Family of Lauren Davis Asks CB 3 to Support Classon Ave Bike Lane
The intersection of Classon and Lexington, where Lauren Davis was struck and killed by a turning driver last April. Image: Google Street View
The family of Lauren Davis, who was killed biking on Classon Avenue in April, appealed to the Brooklyn Community Board 3 transportation committee last night to support a bike lane on the corridor.
Northbound Classon is notoriously prone to reckless driving by motorists heading to the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. It's also a DOT-designated bike route. A 2012 DOT traffic-calming project converted the street from two traffic lanes to one but did not include a bike lane. Instead cyclists are expected to ride in the leftover space of an extra-wide parking lane.
Davis, 34, was biking on Classon in the direction of traffic on the morning of April 15 when a left-turning driver in a Fiat struck and killed her.
"It's kind of a misconception that that's an area that's available for cyclists, and everyone's using it," Lana Norton Davis, Lauren's mother, told the committee. She said detectives investigating her daughter's death told her that a bike lane on the street would have allowed them to prosecute the driver under the city's Right of Way law.
In August, Lauren's sister Danielle launched an online petition urging community boards 2 and 3 and local council members Laurie Cumbo and Robert Cornegy, Jr. to get behind the idea of a bike lane on Classon. Almost 6,000 people have signed on since, but Borough President Eric Adams remains the only local elected official to express support.
"I sincerely believe that if there had been a bike lane on Classon Avenue, Lauren would have been alive today," Danielle told committee members yesterday. "Building a bike lane on Classon Avenue would do more than define safe, separate spaces for people on bicycles and people driving, it would help prevent the next crash."
The Davises spoke during a presentation by committee member and neighborhood resident Shawn Onsgard, who proposed a painted bike lane, bulb-outs, and automated camera enforcement on Classon Avenue. In Onsgard's conceptual plan -- which he hopes CB 3 will endorse to compel DOT to put together its own proposal -- the bike lane would end at DeKalb Avenue, where BQE-bound traffic increases. Northbound cyclists would be directed to continue to Willoughby Avenue and jog over to Taaffe Place.
Transportation co-chair Greg Glasgow was amenable to Onsgard's proposal, but the committee did not have quorum and thus did not hold a vote. Glasgow said he would instead bring the plan to the CB 3 executive committee when it meets in two weeks.
"It's not a comfortable situation, I know for me as a driver and also for people biking," Glasgow said. "You don't need to mix bike traffic with all of that truck traffic trying to get to the BQE."
Stay in touch
Sign up for our free newsletter
More from Streetsblog New York City
SEE IT: Cops Nearly Kill Teen on Moped on Brooklyn Greenway
The NYPD has a history of officers recklessly using their vehicles in chases. On Wednesday, its officers almost killed a moped rider.
Bus Advocates Target Anti-Busway ‘Hypocrites’ at Bronx Zoo and Botanical Garden
A petition drive by Bronx bus riders calls out the institutions for boosting transit on their websites, but then trying to undermine it in the real world.
‘Duped’: A Harlem 20-Something Blows the Whistle on an Illegal Temporary License Plate Business
Kareem found out the hard way that his Craigslist gig delivering temp tags was illegal. Now he's exposing the operation that employed him, revealing clues about his anonymous bosses that all trace back to the same place.
Day 3: These Hunger Strikers aren’t Paid Lobbyists — But Albany Can’t Tell the Difference
ALBANY — “They are putting every barrier in our way to not have to face us directly and look us in the eye and then make an unconscionable decision. This is Albany at its worst,” said Amy Cohen.
