A 55-year-old man was struck and killed by a car on Whalley Avenue Wednesday night in the city’s second fatal car crash in eight days.
Police spokesperson Sgt. Shayna Kendall made that announcement in a Thursday morning email press release.
The crash occurred between Norton Street and Winthrop Avenue.
“During the evening hours of 7:39 p.m. on Wednesday, January 22, 2020, Officers responded to 383 Whalley Avenue to investigate a pedestrian struck by a motor vehicle,” Kendall wrote. “The vehicle was occupied by the operator who remained on scene.”
The victim was transported to Yale New Haven Hospital, where he subsequently died.
Police are not releasing any other information, including what witnesses might have seen, or the identity of the driver or victim.
“The Accident Reconstruction Team responded to take over the scene. The investigation remains in its infancy and further information will be released when it becomes available,” Kendall wrote.
It was the second pedestrian death on New Haven’s streets so far this year. The city so far has had no homicides reported in 2020.
Wednesday evening’s death comes a week after a 50-year-old man was struck and killed by a car on Ella T. Grasso Boulevard.
“I feel this is negligence on the city’s part because this was a tragedy that could have been avoided,” Whalley-Edgewood-Beaver Hills Management Team Chair Nadine Horton said by email after learning about the fatal crash.
“This is shameful, will we now get the proper attention to Whalley that we’ve been asking for now that someone has been killed?!”
She said the members of the Whalley Avenue Main Street Committee have spoken multiple times with the city transit and engineering officials about adding more traffic calming and pedestrian safety infrastructure to Whalley.
“None of us has had any success in getting any meaningful traffic calming or lighting issues addressed, so now is the time for ALL of us to come together to get something done before we have another senseless death.”
Local city planner and Edgewood resident Jonathan Hopkins told the Independent that the city-owned portion of Whalley Avenue, from Howe Street to Ella T. Grasso Boulevard, carries an average of 15,000 to 20,000 vehicles per day.
“The roadway, with two lanes in each direction, is designed to carry 32,000 vehicles per day,” he said by email. “There may be an opportunity here to remove a travel lane in each direction and create a center turning lane.”
He said a three-lane road that includes a a center turning lane could accommodate 22,000 vehicles per day. “That would leave ample room on the roadway to accommodate multi-modal transportation facilities like bus lanes, bike lanes, pedestrian refuge islands, or other investments.”
He said that five years ago he submitted a Complete Streets request to the city’s transportation department (which can be read here) and wrote this article advocating for a redesign of Whalley.
Motorists killed nine pedestrians in New Haven in 2019, including five within one month, prompting cries for emergency action by the city.