Fatalities Mount On Death Blvd

Four of the city’s nine pedestrian fatalities in 2020 took place on a single, 0.4‑mile stretch of Ella T. Grasso Boulevard — making the state-owned blocks between Columbus Avenue and Adeline Street by far the city’s deadliest stretch for people on foot.

According to city police reports, nine pedestrians and two cyclists died after being hit by cars in New Haven last year.

Four of those fatal motor vehicle collisions took place on a notoriously dangerous four-lane stretch of the Boulevard, also known as Rt. 10.

That section of the Hill/West River has been a focal point of traffic safety concern for years among city and state transportation officials, safe streets advocates, and everyday walkers.

The geographic concentration of so many pedestrian fatalities in this area in 2020 has sparked renewed debate about what can, must, and should soon be done to better protect walkers on a run of state road that covers an entrance to West River Memorial Park, the Columbus House homeless shelter, a strip of commercial storefronts, the Boulevard Flea Market, and New Haven Adult Education.

(Watch a video above of afternoon traffic at the Boulevard-Orange-Columbus intersection, and a video below of traffic near the entrance to Adult Ed.)

“I have never felt safe crossing the road here. Not once,” former Columbus House resident and veterinary technician Kim Kinell (pictured at right) told the Independent as she and her friend Dusty walked towards the Orange Avenue-Columbus Avenue-Ella T. Grasso Boulevard intersection on Tuesday afternoon.

“It’s not safe at all. Seriously, the state needs to do something about it. Because the lives that are lost, you’re talking about innocent people just trying to get their way to home, to work. Simple things. And people are getting killed.”

New Haven Safe Streets Coalition organizer Kai Addae agreed. ​“It’s tragic,” she said. ​“People who walk or ride the bus or live in these places, they know it every day. It’s really, really frustrating, and now we’re yelling with the data. Something needs to change now. There are hotspots in the city, and something really needs to be done.”

According to city and state officials, infrastructure upgrades and pedestrian safety policies are in the works.

City transit chief Doug Hausladen and City Engineer Giovanni Zinn told the Independent a $300,000-plus state Community Connectivity grant that the city was awarded in 2018 should be spent this year on building out a new sidewalk where there is currently just a narrow dirt path on the east side of the road by St. Bernard Cemetery.

State Department of Transportation spokesperson Kevin Nursick said that the department plans to begin construction on upgraded signal equipment, including pedestrian signals, starting in April 2022. He also said that the department has initiated a ​“comprehensive review” of this section of Rt. 10 to identify crash patterns and contributing factors which will inform a new set of recommendations for pedestrian safety improvements.

And New Haven State Rep. and Transportation Committee Co-Chair Roland Lemar told the Independent about a raft of proposed pedestrian safety bills he plans to push for in the legislative session that starts Wednesday. The proposals include allowing for local control over speed limits, legalizing automated enforcement through speed cameras, and increased penalties for distracted driving.

Meanwhile, as the rollout and debate over these policy and infrastructure updates churn ahead, pedestrians on this stretch of road have continued to die.

In 2020, those pedestrian fatalities included (in chronological order):

• Arthur Bastek, a 50-year-old New Haven man who was struck and killed by a car at around 7:03 p.m. on Jan. 14 at 695 Ella T. Grasso Blvd., near the intersection with Columbus Avenue.

• Anthony Little, a 31-year-old New Haven man who was struck and killed by a car at around 8 p.m. on April 4 on the Boulevard near Adeline Street. Police believe Little was struck after he stopped and exited his motor vehicle to try to retrieve an electronic device that had fallen from the top of his car.

• Eric Joseph Pechalonis, a 52-year-old Hamden man who was struck and killed by a car at around 8:30 p.m. on Aug. 31 at the intersection of the Boulevard and Orange Avenue. Police believe Pechalonis was walking east from Orange Avenue and attempting to cross Ella T. Grasso Boulevard toward Columbus Avenue when one southbound motor vehicle stopped for him, and a second southbound vehicle passed the first and struck Pechalonis. Police later arrested that 39-year-old driver and charged him with driving under the influence.

• An unidentified male pedestrian who was struck and killed by a car at around 6 p.m. on Dec. 29 on Ella T. Grasso Boulevard between Printer’s Lane and Adeline Street. Police believe that the man was struck as they attempted to cross the street near the 500 block of the Boulevard as a 41-year-old New Haven woman operating a SUV traveled in the right lane of the Boulevard south of Columbus Avenue.

“With four deaths in one year, that highlights the incredible amount of need that is focused here,” Hausladen said. ​“These crashes are incredibly horrific when they are compounded in one area.”

