Wrong turn in Broadmoor

This was the scene in Broadmoor around midnight on Monday after a man who claimed to be driving to Everett crashed his car into two parked cars at high speed, flipping his car in the process.  A witness estimated that the man was traveling at about 50 miles per hour when the accident happened. The photo shows the man's upside-down vehicle, with a fire crew poised in the background. The incident occurred on the 1400 block of Broadmoor Drive E.

Police officers investigating the accident reported that the suspect appeared both drunk and "high on narcotics."  He was Mirandized and later taken to Harborview Medical Center, though he was not seriously injured.  No one else was hurt in the accident.

According to the SPD, the suspect told officers that he had left the "Buffalo Club" earlier in the evening and was driving to Everett when he must have taken a wrong turn and got lost in Broadmoor. The police report notes that the suspect was "several miles from the freeway" when he flipped his car.  A Broadmoor resident we spoke with told us he felt the suspect was probably trying to protect the person in Broadmoor whose home the suspect had been at before the accident.

The suspect was also concerned about protecting himself from his parole officer, telling an investigating SPD officer that he hoped the police wouldn't mention the incident and get him into trouble.   No such luck, however.  Although the suspect was released from Harborview, the case has been referred to the prosecutor.

Crossing fix underway

The City takes action

Readers of the frontpage headline in this month's Madison Park Times ("Accident spurs crosswalk improvements") may have had the impression that improvements had actually been made to the pedestrian street crossing in front of our neighborhood Wells Fargo. The serious accident there involving a pedestrian and a bicyclist in late August certainly warranted some changes.

Yet in spite of the fact that the Seattle Department of Transportation had told community leaders over a month ago that there was going to be an "immediate temporary fix" for the crosswalk, there had been no visible evidence of this intent---until today, that is. SDOT crews arrived late this morning to re-stripe the crosswalk and to paint the curbs red so that no parking will occur in the immediate vicinity of the crossing. Poor visibility is being blamed for the accident, which left the pedestrian seriously injured.

According to SDOT's Dongho Chang, what the City's doing today is only a first step in what may be a longer-term project to improve the site.  He said it's SDOT's intention to work with the community to determine what is the optimal way to improve safety at the McGivlra Boulevard/E. Madison Street intersection. "We want to be thoughtful about what we can do to influence people's behavior," he told us. Possible safety measures might include the introduction of in-street planters, curb bulbs, new signage or new lighting. Anything major might require that the community apply for a grant to cover infrastructure costs, he noted.

Curb bubs

[An editorial aside:  Those who did not read the Madison Park Times story in detail may have missed the fact that the injured pedestrian, Dan Miller, a resident of Washington Park, is on the mend and is expected to make a full recovery. Although we learned of Miller's identity soon after running our original story on the accident, several readers who said they knew the Miller family asked that we not disclose what we knew so that Miller and his family could begin the rehabilitation process outside of the spotlight. We honored that request for privacy.]

Oops!

Driver gets off track

In fairness, it was a very rainy afternoon yesterday, with lower visibility than usual. Also, part of the roadway was missing. For the driver of this vehicle, reportedly an elderly woman (though she disputes the description), the combination of unusual factors was unfortunate. This was the scene in front of Broadmoor at about 5 pm, after the car entered the construction zone.  The driver was apparently unharmed, though perhaps a little embarrassed (though she says her actual emotion was anger---over the fact that the construction area was not properly covered).

[Photo courtesy of Nancy and Paul Dobrin.]

A plea for safer crossings

Several dozen concerned members of the community turned out yesterday morning for a "vigil" to focus attention on the need to make our streets safer for everyone who uses them, whether pedestrian, biker, or vehicle driver. The catalyst for the event was the recent pedestrian/cyclist accident in the crosswalk at E. Madison near McGilvra Boulevard, which left one man hospitalized with life-threatening injuries. It was noted during the vigil that the injured pedestrian may be someone who lives in the neighborhood and has a family here. There was a moment of silence in support of his recovery.

Event organizer Bob Edmiston, a member of the Community Council, noted that the crosswalk in question has been the site of at least ten accidents in the last three years, and a total of 57 incidents have been recorded there over the last ten years.  He stated that safety concerns about the crossing were raised with the City prior to the accident. The mayor's attendance at yesterday's event--and the press coverage which ensued--may signal that this tragic incident has prompted a new awareness of the problem by those in a position to do something about it.

