By Jennifer Warren
A Green Line bus struck a 43-year-old pedestrian on Queens Boulevard at 71st Avenue at 7 p.m. Monday night, police said, the latest casualty in a string of deaths and injuries that have rocked the neighborhoods that line the borough’s main thoroughfare.
The accident occurred just days after three city council members whose districts cover sections of Queens Boulevard agreed to back funding for pedestrian count-down lights, which they hoped would help prevent such incidents on what had become a speedway through the borough.
The pedestrian, who was not identified, was grazed by the bus and suffered only minor injuries, declining medical treatment at North Shore Hospital, said police spokeswoman Carolyn Chew.
Three weeks ago, another Green Line bus struck and killed 83-year-old Holocaust survivor Eugene Eisenberg as he crossed Queens Boulevard at 82nd Road. And on Feb. 7 three people were hit by cars on or near the boulevard and on Feb. 14 a 62-year-old man was struck as he was using the crosswalk at 67th Road.
Since 1993 more than 70 pedestrians have been struck and killed along Queens Boulevard, the seven-mile stretch that runs 12 lanes wide at some points and has been a constant threat to those who decide to cross on foot.
In recent weeks police and city Department of Transportation agents have cracked down on the boulevard, cutting the speed limit to 30 mph from 35 mph on some stretches, ticketing speeders, jay walkers and drivers who fail to yield to pedestrians in a crosswalk as well as illegal parkers. They have also installed safety fences on the boulevard’s median islands, repainted crosswalks for greater visibility, and have increased the number of seconds that pedestrians are given before the light changes.
Traffic slowed noticeably during the ticketing blitzes, frequent users of the boulevard said.
City Council members Walter McCaffrey (D-Woodside), Karen Koslowitz (D-Forest Hills) and John Sabini (D-Jackson Heights), whose districts are intersected by Queens Boulevard, said they would include the count-down lights in this spring’s proposal for the 2001-2002 city budget.
The lights are traditional crossing signals equipped with a digital, second-by-second countdown, enabling pedestrians to know the amount of time remaining when crossing the boulevard. They are already in use in Boston, New Haven and other cities.
“We think that [the lights] make great sense,” McCaffrey said. “And certainly someone who sees the flashing hand sign doesn’t know if the hand means they have one second of grace time or eight seconds of grace time. The numbers would end up telling them to not use the crosswalk or to go to the next available median.”
The countdown or smart lights, which cost less than $500 each, are actually kits that are attached to the existing lights. McCaffrey expects about 20 of them to be placed in his district in Woodside.
Laurie Phelan, president of Eyes Voice Ears of New York City, a civic activist group, who is spearheading the smart lights campaign, said, “I’d rather know how much time I have rather than not know anything. This way there’s no more second-guessing.”
Phelan initially approached the DOT about the technology two years ago when she first learned of it. At the time, she said, she received no response from the department.
In past weeks, she called again, but this time added to her call list several city council members. She said she got the same brush-off from DOT, but the interest of the three council members from Queens was piqued.
McCaffrey said he hoped the lights would be seen by DOT as a pilot program, especially since he and his fellow council members would be paying for them out of their council district budgets.
DOT spokesman Tom Cocola said department officials would consider the lights, but he said they were concerned that some pedestrians might interpret the countdown as a cue to race across the street.
“If you get 10 seconds, some people will wait and then run to see how quickly they can get across,” Cocola said. “But we’re open to virtually any measure that we can do.”
Phelan proposed the lights for eight intersections along Queens Boulevard: Sunnyside at 46th Street; Elmhurst at 51st Avenue, Broadway and Grand Avenue; Rego Park at 66th Avenue; Forest Hills at Yellowstone Boulevard, 70th Road, 71st Avenue, and 75th Avenue. But exact locations are still under discussion.
Reach reporter Jennifer Warren by e-mail at Timesledgr@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 155.
