January 13
...serving up your daily dish.
This week's Montclair Times reports on the speedway like conditions experienced by pedestrians trying to cross Grove and McDonough Streets. Here at the Baristanet, we were working on our own story about the Most Dangerous Intersections in Baristaville. Last week we called the Montclair Police Department for comment, and are still awaiting their response. In the meantime, we turn it over to you: Nominations please, for the Most Scariest, Harrowing, and Dangerous Intersection in Baristaville, besides Watchung Plaza...
January 13, 2006 in Intersections We Hate | Permalink
I live on Hillside Avenue below GRHS. People are constantly flying down Hillside either trying to make the green light on the corner of Bloomfield Ave or just speeding under the overpass. I cross the street every morning and its amazing how many people are speeding their way to school. Although, its just as bad at night.
Posted by: Nicki | Jan 13, 2006 11:18:29 AM
Washington Street, Glen Ridge/Bloomfield is a disaster waiting to happen. Impatient drivers go twice the speed limit on a very narrow street with cars parked on both sides as Parents are dropping of their kids at the day care center and commuters try to cross the street from the Farrand lot to the train station.
It's a shame that it's going to take a dead kid or commuter before the cops put some speed control on this street.
Posted by: RadonMan | Jan 13, 2006 11:27:43 AM
Park Street, underneath that little bridge that takes you into Watchung Plaza. Walkers and joggers take heed: Drivers do NOT always stop at Stop Signs!
Posted by: Miss Martta (8T) | Jan 13, 2006 11:29:46 AM
I live right by the Grove St./Bellevue Ave. intersection and can attest to the frequency of accidents there... The accidents are not pedestrian related, but they occur often.
Posted by: Matt | Jan 13, 2006 11:32:27 AM
By far the most dangerous intersection in the world is Valley and Bellevue. Because it seems to exist at the center of civilization, one would expect more civility. Just the other day, however, I was nearly run over crossing the street by some imbecile who had been waiting for traffic to clear before making a left turn. He screamed around the corner without considering the possibility of encoutering a flesh and blood human not encased in two tons of steel and airbags. Had I not leaped out of the way (all right, not quite Nureyev-style, but not bad for a bald, middle aged man with Bill Clinton's body mass index) I would have landed in the hospital or the morgue.
Posted by: walleroo | Jan 13, 2006 11:37:56 AM
This won't be a popular one but it is to many who travel it:
Blinded by cars constantly parked on the southbound side it is difficult, when travelling east on Union Street, to cross South Fullerton without the feeling that you are about to get creamed.
Posted by: David | Jan 13, 2006 12:16:50 PM
I think the most dangerous intersections are those around the High School, especially the mid block crossings on Midland and on Park.
With no crossing guard on Midland, and a guard who seems to leave early on Park, cars are free to try and mow down the kids. Drivers go to such lengths to avoid not stopping that they routinely will drive around a kid in mid-crosswalk, even resorting to driving on the wrong side of the road to avoid stopping.
And while the town has a meter maid who promptly starts ticketing student cars at 8 AM every morning, the town has not seen fit to even occasionally assign a patrol car to ticket cars for failure to yield at these crosswalks.
Hey, the town could get a lot more money ticketing for failure to yield then they'll get from this false alarm ordinance they're planning!
Cary
Posted by: cary | Jan 13, 2006 12:34:19 PM
Washington St driving East from GR to Bloomfield...the speed 'humps' do almost nothing to slow people down...
Watchung Plaza
Bloomfield Ave at North Fullerton (even when the cops are there)
Posted by: Pam | Jan 13, 2006 12:37:06 PM
"Hey, the town could get a lot more money ticketing for failure to yield then they'll get from this false alarm ordinance they're planning!"
Actually the ordinance has been on the books for some time, it has just been uninforced. All of our laws should be enforced I think. Although this is not as pernicious as, say, the denial of 1st amendment rights in political discourse, it is still important.
Posted by: Right of Center™ (8T) | Jan 13, 2006 12:44:18 PM
"Drivers go to such lengths to avoid not stopping that they routinely will drive around a kid in mid-crosswalk, even resorting to driving on the wrong side of the road to avoid stopping."
Should be said, too, that some of these kids deliberately walk veeeeeery slooooowly across the middle of the street, far from a crosswalk or intersection, to what purpose I wouldn't wish to speculate.
Posted by: walleroo | Jan 13, 2006 12:47:50 PM
Mt. Hebron between Valley and Grove. The blind corner where Park Street ends is inherently bad, compounded by people speeding down the hill toward Grove. I know of someone who was recently involved in a head-on collision there, in which the other car (heading East) lost control, veered into the opposite lane and ultimately ended up on its roof. Thankfully, everyone involved survived. And from what I heard, no alcohol was involved - just speeding. That curve is horrendous.