And speaking of safer crossings...

After

Redesigned intersection open in time for school

It only took construction crews two weeks to reconfigure the north side of the intersection of 37th Avenue E. and E. Madison Street.  The new and much improved meeting of the roads began receiving vehicular traffic on Friday.

The redesign was prompted by an accident at that location two years ago, when a boy on his way to school at McGilvra Elementary was struck by a car. The driver said that because of limited visibility she did not see the student, who was on his bike heading east on the Madison Street sidewalk. When she pulled forward to merge onto Madison, the boy sped into the path of her oncoming car.  Fortunately, the boy fully recovered from his injuries.

Last year it was announced that the 37th & E. Madison intersection reconfiguration had been approved for funding under the City's Safe Routes to School Program.  As can be seen by comparing the before and after pictures, visibility has been significantly enhanced.

Before

Police investigating accident

Vigil planned

The tragic early-morning collision of a cyclist with a pedestrian on Friday has prompted a Seattle Police investigation, we learned today. The incident has also motivated a group of concerned community members to plan a vigil at the site of the accident. The purpose of the vigil is to heighten awareness of the inadequate pedestrian safety measures at the crosswalk and, presumably, put pressure on the City to take corrective action.

The Seattle Police Department's public information officer, Mark Jamieson, has confirmed that the Traffic Collisions Investigation Squad of the SPD has started looking into the
accident. This does not mean, however, that anyone should assume that this is a criminal incident. The investigation was triggered by the seriousness of the injuries to the pedestrian, he noted. Jamieson told us that this kind of investigation often takes months to complete and typically involves the interviewing of witnesses and reconstruction of the accident scene. Investigative techniques include taking photos and measuring distances to determine such things such as speed and velocity. When the investigation is completed, he said, SPD will send a recommendation to the Prosecutor's office, where the determination will ultimately be made on whether to charge anyone with a criminal act.

Although many readers have asked us to follow up on the accident victim's condition, we have been unable to learn anything other than what was in the initial report from the Fire Department, which was first on the scene Friday with its emergency personnel. At that time the SFD reported that the victim apparently had no I.D. on his person. He may therefore have been admitted to Harborview Medical Center as a "John Doe."  The hospital was unable to provide any information to us when we checked with their press officer today.

As a result of privacy laws, we may learn nothing further about this accident for some time.  Without any charges having been filed, the police will not give out the names of anyone involved in the accident, including witnesses.  This is standard procedure, according to Jamieson. The police, however, are likely to know by now who the victim is, since his cell phone was reportedly found down the block from the point of impact. The Fire Department, meanwhile, is referring inquiries to both the SPD and the hospital. Because of partient-privacy laws, however, Harborview is limited in its ability to provide information to the public even when the patient's name is known.

Meanwhile, Alice Lanczos of the Madison Park Community Council, notified us today that a vigil is planned for 10:00 on Saturday morning to be held in front of the Madison Park Wells Fargo branch, where the accident took place last week. She told us that while the Community Council has been trying to get the City's attention to the problem, this particular crosswalk did not seem to be a priority for the government because there weren't enough "documented accidents" to warrant corrective measures.  She, the Council, and other concerned community members are hoping that the Saturday vigil will help focus attention on this site and get the priorities changed.

Cyclist severely injures pedestrian in crosswalk

Horrific accident apparently resulted from inattention

At about 8:40 this morning, an unidentified man described as being in his 40's or 50's was struck by a bicyclist at the crosswalk in front of the Wells Fargo branch near the intersection of E. Madison Street and McGilvra Boulevard E.  The man was knocked to the ground unconscious and suffered what are described as life-threatening head injuries as a result of the collision.  According to a witness, the man was convulsing when the ambulances arrived. He was taken to Harborview Hospital, but information on his condition has not been released.

The cyclist was reportedly traveling at a fairly high speed down Madison, heading towards the water, when the pedestrian stepped into the crosswalk on the Wells Fargo side of the street. A witness stated that the man appeared to be on his cell phone, stepped into the street from behind a tree, and did not look to his left when starting across the street.  The cyclist, who is reported to be 26 years old, attempted to slow down but was unable to stop before the man wandered into the path of the bike. A witness estimated that the bicycle may have been traveling 30 miles an hour at the point of collision. The cyclist was also injured in the accident, but a report by KOMO states that these were only scrapes and cuts.

