Bedford at Pine Street: 'Like Playing Chicken'

Recently Sleepy Hollow held a public meeting for proposed safety improvements to the crossings at Beekman and North Washington. For this they are seeking a state grant.

There’s another hot spot in the Village that may have less users but those users might be at greater risk: on Bedford Road at Pine Street, close to the back entrance of the High School. There’s a crosswalk in the middle of the steep slope of Bedford that cars are often cited racing up or down – like in this week’s Police Blotters, in which one driver reported seeing another one running a redlight at Beekman and racing dangerously up the hill.

This crosswalk has Patch user "J. Cattano" shaking in his boots.

He wrote recently in the comments:

Crossing Bedford Rd. at the Pine St. crosswalk is like playing chicken. You look and look and then you just dart across holding your breath the whole trime. It is so unnerving. The cars coming down Bedford Rd. going west are usually speeding and even if they see someone standing there be it adult or child they just drive on by. They really need to rush down to that traffic light I guess. It is so dangerous, and it feels to me as has for quite some time now like a tragedy waiting to happen - then they can all start the blame game when a simple fix is so easy to obtain. PUT A SIGN THERE! NY STATE LAW- MUST STOP FOR PEDESTRIANS IN CROSSWALK -- very simple.

Are we waiting for one of our children to be hit by one of these cars that go speeding by them everyday not even caring to slow down let alone stop to let them cross before we take this problem seriously?? I am furious about this and will pursue this with the local news as-well. Shame on you Sleepy Hollow!!!

Putting up a sign seems cheap and easy enough, but Sleepy Hollow Police Chief Gregory Camp basically said: we can't do it; it's not our road.

Though the Chief hadn't heard specific complaints about this crosswalk at Pine Street, he was of course aware of the grave dangers of the whole area. Bedford Road, as is Route 9, is a state road, and we rely on the state for any improvements (or their lack), Camp said.

It’s not a state grant we seek, but the state itself.

“It’s something we really want the state to look into but until they agree, we’re at their mercy,” he said.

Camp knows all too well the problem of all the traffic at that notorious five-point intersection below. Bedford itself he called an “old road, windy.” Bedford was targeted in several speeding surveys he submitted to the state in about the last year. “It’s hard for us to do a real traffic study,” he said, noting that the department lacked the equipment and the manpower to do something more comprehensive.

He recalled when Sleepy Hollow High School was built there were caution lights and signage on Bedford, which the state took down after. “I wished they would have left it up,” Camp said.

“Until I get someone with the state who’s willing to talk with us, I can only send a letter or leave a message,” he said, though he did say he would not stop trying to get help for this road and that five-point intersection.

“Eventually if I’m squeaky enough, they’ll have to oil me. That’s what I’m hoping for,” Camp said.

He suggested the community do the same. Bother not the Department of Transportation, he advised, as “there’s no luck with the DOT” but go right to the Governor.

You can contact Governor Andrew Cuomo:

• by phone at (518) 474-8390,
• by mail (include your own mailing address on the envelop):

Andrew M. Cuomo

Governor of New York State

NYS State Capitol Building

Albany, NY 12224

• or by email by following this form on his website.

Add that letter to that other pile of letters likely growing on his desk over that stretch of Route 9 in front of the Manors that have residents scared to turn out of their streets and risk the lives of bikers and walkers brave (or rash) enough to try to navigate the few inches of allotted roadway.

Like us on Facebook  |  Follow us on Twitter  |  Sign up for our newsletter