An elderly man was hit by an SUV around 5 p.m. on Saturday as he crossed 72nd Street on Columbus Avenue. The man had a walk signal and the SUV crashed into him as it turned from Columbus onto 72nd, two witnesses told me. The man was carried by stretcher to an ambulance and taken to St. Luke’s Hospital, but he was able to talk, witnesses said. He apparently lived nearby. As of 9 p.m., police did not have a report on the incident and it was unclear whether the driver was charged. (As of Sunday afternoon, there was still apparently no report). We’ll update if we learn more.
The NYPD has been under pressure in recent months for rarely bringing charges against drivers who injure or kill pedestrians.
Top photo by Ken Lupano. Bottom photo by Avi.
To the gentleman who was hit — I hope you have a full and speedy recovery.
To the driver — I hope you take full responsibility for your actions. There’s no excuse for this. It appears you entered the crosswalk and hit the pedestrian from behind. I’ve witnessed a similar type of accident at West End Avenue and 95th Street. It’s horrible.
To the witnesses of this accident who gave their contact info to the NYPD — write an account of what you witnessed today. Note as many details as possible. It sometimes takes months before anyone calls you about the accident. When they do call, you’ll be glad you had your own report to refer to. Know that the report that will be written by the NYPD will never be as complete as your own report.
It’s very important to do this, and step up when you get the calls from investigating parties. The last accident I witnessed I had three contants — a taped phone call interview from an insurance agent; a face-to-face meeting with a PI who was hired by the attorney’s office representing the pedestrian (it was scheduled at a location and time that was convenient for me); another face-to-face meeting with another PI who was working for the driver.
Thanks so much for reading & peace.
Drivers in this neighborhood continuously run red lights and show very little respect toward pedestrians. I’ve nearly been hit twice on Riverside Drive while trying to cross into the park when I have the walk light. I don’t trust that anyone will stop when they’re supposed to! What can we do to have the red light cameras put up? Can fines be increased for these types of violations?
As a car owner who lives down the street from this accident site, I can say that the crossings around here are really dangerous for both pedestrians and drivers. The area is so populated, there are so many people in the crosswalks, particularly on the weekend, it’s hard to turn a car before the light changes. (I’m not making an excuse for the person in the SUV. Cars should absolutely not try to squeak through after the light changes to red. Nica is right – hopefully witnesses can record and provide precise descriptions of the incident.) For pedestrians, there isn’t a lot of time to get across the avenue, although it’s gotten better at 72nd and Amsterdam. It’s a recipe for tragedy, like this. I hope the man who was struck wasn’t too badly injured.
beth, there’s no excuse for these collisions. From what we read, the pedestrian clearly had the right of way. Just to say there are ‘so many people in the crosswalks’ is no excuse for injuring or killing a pedestrian. If there’s a pedestrian in the crosswalk, stop. Period. This driver should be ticketed for failing to yield ROW, but he probably won’t be cuz the cops will claim they didn’t see it.
In addition, there is a ‘due care’ standard. As the driver of a 5000 lb vehicle, you are supposed to exercise due care to avoid striking and injuring or killing pedestrians. Since it appears there were no mitigating factors (rain, snow, lack of visibility, pedestrian jumping out from between two parked cars), even if the pedestrian _didn’t_ have the ROW, he has failed to exercise due care.
Violating ROW plus failing to exercise due care should have earned him a vehicular assault charge. But since most of the cops live in the burbs and think that the car is king, this driver walks and the victim will be lucky to get the driver’s insurance to pay for his (hopefully not grievous) injuries.
I drive too, btw.
Denton, I don’t disagree with anything you said. As I said, I wasn’t excusing for the SUV driver and he/she should experience the consequences. A car is going to win, no matter what, no matter if the other person is on foot or on a bike, etc. If there are people are in the crosswalk, you simply don’t attempt to drive through it. That said, the crosswalks can be tricky to navigate at times.
Just yesterday I watched a man cross in a cross walk with a “walk” signal at Amsterdam at 96th. As he’s crossing he gets honked at and then cursed out by a driver who stopped in the intersection to roll down her window and yell at the man and say he needed to watch where he was going while she turned. I understand driving in the city is tricky, but what is more important, the safety of pedestrians or getting your “turn” in line? This feeling of driving entitlement never ceases to amaze me.
The title and first sentence of this very article are part of the problem! The man wasn’t hit “by an SUV”, rather he was hit by a person *driving* an SUV. Read a few stories and you’ll see how the vehicles are constantly being anthropomorphized and shielding the drivers from responsibility. The perception is that those cars and trucks are wild animals that you had best stay out of the way of! If someone jumped into the Lion’s cage at the zoo and got mauled, you wouldn’t be angry with the Lion, right? We shouldn’t be saying people were hit/killed by cars any more than we would say, “A man walking in the park was killed by a baseball bat.”