Traffic Light Proposed At Deadly Basking Ridge Intersection

BASKING RIDGE, NJ — Concerned residents spoke out at last night’s Bernards Township’s Committee meeting and have also started a petition to make Allen Road safer after a Basking Ridge local was struck and killed last week.

Beom Sohn, 56, from Basking Ridge was hit by a car when he was crossing Liberty Ridge Road at Allen Road around 7:50 a.m. on Oct. 6, according to Bernards Township Police Lt. Scott Ward.

Sohn was airlifted to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick where he died the next morning from his injuries.

The driver, Dongmei Gou, 52, of Basking Ridge was issued a summonses for Careless Driving.

“She is not being charged criminally with anything,” Ward said. “She had no intent to hit the person walking on the street.”

This isn’t the first pedestrian accident on Allen Road. Doug Dolgin, who started a petition to install multiple traffic signals on the road, was hit by a car on Dec. 15, 2015.

Dolgin was hit by a speeding car on Allen Road at the intersection of Patriot Hill/Hamilton Woods. He suffered a severely damaged left leg, requiring five major surgeries in 14 days and his two dogs were killed, Dolgin wrote change.org.

“It was a terrible accident,” Dolgin said at last night’s committee meeting. “I went to rehab and had 20 screws put in my leg. I had to be home for six months.”

Now Dolgin has a new dog and he walks along Allen Road with a radar gun where he clocks passing drivers.

“I have done 135 tests and not one of the cars were traveling 35 mph, which is the posted speed limit,” Dolgin said. “The highest was 76 and the average speed is 57.”

One after another residents stood up and spoke to the Bernards Township Mayor and Committee sharing their own stories of peril on Allen Road.

“No one stops in the cross walk and two ladies almost hit me this morning,” Joanne Zilli who walks on Allen Road every morning. “No one stops at the crosswalk or stops at any of the lines. No one stops anywhere, no one even looks… Coming up and down Allen Road, it’s a speedway and it’s scary. Ever since this man got hit and killed it’s even more scary.”

Dolgin’s petition proposes a light at the Rite Aid entrance and flashing red/yellow lights with walk capabilities at three other neighborhood entrances.

Mayor Carol Bianchi thanked all the residents for their comments and concerns and would pass it along to Bernards Township Police Chief Brian Bobowicz and the Department of Public Works.

To read the petition or to sign it visit https://www.change.org/p/dept-...

(Image via Morguefile)

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