Melissa Bailey Photo
As two bicyclists recover from assaults along the Farmington Canal Heritage Trail, a city parks worker is taking his own initiative to make the area safer.
Two men reported being attacked by teens on the linear trail just north of the Hamden line on July 1. As one victim sent out warnings about the trail’s safety, police, security officers and the parks worker, Bill McElveen, shared what they’re doing to keep an eye out.
Earlier this week, McElveen (pictured) leaned into a blue emergency phone along the trail near Thompson Street and pushed the red button. The 57-year-old seasonal parks worker was hired by the city two weeks ago to pick up trash on the trail. Along his route, between skewering beer cans with a pointed stick, he takes a moment to check if the emergency phones are working. He said he came up with the idea himself soon after he started work, and ran it by his boss.
“I’m just checking the phone,” he announced, drawing close to the metallic speaker.
The police dispatcher replied in a soft, faraway voice.
“I can’t hear you,” McElveen reported. “It’s very low.”
McElveen, sweating in the blazing sun and 90-degree-plus heat, moved back a couple of steps to test how well the dispatcher could hear him.
“Can you hear me now?” McElveen asked.
The dispatcher replied in the affirmative. Satisfied that the police could hear him, McElveen thanked him and hung up.
The conversation took place Monday, less than two weeks after two men were assaulted further up the trail, across the Hamden line.
“Lucky That I Didn’t Fall”
One of the victims reported his assault in an email to the Independent. He said the attack happened he was riding his bicycle through Hamden to New Haven on July 1 at 5:45 p.m.
“I was attacked by two juveniles with a large board across my face,” reported the victim, who declined to use his name for fear of retaliation. He said the attack took place in Hamden, near the new pedestrian bridge at Putnam Avenue.
“Not sure how I stayed upright,” he wrote, “but I got out immediately.”
He rode home and called 911, then checked himself into a hospital.
“I’ve got multiple facial fractures and [am] waiting to see about nerve damage,” he reported. He called the incident “one of the worst experiences of my life.”
“I consider myself lucky that I didn’t fall,” he wrote. “Not sure that I would have walked away from what could have followed.”
City Teens Charged In Attempted Robbery
Later that day, police arrested two New Haven teens for a similar assault on the trail, about 1.5 miles north of that spot. The attack took place near Connolly Parkway in Hamden.
Here’s what happened in the second incident, according to Hamden Police Capt. Ronald Smith:
A 24 year-old New Haven man was riding his bicycle on the canal line around 7 p.m. when two teens came up to him. They tried to push him off his bike, then chased him “for a brief period of time.”
After the rider got away, the two teens fled on foot. One of them sneaked into an enclosed patio in the Spring Glen section of town and hid there, Smith said. Hamden cops eventually caught up with the two teens in the rear yard of a Dixwell Avenue home and arrested them, Smith said.
The two boys, ages 15 and 16, of New Haven, were charged with second-degree attempted robbery, conspiracy to commit as much, and interfering with an officer. The 15-year-old was also charged with third-degree burglary. They were taken to juvenile detention in New Haven.
The victim in the first assault said he has returned to bicycling, but he is now too afraid to bike through southern Hamden into New Haven. He said he has been posting on public message boards to warn other cyclists.
Capt. Smith said crime against recreational trail users has been rare.
“There hasn’t been a rash of robberies or assaults,” Smith said.
Smith said the only other recent incident took place on June 23 at 11:45 p.m., when two Hamden teenagers were charged with throwing rocks at cars on Sanford Street, near the Farmington Canal Line. There have been some reports of fighting along the trail, but no other recent attacks of people riding through the trail, according to Smith.
Eyes On The Path
Hamden cops have been keeping an eye on the area, Smith said.
“We’ve been patrolling the canal line with our bicycle unit for about a month,” Smith said. The bicycle beats last through the summer, he said, and “we’re hoping to continue our bicycle patrols into the fall.”
Smith recommended that people bike with a friend, and keep a cell phone ready to report any suspicious activity.
“The police are nearby — even if we’re not on the canal line, we have patrol cars in the area,” Smith said.
Across the town line in New Haven, Yale security officer Brian Avallone (pictured) was keeping watch of the area of the trail near Science Park. He patrols the path on an electric vehicle called a T3. The vehicle is like a Segway, except it has three wheels, and you can steer it with handlebars.
Lt. Thaddeus Reddish, New Haven’s top cop in the Newhallville area, said he had a bicycle cop patrolling the trail last year, when there was more criminal activity there. Last June, a Yale administrator was ambushed and robbed of his bicycle while riding the trail through Newhallville. Others reported similar incidents.
That bike cop was put on another shift and was not replaced this year, Reddish said. While there has been plenty of crime in Newhallville, the trail has been quiet lately, he said.
“We haven’t had a call for problems on the canal itself” in recent months, Reddish said.
Farmington Canal Heritage Greenway covers approximately 84 miles from New Haven, to Northampton, Mass.
The long, uninterrupted, well-paved Greenway makes for a smooth interstate passage for people who coast on two wheels. Mark Hanley (pictured), pedaled down the trail Monday with a light backpack strapped to his bicycle’s rear wheel rack. The 29-year-old said he was on his way from Boston to Tennessee for a family reunion. He found the trail on Google Maps. He said he was riding Monday from Hartford to New Haven, where he planned to catch a train to New York City.
The portion of the trail that goes through New Haven and Hamden is about 11 miles long.
Parks worker McElveen was hired by the city to pick up trash along a small portion of that route, from New Haven’s Canal Street up to Thompson.
Monday morning, he poked his stick into the bushes to retrieve some plastic bags and a can of Budweiser.
He said the area seems pretty safe to him during his 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. shifts. He said when he started the job, he quickly set to work thinking of ways to make the area safer. Top on his list: Add more emergency phones, and make sure they’re all audible.
McElveen grew up in Harlem and now lives in Waterbury. He said that stretch of Newhallville isn’t so bad — “compared to where I’m from, it’s not tough tough.” He reckoned that nights and weekends must get “riskier” for people riding through.
He has suggested adding more lighting to the trail to deter crime — cops tried that with great success in Harlem, he said.
“It’s very dark,” McElveen said. “It’s tempting to someone young and vulnerable, to think they can get away” with a crime.
McElveen said when the sun’s out, as it was in abundance Monday, he feels the trail is pretty safe. There aren’t many people hanging around there, and there’s remarkably little trash. After a couple hours of picking up trash, he still hadn’t needed to open his second black trash bag.
“In the inner city,” he reckoned, “I’d have two bags full.”
With those words, he picked up his trash poker and continued down the trail, carefully looking around.
Between his initiative at testing the phones, and call for more phones and better lighting to fight crime based on experience in other locations, can we get Mr. McElveen a promotion, or on an advisory board somewhere? Thanks for going above and beyond for the cycling/pedestrians in the area.
I've had very good luck on the trail so far; I've also tended to ride it between 7am and 2pm unless I'm with a group, though. It's interesting that the most recent attacks are along spots that many would assume to be safer than the New Haven section.