“Any traffic-related death is one too many,” added Nursick, ​“and we are particularly concerned with recent upticks in fatalities and injuries related to driver behavior resulting from conditions created by the pandemic.”

And in a letter sent by the Hill North Community Management Team last September to a host of city officials, including Hausladen and Zinn, community leaders stressed how a 2022 construction timeline for the state’s signalization upgrades is dangerously distant. Click here to read that letter in full.

“Lives are at stake in and from our neighborhood,” the letter reads. “[O]ur lives, our family, friends and neighborhoods lives are at stake. And we cannot … we will not wait until 2022.”

Passersby: ​“People Drive Like They’re Crazy”

During a recent walk along this very stretch of Ella T. Grasso Boulevard, the Independent spoke with a range of passersby, neighborhood residents, and workers who called for a variety of potential solutions to the traffic madness they see on the street every day.

They also all confirmed that last year’s concentration of pedestrian fatalities on these blocks appear to indicate: that walking along Ella T. Grasso Boulevard is an uncomfortable and dangerous activity.

“People drive like they’re crazy,” said John Dossantos, who’s run a nearby check cashing storefront for six years.

“There’s no such thing as a red light around here,” added Dusty, a former Columbus House resident. ​“They just go right through.”

“It’s definitely a downer,” said his friend, Kinell. ​“This place is just dangerous.”

Kinell and Dusty said that they would like to see speed bumps installed on the state road in a bid to slow traffic. ​“Just like on Long Wharf,” Kinell said. ​“On Long Wharf, the city took care of it.”

Barry Peterson and Robert W., both of whom said they live in the area, agreed. ​“They’ve got to put some speed bumps in,” said Peterson.

Robert W. singled out the traffic signals as contributing to the road’s high speeds. ​“They’ve got lights, but they’re not synchronized,” he said. Pointing from Columbus Avenue to the entrance to New Haven Adult Ed, he said, ​“that’s a racing strip,” especially at night.

Oscar Hernandez, who works at a nearby car washing station, said that his friend Maria was hit by a car on this block just a few weeks ago. ​“We need better security,” he said.

Mike, who runs a barber shop-turned-smoke shop on the Boulevard, said he would most like to see improved lighting on the block. ​“These street lights are not as bright as they need to be.”

Dossantos agreed with the call for better lighting, and said that the planned new sidewalk to be built on the east side of the street should also help.

When asked about traffic safety on this stretch of the Boulevard, another passerby, Mark Anderson, said, ​“It’s pretty fucked up.”

When asked what would make the street safer for pedestrians, he said, ​“People don’t take precautions. But you know, it is what it is. You’ve just got to be more safer. It comes down to the person. You can pass the law, but not everybody is going to uphold the law.”

Reached by phone, safe streets advocate Addae said that her top priorities — at a city level and during the upcoming state legislative session — include pushing for the very same types of infrastructure and enforcement upgrades detailed by neighborhood residents and workers and by Lemar, Hausladen, and Zinn (see below).

“We’re pushing for the state to give us funding and to change speed limits and build infrastructure in safer ways,” she said. ​“We’ve been talking to representatives about getting automated traffic enforcement, about getting a bill written and getting support, because in the short term, you need some kind of enforcement. It’s been show to be very effective at getting people to slow down.”

Big picture, she concluded, streets like Ella T. Grasso Boulevard need much more than short-term tinkering if they are to move away from being hotspots for pedestrian deaths.

“It’s going to keep happening,” she said, ​“until there are really big infrastructure changes.”

Officials: New Sidewalks, Signals, Studies Coming

Hausladen and Zinn said that one of the sooner pedestrian safety upgrades coming to those blocks of the Boulevard will be the new stretch of sidewalk on the east side of the street by St. Bernadette Cemetery. Currently, that area consists of a dirt path — or ​“desire.”

The city transportation and engineering officials said that the sidewalk will be funded by a $317,085 state Community Connectivity Grant that the city was awarded in 2018.

Zinn said that his department is just about done with the designs for the new sidewalk and that it needs a few more final approvals from the state. He said the city plans to go out to bid for the construction work as soon as possible, and that it hopes to have the sidewalk built out later this year. The new sidewalk should connect existing sidewalks from across the street to the entrance to Adult Ed to the northern end of the cemetery.

“It doesn’t make a lot of headlines,” Hausladen said about the planned stretch of sidewalk. But building out the basics like adding a sidewalk where there currently is none — and where plenty of pedestrians walk anyway — can save lives.

