NYPD: 1,301 Pedestrians and Cyclists Injured, Nine Killed in Traffic in July

Image: NYPD

Nine people were killed by motorists while walking and riding bicycles on city streets in July, and 1,301 were injured, according to the latest NYPD crash data report [PDF].

Citywide, six pedestrians and three cyclists were fatally struck by drivers: one pedestrian and one cyclist in Manhattan; one pedestrian and one cyclist in the Bronx; three pedestrians in Brooklyn; and one pedestrian and one cyclist in Queens. Among the victims were Christopher Hutchinson, David Ellis, Juan Rivera-Quintana, Roger Hernandez, Isabel Rodriguez, Shaquille Cochrane, and one unidentified cyclist.

Of seven pedestrians and cyclists whose deaths were reported by Streetsblog and other outlets, two were killed by hit-and-run drivers who were not immediately caught or identified. Of the remaining five crashes, three motorists were known to have been charged for causing a death. In each of those three cases, the driver was also charged with DWI or DWAI. Historically, nearly half of motorists who kill a New York City pedestrian or cyclist do not receive so much as a citation for careless driving.

At least one senior was killed by a motorist in July: Isabel Rodriguez, age 88. Of the three cyclists killed, two were in their teens: David Ellis, 18, and Shaquille Cochrane, whose age was reported as both 18 and 19.

Across the city, 855 pedestrians and 446 cyclists were hurt in collisions with motor vehicles. Per NYPD policy, few if any of these crashes were investigated by trained officers.

Seven motorists and six passengers died in the city in July; 1,599 and 1,940 were injured, respectively.

There were 16,956 motor vehicle crashes in the city in July. After the jump: contributing factors for crashes resulting in injury and death.

Download July NYPD summons data here.

Crash and summons data from prior months is available in multiple formats here.

Image: NYPD
  • Anonymous
  • KillMoto

    They’re not “accidents” unless there’s an investigation concluding with a finding that there was no negligence or malice.  God damn I’m sick of the misuse of the word “accident”.

    NYPDs wonton misuse of the word is a mirror on their culture of apathy.  “That’s why they call it an accident”.  If I had a magic wand that could only perform small feats, one of those would be to a search & replace on all NYPD documents for “accident” and change it to “un-investigated collision”.  They can then manually go back and correct any document where the word “accident” genuinely applies. 

  • JT

    547 motor vehicle accidents per day?!!

  • Ian Turner

    @fd22f38e5353be50b99d8c417c7fd3ca:disqus : 644 crashes per day. We can’t say how many were accidents because almost none were investigated.

  • Mark Walker

    Following up on Ian Turner’s and JT’s comments, if something happens five or six hundred times a day in a single city, it’s not exactly an accident, is it?

  • Joe R.

    There’s something inherently wrong with any form of transportation which has hundreds of “malfunctions” each day. Just think of the rage it would evoke if the subway had even 10 crashes per day. For some reason, we accept hundreds of crashes per day as business as usual with motor vehicles. This just defies logic.

    The “system” itself is what’s broke here. I’m not seeing any fix other than much stricter licensing, far fewer cars on the road, and eventually removing the driver from the equation entirely via robocars.

  • Erik Pedersen

    I’m not at all surprised that the top three contributing factors in these “accidents” are (in order) DRIVER INATTENTION/DISTRACTION – 2200; FOLLOWING TOO CLOSELY – 1107; and FAILURE TO YIELD RIGHT-OF-WAY – 732.

    This just corroborates what I’ve suspected for years, drivers in this city simply don’t pay attention, not even to the most basic rules of the road like who has right-of-way. NOBODY KNOWS! I’ve been cussed out by drivers because they genuinely believe that I have to wait for all the cars to do what they want to do before me on my silly little bike can go where I need to go.

  • Boris

    Two weeks ago the driver of an Escalade drove over my friend’s foot when he gunned the engine as soon as the light changed (my friend had the light initially; she was running to catch the bus). The driver claimed to have not seen her run right in front of his huge-ass truck. The police officer who showed up wrote in the “accident” report that she was running across the street on red through free-flowing traffic. So I don’t even believe these stats. The drivers are the biggest problem, but the cops are not trained (or do not care) in reporting the truth either.

    The amazing thing is that the driver’s testimony matches hers: he was stopped at the light. My friend has now been to the precinct (in her cast) multiple times trying to change the report, but the relevant people refuse to see her.

  • Anonymous

    Those are not accidents, they are crashes.  Despite the NYPD labels.

    An accident is what a 2 year old has during potty training, or when an airplane crashes on your head.  What happens on the street starts with one or both parties making a series of avoidable mistakes that result in a crash. 

    For example, drink drivers start by making the avoidable mistake of
    getting behind the wheel. Nothing that happens after that is an
    “accident.”

    Today, traffic engineers and planners have dropped the term accident from the vocabulary and replaced it with crash.
    When
    an incident that happens unexpectedly and unintentionally, the
    assumption is that there is no way to understand the causes, nor any way
    to systematically prevent the crash.  The best that can be done with
    “accidents” is mitigate the damage after the crash has occurred.

    Transportation professionals call crashes crashes in order to
    objectively search for the causes and then implement measures to prevent
    future crashes.

    This is why we have serious concerns when the NYPD repeated use the
    term “accident” to describe crashes.  This is why we believe that the
    NYPD cannot take pedestrian and bicyclist death and injury by
    caused drivers seriously.  Not only is the police Accident Investigation
    squad short on manpower and resources, by starting with the name
    “Accident” they are already assuming they can’t prevent another
    “accident” from happening again, and again, and again.

    The first step to sobering up is to recognize and admit that you have
    a problem.  The NYPD has not taken that first step yet.  And that is no accident.

    The old dictionary meaning:
    ac·ci·dent /?aksid?nt/

    Noun   

    1. An unfortunate incident that happens unexpectedly and unintentionally, typically resulting in damage or injury.

    2. A crash involving road or other vehicles, typically one that causes serious damage or injury.

  • Ben Kintisch

    Imagine if all of this killing and maiming happened with guns or knives. Then NYPD would give a damn.

  • fj

    It is very important to keep repeating the damning statistics, the horrors they expose, and the lack of rationality in the way we do transportation.

  • Anonymous

    Notice where “Traffic control disregarded” falls: 253. It’s not even in the top 5.

    If I’m right that this means (among a few other things) “blew the light,” do you think we can use that information to get rational enforcement priorities that address the real threat to our roads?

    No? Really? Okay. Best to ticket cyclists.

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