Community Corner

Neighors Express Concern Over Site of Kennedy Accident

Residents worked six years ago to get modifications made, but most say the city didn't do enough.

Pat Hurley says he knew it would happen eventually.

The 192 Ashland Road resident has been expressing concern over the 5-point intersection where 55-year-old Carlyse Kennedy was hit by a car near the intersection of Mountain Avenue and Devon Road for 14 years. Kennedy died at Morristown Memorial Hospital following the accident.

“The design allows for speed,” he said. “The whole intersection is designed for high speed.”

Corina Borg and her husband Josh have now put together a letter from residents of Plymouth Road and the surrounding neighborhood in response to Kennedy’s death.

“The residents of Plymouth Road are deeply saddened by today’s tragedy and pray that it will never happen again,” the letter—with more then 50 signatures—reads. “We hope that Mayor Glatt and fellow City Council members take special interest in this matter and enact corrective measures quickly to insure a safer environment for Summit residents and their children.”

But 6 years ago Hurley and several of his neighbors teamed up to take matters into their own hands. They wanted something done about this stretch of roads before an accident did occur.

“The city has tried, probably not as aggressively as they could, to get something done,” he said.

However Mountain Avenue is a county road, which complicates matters.  Hurley said six years ago residents proposed all manner of solutions, including rumble strips.

“We were told you’re not allowed to have rumble strips for environmental reasons, because of the noise pollution,” he recalled.

After the city engineer recommended a “calming traffic circle” which many residents opposed, the city made what Hurley and many other residents call minor modifications.

“They took out a crosswalk from Plymouth to Pine Grove,” Hurley said. The turnoff from Ashland Road to Mountain Avenue was also tweaked from an approximately 30-degree turn to a 65-degree turn.

But what residents really wanted, Hurley says, is for the entire intersection to be squared off, with stop signs at every corner.

“If they have to stop, the speed goes away,” he said.

Hurley also was outraged last week when he saw county public works employees removing school caution warnings painted on Mountain Avenue.

Six years after modifications were made, Hurley still feels the city only addressed half the problem.

“They look at it mathematically,” he said. “They don’t look at how many crosswalks or where they are placed.”

The corner where Kennedy was struck Sept. 28 does not have a crosswalk.

“In hindsight, we feel we should have been more aggressive,” he said.


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