signs
Yield when needed
@Marie Jackson – I agree. We need to better mark our crosswalks. The Town of Needham has done a great job using blinking lights to slow traffic and marking crosswalks in green, They had a tragedy two years ago, when two Needham High students were struck and killed outside Needham High School at dusk. Newton must do better.
A few years ago, I was hit by a car when I was in a crosswalk in Newton. It was severe enough to cause broken bones. This driver was also cited for failure to yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk, which has a maximum fine of, I believe, $200. I don’t mean to be vindictive, but that seems like a slap on the wrist to me.
NewtonHighlander,
I totally agree that your broken bones was more suffering than a $200 ticket plus the increase of the driver’s insurance.
While not disagreeing with any of the above commentary, *assuming* that the crosswalk is the one photo’d in the Patch article, I don’t know how much more we can do.
I pass by that crosswalk at least twice a day; it is well marked, governed by a dedicated traffic light, and staffed by an actual patrolman (not a crossing guard) at busy times.
From a street design perspective…I’m tapped out on what else to do here. This comes down to influencing driver behavior (presumably by increasing penalties).
@Marie Jackson. The intersection of Chestnut Street and Summer Street near where you live is the worst of the worst. I’m amazed there haven’t been any fatalities. Here’s the problem. Motorists point the blame at bicyclists; bicyclists point the blame at motorists and pedestrians point the blame at both bicyclists and motorists. In recent years, I’ve seen many boneheaded moves by all three and have been guilty of a few boneheaded moves myself. I know this will come across as a rant from an old man, but people are simply in too much of a hurry and too impatient and there is a frustrating since of entitlement by many including a few weeks back when an idiot honked at me to hurry up while I was in the crosswalk on Lincoln Street across from the Walnut Foods market. I just stopped and glared at him.
This is a failure of design. Paint cannot save us when there is a pedestrian on a street and a heavy SUV speeding along at 35mph. It also puts us in a real bind. On the one hand we have people complaining about traffic and how long it takes to drive across the city. On the other is the fact that to make pedestrians safer we need to slow down drivers.
Keep in mind, we have a city councilor who has gone on record as proudly saying “Newton is a city where people drive.”
If we want to solve this problem we need to be committed to prioritizing the safety of people OUTSIDE the cars. This isn’t where the automakers put their attention. I saw a commercial recently from Nissan in which a car is driving down a street where every pedestrian is on their phone and wandering into the path of the car. The driver is “kept safe” inside from all those dangerous pedestrians. This isn’t the reality I live in, it’s quite the opposite.
SUVs now have front grills that are 5 feet high and can act as battering rams when they hit a person. A TV station showed that you can line up a whole bunch of kids in the blind spot right in front of a truck like that. Well-designed vehicles take pedestrian safety into account with lower front ends and better visibility.
If we want better we need to demand better. Asking for painted lines and cops to be every intersection isn’t enough. We need to redesign our roads to slow cars down and provide public transportation so we can move more people.
Until then, we’ll just need to run across the street and pray we don’t get hit.
If Newton truly wants to encourage drivers out of their cars and on to walking sidewalks, then it has an obligation to make pedestrian street crossings as safe as possible. As an example, there is more than needed either a red light, or blinking light, at dangerous intersections such as Kingman/Berwick and Walnut. A complete red light would be preferable, concomitantly safely to allow frequent hazardous vehicular left turns from Kingman to Walnut, as well as create a gap in traffic for frequent hazardous vehicular left turns to Walnut from Lakeside and Duncklee, as well as pedestrian street crossings in that stretch containing bus stops.
That the City would leave these hazardous conditions to continue, after previous notice and many near misses, seems puzzling. In fact there have been serious accidents on that stretch. Must the City wait for a fatality or another serious injury?
This is really sad. That poor dog and its owner.
Newton is not pedestrian-friendly. I have a ten year old who would like to start walking to school independently. There’s one street that I will not let him cross unsupervised because it’s a 4-way stop where people (usually making right turns) just roll right through. It’s really distressing.
@Peter Karg, what evidence do you have that marking crosswalks is the problem? Was this crosswalk not well marked? There was a traffic signal, too. The problem is that the roads are too forgiving and drivers aren’t paying attention. Bad combination. All the paint in the world won’t fix that. We need to invest in better pedestrian facilities and traffic calming that forces drives to slow down (not like the way it was done at the Lexington Street crossing where this occurred)
No, Needham did a very poor job responding to the fatalities at the intersection outside the high school. Instead of forcing drivers to slow down, they’re now making signs flash, hoping people will pay attention. They’re doing the same for some of their less effective stop signs. Should drivers now not pay attention to signs that don’t flash? What happens when drivers are used to flashing lights on signs? What do we add then?
