NYPD, agencies go extra mile to drive down traffic deaths
NYPD brass are joining forces with Transportation Department leaders and other city agencies to figure out novel ways to prevent traffic deaths in New York City.
The multiagency approach to tackling longstanding safety problems is now a regular part of the city’s response to street and highway fatalities, says Kim Royster, chief of the NYPD’s Transportation Bureau.
The NYPD’s data-driven CompStat program has guided crime prevention and law enforcement efforts since it was introduced in 1994. In weekly CompStat meetings at NYPD Headquarters, commanders review the data with NYPD brass and brainstorm solutions to problems.
NYPD traffic safety forums, introduced about two years ago, are taking that approach a step further by drawing in other agencies.
A case that came up at a recent forum involving Transportation and NYPD officials highlights the new thinking.
Panhandlers regularly seek money from drivers in the painted median of the intersection of Eastern Parkway and Schenectady Ave. in Crown Heights, Brooklyn — and two of them died in crashes there last year.
A case in October involved an alleged reckless driver who mowed down Walter Gonzalez, 56. Witnesses said the victim lived nearby and often sought money from motorists at the intersection.
Gonzalez was killed by a driver who entered the painted median area in order to get around a vehicle in front of him, police said. There’s no curb or traffic island denoting the median — just paint on the pavement. The driver was charged with vehicular manslaughter.
Another panhandler, identified by his family as Ronald Smith, died at the same intersection on an evening in April when he was struck in a crash involving a police van. A witness said he was also a regular panhandler at the intersection. Smith’s family has pursued legal action against the city in the case.
Eastern Parkway — deemed by the city the second-most-dangerous street in Brooklyn after Flatbush Ave. and known for having some of the city’s most dicey intersections — was the country’s first parkway. Its original use was for horse carriages and pedestrians.
But if there was more than just a painted area on the roadway, pedestrians might be safer today.
So the Department of Transportation is trying to figure out if the solution lies in a road redesign or, as the NYPD suggested, installing road stanchions to warn cars to stay out of the median.
Royster, referring to Gonzalez’s death, said there also needs to be a change in what she sees as pedestrian and vehicular “culture.”
“People thinking they can stand in those lines — that’s a culture,” she said. “[Drivers] thinking they can overtake a car in front of them — that’s a culture.”
Transportation Department officials appeared at the meeting virtually. Even though the participants were not in the same room, the exchange of info and ideas was more immediate than in the past, when the agencies just exchanged reports on incidents.
The city saw slightly fewer traffic deaths in 2022, the 255 reported fatalities representing a 7% drop from the 273 reported in 2021. The tally includes the deaths of 17 bicyclists, two fewer than the 19 reported in 2021 and 12 fewer than the 29 reported in 2019.
Pedestrian fatalities also dropped last year, to 118 from 126 the year before.
But some problems persist. In 2021 and 2022, 16 people died trying to walk across a highway, parkway or expressway.
One such death, captured on video the night of Oct. 19, shows a 44-year-old man crossing the Grand Central Parkway near 73rd St. — a half-block from a pedestrian overpass in Astoria, Queens. The victim was struck by a BMW driver.
Preventing such deaths isn’t merely a matter of law enforcement. Royster knows from the data that many pedestrians killed crossing multilane highways are some combination of homeless, intoxicated and mentally ill.
So what’s the fix? Police weren’t sure.
“We brought in [the city] Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, Homeless Services and
EMS,” Royster said. “We wanted to bring this particular issue to their awareness but also to ask them, ‘Is there something you’re seeing that we should be aware of?’
“That’s what we’re trying to figure out.”
A new city law required the Department of Transportation in 2022 to start sending investigators to every fatal or serious vehicle crash with an eye to seeing where streets can be improved through redesign or traffic signals and signs.
A one-block stretch in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn — Gates Ave. from Vanderbilt Ave. to Fulton St. — was turned into a pedestrian plaza following the 2021 death of 3-month-old Apolline Mong-Guillemin in a crash involving a reckless hit-and-run driver going the wrong way on Gates Ave. The driver was hit with a slew of charges including manslaughter.
Police and transportation officials working together decided the pedestrian plaza could help prevent future injuries and deaths at the scene.
Another purpose of the Traffic Safety Forum meetings is to get ahead of recurring problems, such as illegal electric scooters, dirt bikes and all-terrain vehicles.
Police have made a show of seizing the illegal ATVs, motorcycles and scooters by crushing them into scrap metal while reporters and film crews watch.
Their use dies down in the cold-weather months. At the January Traffic Safety Forum meeting, Royster asked officers to be ready for the illegal rides to return.
“Think about your plan going forward for the spring and summer,” she said. “Don’t wait for the spring and summer to start your plan.
“Your plan should start now.”