Posted by: Kay | Jan 13, 2006 12:51:35 PM
Walleroo - I agree, and it is quite perplexing to me. I live near a direct walking path to the high school and in the morning, it's almost as if the kids are playing "chicken" with drivers. I never experienced this phenomenon til I moved to NJ - is this an East Coast thing? Or just a sign of the times?
Posted by: Kay | Jan 13, 2006 12:58:11 PM
North Fullerton at Gordonhurst is a tragedy waiting to happen. A sump pump empties water onto North Fullerton just north of Gordonhurst, and the puddle is routinely frozen in the morning, leaving a ten-foot long stretch of ice the full width of the road. Plenty of drivers speed on North Fullerton; plenty of others ignore the stop sign on Gordonhurst, and accidents occur there now and then. The thing that's so troubling about it is that there is a schoolbus stop at the NW corner. I worry that one day someone speeding along will will brake suddenly to avoid someone ignoring the stop sign , skid on the ice, and hit one of the kids waiting at the stop.
Posted by: Bob | Jan 13, 2006 1:00:00 PM
No here has ever gone north on South Fullerton (onto North Fullerton) crossing Bloomfield Avenue.
No seems to have a clue what do do there when they want to turn.
I see close calls every single day.
And, of course almost every day as I am driving the youngest member to the high school, I see people whizz past school buses with their lights flashing. It's amazing to me how many people don't stop.
Posted by: Dan Epstein | Jan 13, 2006 1:09:36 PM
ROC -- Agree with you, for sure!
As to kids taking their time, I can't comment. But I take my kids every day to school, and watch the kids in the crosswalk. They're usually rushing, 'cause they're almost late, and they're concentrating on nothing other than getting in before the bell!
I could take videos, and you'd be amazed. It's around 8 AM, so the drivers are rushing to get to the train, to work, etc. A sure prelude to an accident.
Cary
Posted by: cary | Jan 13, 2006 1:12:59 PM
Van Vleck and North Mountain...why?
because every SUV that approaches the stop signs on Van Vleck are in denial that they exist...
Why do people RACE towards stop signs??They still have to stop!
Posted by: mtc citizen | Jan 13, 2006 1:15:35 PM
I third Washington Street in GR/BLM. I'm there everyday and Radon is right, it's only a matter of time before a death or serious injury on that street.
Posted by: State Street Pete (vmfpwfl) | Jan 13, 2006 1:18:50 PM
Back in the 1960s, Park at Lorraine had accidents monthly or more frequently.
I go out of my way to avoid driving on Highland Ave across Bradford Ave in Upper Montclair.
Posted by: buycopy | Jan 13, 2006 1:22:49 PM
Although it probably wouldn't win first prize in this contest (because it doesn't get much pedestrian traffic), Upper Mountain and Bradford. I live on the downhill side, and can attest to the MANY car accidents that occur there, many of which look serious and draw multiple emergency vehicles. Drivers, please be careful there. Since there is a traffic light there, it must be impatient drivers making turns.
Also, PLEASE stop for school buses! I can't tell you how many times I have been almost mowed down near that intersection, sometimes with two little girls in tow, because people don't stop for stopped school buses. One time we were almost hit by someone swerving from behind the bus into the opposite lane of traffic (where the cars were stopped) to pass the stopped school bus!
Posted by: Annie O | Jan 13, 2006 1:29:45 PM
I'm with buycopy. Heading north on Highland and trying to cross Bradford is a nightmare; you can't see the cars coming around a curve and down the hill (except at night when you CAN see the headlights heading your way). I, too, go out of my way to avoid that intersection.
Posted by: MontclairMom | Jan 13, 2006 1:46:48 PM
Any of the intersecting streets along Broad Street in Bloomfield from Belleville Avenue through Bay. I regularly have to outrun freakin' SUVs and cars that make hairpin turns without seeing if there is a pedestrian already in the MIDDLE OF THE CROSSWALK. The other night a woman didn't even register that she almost ran over me. I imagine that these people are either drunk or stupid or both.
Posted by: Krys | Jan 13, 2006 2:52:10 PM
The area around Mountainside Hospital where Claremont/Walnut Crescent/Bay Ave/Pine St. converge has it all: a blind curve, speeding ambulances, senior drivers, people not from the area who don't know where they're going, and pedestrians trying to cross to and from parking lots.
I'll fourth Washington St. on the Bloomfield/Glen Ridge border, though. Wicked sun glare eastbound during the morning rush.
Posted by: tickledpink | Jan 13, 2006 3:41:32 PM
The Sunset Park area!
There are always kids, or dogs, or kids with dogs playing in that area and the cars fly around the corners.
Drivers don't bother to slow down before turning onto these streets, and they don't bother to consider the street around Sunset Park as two lanes streets so they take up the entire road making it dangerous for drivers and kids playing.
Also, the turn as you approach Park Street is another place where people drive in the center of the street too fast and without thinking.
Posted by: hrhppg | Jan 13, 2006 3:57:52 PM