In addition to the state-funded city sidewalk work, Hausladen and Zinn said, the state plans to put in pedestrian signal heads where there currently are none at the Boulevard-Orange-Columbus intersection.

Nursick confirmed that the signal project is still in the works. Back in 2017, he told the Independent that the anticipated completion date for the signal upgrades was 2020.

“As you have noted, we have not yet broke ground at this location,” he told the Independent by email this week. ​“The current schedule will have construction beginning in April of 2022, and includes this, as well as 11 other locations to receive upgraded, new signal equipment. It is our intention to have this location prioritized in the project to have it completed as quickly as possible once work begins.”

As for the new state DOT study of the Boulevard in New Haven, Nursick said, ​“The Department has just recently initiated a comprehensive review of this section of Route 10 in New Haven to identify crash patterns and contributing factors to those crashes, the outcome of which will result in recommendations that the Department and the City can pursue and implement as safety upgrades and countermeasures, which could include infrastructure upgrades and modifications, with an emphasis on improving pedestrian safety. The review is anticipated to offer a range of both short and longer range recommendations. We anticipate completion of the review in approximately six to eight months and we will share our findings with the City.”

Bigger picture, Zinn said, ​“traffic calming that we do on our roads, such as raised elements, neckdowns, road diets, all of that needs to be on the table. I think we’re engaging in productive conversations around that, with the understanding that what a four-lane state secondary road is in a rural area is very different than what it is in an urban area” like this stretch that cuts through New Haven.

Zinn said that the traffic safety challenges that the city faces on this part of Ella T. Grasso Boulevard are not unique to this road, but are also problems on stretches on the east side of town on Rt. 80.

“They are all challenging, where you have long stretches typically without crossings. You have a lot of vehicles moving very quickly. The roadway designs came out of a school of thinking [that prioritized] moving cars rapidly in and out of the city.”

“We certainly understand now that all users of the road have the right” to travel safely, he said, especially the ​“most vulnerable users” like pedestrians and cyclists.

Hausladen said that Pete Buttigieg’s pending assumption of the role of secretary of the federal Department of Transportation could open more pockets of money to fund safe streets updates. Hausladen pointed to one such potential project as transitioning traffic signals at intersections from being ​“exclusively pedestrian” to ​“concurrent leading pedestrian intervals” — meaning that pedestrians should be able to cross in parallel with traffic.

Lemar: Focus On Enforcement

As a former alder who helped write the city’s Complete Streets legislation and as the current co-chair of the state legislature’s Transportation Committee, Lemar said that he has long been aware of the dangers faced by pedestrians on this stretch of Ella T. Grasso Boulevard.

“Sadly, the concentration in that specific area doesn’t surprise me,” he said. He said that, as an alder and a state legislator, he’s been working with the state Department of Transportation on trying to get traffic safety fixes for that particular intersection for years.

He also noted the Community Connectivity Grant that will fund new sidewalk construction, the traffic signalization project to be undertaken by the state, and the state study of traffic safety conditions on the Boulevard.

“A core component of this is that the rate of speed is up, distracted driving incidents are up, and fatalities on Connecticut roadways are up,” he said. A preliminary estimate found that there were 320 road fatalities across the state in 2020, he said.

“It’s pretty scary to see that level.”

In addition to focusing on infrastructure upgrades — like more speed tables, road narrowings, enhanced crosswalks, and improved visibility at midblock crossings — Lemar said that he plans to focus on increased traffic safety enforcement during the coming legislative session.

That in part means allowing municipalities like New Haven to set their own speed limits on state roads. (The current speed limit on Ella T. Grasso Boulevard is 25 miles per hour.)

“I do want to talk about enforcement more,” he added. ​“The idea of speed cameras in school zones, and enhanced penalties for distracted driving,” should be on the table. ​“Speed and distracted driving are two of the core factors of the lethality of crashes.” He said that speed cameras — which automatically detect drivers going, say, 10 miles above the speed limit, and then send them a speeding ticket by mail — have proven effective in places like Washington, D.C. and New York City.

Lemar also plans to try again to pass legislation that would ensure pedestrians have the right of way at an intersection so long as they signal their intent to cross.

Lemar was asked about how former Transportation Committee Co-Chair State Sen. Carlo Leone’s decision to step down from the legislature and join the state transportation department should affect his committee’s policy priorities. He responded that he had ​“developed a strong working relationship” with Leone during their time co-chairing the committee,. He also said he’s looking forward to working with Manchester State Sen. Steve Cassano, who will be taking over Leone’s co-leadership role.