Crash Reality Check, From The Front Lines

As another fatal crash has refocused New Haven’s attention on how to make streets safer, two cops used to firsthand encounters with collisions offered tempered words of wisdom about seeming quick fixes.

Such as: Traffic ​“islands are great — unless you’re driving over them.”

Or: ​“Cars will go as fast as you let them.”

And, of course: ​“When metal meets flesh at any speed, bad things are going to happen.”

Lt. Rob Criscuolo, the police department’s deputy patrol commander, and Officer David Hartman, police spokesman, offered those and other observations during a conversation Wednesday on WNHH radio’s ​“Dateline New Haven” program about the cop’s‑eye view on traffic-calming, a perspective not always heard in impassioned city debates on how to cut down on the 20-plus local collisions that occur every day.

The officers appeared on the program two weeks after a driver killed a 42-year-old nurse standing on a sidewalk at the perilous intersection of York Street and South Frontage Road. The city’s transit chief revealed to solution-seeking alders that New Haven had 7,800 reported car crashes in the fiscal year 2015 (the most recent available statistics), up from 6,600 the year before.

The York-South Frontage crash, in which the driver drove straight through a left-turn lane that ended, was the second fatal collision there in nine years. In that time, people all over town have launched a citywide ​“traffic-calming” movement, leading to speed bumps, pedestrian-safety campaigns, roundabouts, and soon, protected two-way bike lanes. Meanwhile, the number of cyclists has increased on New Haven streets.

Criscuolo said that New Haven doesn’t generally have more crashes than comparable cities, such as Bridgeport and Hartford. He and Hartman agreed New Haven doesn’t have a traffic-safety crisis. Most of the collisions are minor; about 12 to 15 a year are serious enough to cause the police crash investigation team to launch a probe. On average, four to eight pedestrians die in crashes each year, and are often technically at fault, though high-speeding drivers are also a major factor, Criscuolo said. (Four separate fatal crashes in January warranted investigations, according to Criscuolo.)

But they also agreed about the need to find ways to make streets safer. And they agreed cops spend way too much time responding to crashes. Each day sees an average of 20 or 21 crashes. That means around seven times per eight-hour shift, up to five cops at a time are tied up directing traffic, preserving evidence, interviewing witnesses, time they could spend preventing or responding to other crimes.

But traffic-calming fixes don’t always produce the results people envision, Hartman observed.

“They [recently] put a speed hump in Westville on Chapel Street close to Alston.

“I have a friend who lives pretty much across from this new speed hump. She observed for the first week or so cars were approaching that speed hump and going very slowly. Until they realized their car shook a lot less if they hit at 30 miles per hour. I agree with the speed hump being there. What I’m saying is, there’s a counteractive result, even though it’s still necessary: Some people have learned now if you hit them at faster speeds, you’re going to get over them with less rattle.”

The same stretch of Chapel Street received a new traffic island aimed at slowing drivers. ​“The islands actually work unless you drive over them — and that’s happened in New Haven a couple of times,” Hartman said. (Another island previously went up on the raceway known as Woodward Avenue.)

Speed ​“tables,” such as the one on Edwards Street, have definitely slowed traffic, Hartman and Criscuolo said. So have roundabouts like the one on West Park Avenue. (Beaver Hills neighbors are seeking a speed table at Goffe Terrace and Ella Grasso Boulevard.)

“A table works more effectively. You realize if you hit that at 30 miles per hour, you’re going airborne. There’s a learning curve.”

The police pair agreed with city planners and activists that street design can affect driving speed: ​“Roads dictate speeds, not signs,” Hartman observed. But sometimes designs that try to keep stopping or slow drivers can just make drivers more impatient and lead to unsafe driving — whereas well-timed lights that ensure a steady ride can calm the street.

The York-South Frontage crash has prompted consideration of adding bollards to the intersection. Bollards can help, Hartman said. But ​“if you put bollards up, it’s not necessarily going to prevent something like that from happening again. Bollards can get run over at traffic speeds. Bollards are more to prevent people from driving into an area they’re not supposed to — a closed-off area. Bollards, for instance, at the Temple Street entrance to that park walkway. You’re trying to prevent a car from going there in the first place.”

An experienced cyclist, Hartman said that painted bike lanes didn’t end up making bike-riding that much safer in town. But he did welcome plans to build separated two-way ​“cycletracks” on major arteries in town; they will make him, for one, feel safer and more likely to bike on city streets. He was less enamored of new ​“contraflow” bike lanes that have cyclists moving against traffic on roads like High Street. ​“I don’t think it’s much to ask a cyclist to [ride] around one more block,” he said.

Most discussions of traffic safety end up with a focus on enforcement. Criscuolo said the cops make about 50 traffic stops a day related to motor vehicle violations (as opposed to other suspected crimes). Two-thirds of them usually end up with the issuance of citations. Teams of officers sometimes also set up at problem stretches with laser guns to catch speeders. The department is considering expanding the traffic unit to free up other officers, Criscuolo said, but it has limited resources with which to address many priorities.

Both Hartman and Criscuolo enthusiastically endorsed the ​“red-light camera” proposal that has for years come up for consideration at the state legislature, only to be voted down amid civil-liberties concerns. The proposal would allow cities like New Haven to ticket speeders caught on video. Hartman said he has noticed how such cameras have changed drivers’ habits in Providence, R.I., where they operate around Brown University’s campus. The bill is expected to come up again in the new state legislative session; Mayor Toni Harp said on an earlier episode of ​“Dateline New Haven” that the city will again support it.

“The cameras are there,” she noted, and they’re taking footage for other purposes already. So road privacy is dead anyway — as are people hit by speeders.

Click on or download the above audio file to hear the full interview with Lt. Criscuolo and Officer Hartman on WNHH radio’s ​“Dateline New Haven,” which begins with their observations about all the confusing street signs they saw on poles as they drove to the studio from the vicinity of the train station and police headquarters.