Wells Fargo's branch manager, Michael Morrow, who saw the accident, told us that there have been at least nine accidents at that crosswalk in the three years he's been in the job.  He says there's a lack of visibility both for those crossing the street and those traveling on Madison. In this incident, he said, "cars were parked on both sides of the south end of the crosswalk, the site lines were blocked, the pedestrian did not see the cyclist nor the other way around, and the cyclist was going too fast."  He notes it could just as easily have been a car that hit the pedestrian.

Morrow was already involved with the efforts of the Madison Park Business Association and the Community Council to get a Seattle city grant to improve the crosswalk. Among the ideas suggested, he told us, are a raised crosswalk (as in the Arboretum), a concrete pedestrian "refuge island" (as on E. Madison in front of the Broadmoor entrance), and redesigned curbs to the west and east of the crosswalk in order to prevent cars from parking too close and blocking visibility.  New signage, flashing lights, and speed bumps are other potential alternatives that SDOT could consider, though some of these ideas might not be practical for this intersection. The city, according to Morrow, was already well aware of the hazard to pedestrians at this site, but today's accident may heighten efforts to fix the problem.

One dangerous intersection

This is the intersection of E. Madison Street and 37th Avenue E., located adjacent to the southeast corner of Broadmoor's enclosing wall.  It was at this intersection that on a rainless morning last September a student riding his bicycle to McGilvra Elementary was hit by a car and seriously injured.  Police reportedly determined that the driver of the vehicle was not at fault since the driver, when stopped at the stop sign facing south on 37th, could not have seen the boy on the bicycle, who was heading east on the sidewalk. The child apparently didn't stop at the intersection before heading into the path of the oncoming car, which was turning right onto Madison.

We admittedly missed this story at the time the incident occurred. This, in spite of the fact that he happened upon the scene shortly after the accident.  We mistakenly believed that there had no serious injuries, and we were only disabused of this idea when we sat through the greenways presentation at a meeting of the Madison Park Community Council last month. The incident was used as an example of what can happen when there are not well-designed bicycle paths and good lines of sight between vehicle drivers and pedestrians and cyclists. Because of the location and configuration of Broadmoor's wall, this particular intersection is relatively blind unless a car pulls forward of the stop line.

The reason for reporting this story now, a full six months after the accident, is twofold: 1) it is a cautionary tale that all drivers should take note of, especially given that there are also other difficult intersections in the neighborhood where vehicles and children can meet in unpleasant ways, and 2) Broadmoor could give serious consideration to changing the configuration of that particular corner of its property in order to provide better sight lines.

According to Maurice Cooper, a longtime resident, Broadmoor will soon be doing some reconstruction on several brick columns of the wall near community's Madison Street gate.  Knowing this, he says he had raised the subject of extending the work to include redoing the brickwork at the 37th Avenue corner of Broadmoor to re-angle that section of the wall. He introduced the idea at a recent meeting of Broadmoor residents, he reports, and is hopeful that the community will take the necessary action.

In the meantime, for this intersection and others, it's driver beware.

[The McGilvra student injured in the accident reportedly recovered fully from his injuries and was able to return to school quickly.]

It could have been much worse

This was the scene at about 9:00 am today at the intersection of E. Madison Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Way E., half an hour or so following an accident that left two cars totalled and sent one driver to the hospital with minor injuries. A dump truck hauling rock was headed east down Madison when, according to its driver, the brakes failed. After hitting the two cars, the driver swerved off the street and stopped his vehicle by raming into the brick wall of Madison Cleaners. Neither the driver nor the wall was seriously damaged in the accident, though the truck sure was.

My neighbor Jim Waltz, who covered the story as a cameraman for KIRO-TV, told me that the police administered the mandatory sobriety test to the truck driver, who in an on-camera interview with the station said that he swerved to avoid hitting additional cars and thought the brick wall should do the job of stopping the truck. It did.

Another of my neighbors was a witness to accident. He was sitting at the counter of Essential Bakery looking out the window when he saw the truck coming down the hill at a very very fast rate, he told me. The truck hit a parked car sitting at the curb (with the driver in it), careened through the intersection, hit a car turning into the Madison Cleaners parking lot, and then smashed into the wall. From his vantage point it did not seem to be a controlled crash. More of an out-of-control smashup.

Thanks to Barbie Hull of Barbie Hull Photography for the great shots: