The Weekly Carnage

10:05 AM EDT on August 25, 2006

This week, New York State authorities launched a probe into the gap between Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North trains and platforms. After that, the National Transportation Safety Board launched its own probe, which like the state's follows the tragic death of a Minnesota teenager who fell through such a gap boarding an L.I.R.R. train on Aug. 5. These probes are a good idea, but why the obsession with making the safest mode of transportation even safer when someone dies in a tri-state traffic crash every three and a half hours? This week we learned that U.S. traffic deaths rose to 43,443 in 2005, the highest level in 15 years and 16 times the number of U.S. casualties in the Iraq war to date. Imagine what those figures might be if public authorities were as focused on eliminating fatalities on our roads as they are on our rails. Here are news articles about some of the regional traffic deaths and injuries that occured this week.

Hit-and-Run Drag Racer in Stolen Car Kills Brooklyn Cyclist (NY Post)
Cyclist Was on His Way to Buy Ice Cream for Local Kids (Daily News)
Victim's Wife Learned About It by Watching TV (NY Post)
Hit-and-Run Driver Kills Immigrant Father of 5 in Queens (Daily News)
19-Year-Old L.I. Driver Killed, Passenger Injured, in Car Rollover (AP via DN)
18-Year-Old L.I. Passenger Killed, Driver Injured, in Crash (MSNBC)
18-Year-Old L.I. Driver Killed in Crash With Pole (WINS)
Queens Newlywed, 25, Crushed to Death by Lincoln Navigator (Daily News)
Westchester DWI Teen in Death Crash (NY Post)
Woman Dies After Route 149 Crash in Queensbury, N.Y. (Post Star)
19-Year-Old Dies After Crash With Logging Truck (Post Star)
Driver of Stolen Pickup Truck Kills Newark Pedestrian and Injures 2 (NYT)
Massapequa Park Man Killed in Motorcycle Crash (Newsday)
Livery Cab Critically Inures 79-Year-Old Woman on Upper East Side (Gothamist)
Truck Flips Over on BQE and Driver, Injured, Gets DWI Charge (NYT)
Brooklyn Hit-and-Run Driver Surrenders (NY Post)
Drunken Truck Thief/Car Chase Causer Given 5 Years Probation (NY Post)
Off-Duty Cop in Fatal March 28 Crash Was Drunk (NY Post)
Aging Drivers' Rising Risk (Newsday)

Aaron Donovan

Before he began blogging about land use and transportation, Aaron Donovan wrote The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund's annual fundraising appeal for three years and earned a master's degree in urban planning from Columbia. Since then, he has worked for nonprofit organizations devoted to New York City economic development. He lives and works in the Financial District, and sees New York's pre-automobile built form as an asset that makes New York unique in the United States, and as a strategic advantage that should be capitalized upon.

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