@Donald Ross plenty could be done. Instead of a rumble strip down the middle preserving a straight path for traffic, chicanes could be added to narrow the road and make it uncomfortable to speed. Vertical traffic calming like a raised crossing is another tool. But a comprehensive approach is probably needed to calm traffic along the road, not just at a single point.
I agree with Adam that Needham’s blinking yield and stop signs offer at best transient benefit. As anything becomes more common it becomes less attention-getting – that’s basically the definition of “common” and “attention-getting”.
Actual visibility of the signs generally isn’t the issue. Retroreflective signs are almost always visible (rural locations on twisty roads being a possible exception). It’s that drivers aren’t attentive to them. And that can be for a variety of reasons.
RRFBs (rectangular rapid flash beacons) are significantly better because they are pedestrian-activated: they light up only when a pedestrian is waiting to cross or crossing. Distinctive flashing pattern = look for a pedestrian. The high safety condition remains an exception, and drivers don’t get used to it. That’s even more important in Newton, where pedestrians on the side of the road are often not very visible during the evening, night, or early morning.
I would personally wait to see what the police report says about this crash. It’s a full signal, after all. Generally drivers are looking for those. The sight lines are pretty reasonable. There may be other issues at work (no mast arm signal since it was hit by a tree some time ago, possible changes in pavement marking, etc), but this isn’t exactly a hidden crosswalk.
To Adam’s point, though, slow speeds improve survivability even when people make mistakes. If we admit to human fallibility, whatever may cause it, we need to build an infrastructure more forgiving of those failings. In the 1950’s, that meant easier driving. Today, it means safety for all road users. Lower speeds means more reaction time and less kinetic energy.
I’ll chime in about Newton Corner- I had held off commenting on the last thread as it was elsewhere (as is this), but we seem to have a new trend.
I’m waiting for something bad to happen in the Newton Corner “Circle of Death.” Just this morning before work (walking to the Y and then back to the bus stop), I had 6 cars race by me while I was attempting to cross:
– 1 running the red light at the Pike Westbound on ramp (Quite common)
– 3(!) running the same red light – at high speed- by the 400 Centre St Bus stop.
– 2 at the crosswalk at Richardson and Centre; it’s a rare day when someone doesn’t zoom through the crosswalk while I am in it, attempting to cross.
Yeah, so solution? Traffic calming, definitely, I agree (I’ll leave it to traffic engineers to design the how). Enforcement, yes, as I feel (without empirical proof) that that has worked at least to a degree in Newton Centre and Newtonville.
I saw the whole thing and consoled the woman while awaiting the responders. The truck that hit her didn’t even slow down until after she and her dog were hit. If I had to guess the driver was likely distracted. How can you not see a red light and a pedestrian in front of you?
Prediction: as the many and monstrous developments come online traffic (inevitably!) increases along with road rage and incidents as described. Buckle up, folks. It’s going to get a lot worse. And don’t forget to put the blame where it belongs. Some may find blood on their hands. Already that of a poor woman’s little dog. 🙁
Oh please – this accident happened at 9:40am, well after rush hour. Reports are that the pedestrian had a walk signal and the driver had a red light. There is absolutely no evidence that traffic congestion or road rage had ANYTHING to do with it. Trying to use it to further your agenda is sad.
Pat – do we know that either of the drivers were from Newton? I believe up to 70% of the traffic on Needham St is cut through, neither starting nor ending in Newton.
Last Tuesday at 5 pm I was driving from Needham to Cambridge, the best routes on both Google Maps and Waze directed me to local streets through Newton. The 2nd best recommended routes were local streets through Newton too.
Unfortunately, we can’t stop traffic driving through Newton or make our cut through streets, like Needham St, toll roads. It’s against state law.
I think there’s evidence that greater numbers of pedestrians near higher density development increases pedestrian safety. Pedestrians are then the rule, not the exception.
“And don’t forget to put the blame where it belongs.” Yes, let’s not. It is on the driver. This is a crash, not an accident. Drivers are responsible for their behavior, actions, and consequences.
“Some may find blood on their hands. Already that of a poor woman’s little dog.” Not seeing how ghoulishness is going to help us solve these important problems.