Park Slope Street Where 2 Kids Were Killed Gets Safety Upgrade

PARK SLOPE, BROOKLYN — The city has almost completed safety measures at the Park Slope intersection months after two children were killed while crossing the street.

A Vision Zero project that will bring slow-turn treatments, a mile-long protected bike lane, and shorter pedestrian crossings to Ninth Street between Prospect Park West and Third Avenue is expected to wrap up about six months after driver Dorothy Bruns fatally ran over Joshua Lew, 1, and Abigail Blumenstein, 4, in March, officials said.

Bruns — who may have suffered a seizure behind the wheel —was charged with manslaughter after an investigators found she ignored her doctor’s warning that health issues rendered her unfit to drive, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney's office.

Elected officials and activists surveyed the work happening along Ninth Street Thursday, and several New Yorkers who lost family in car crashes chided the city for poor road safety conditions, the Daily News reported.

“The paint that went down here today, the lines that we’ve drawn on the street, they shouldn’t happen only after two toddlers die,” said Amy Cohen, whose 12-year-old son Sammy Cohen-Eckstein was also killed by a driver in Brooklyn.

“For us, it’s too late," added Jane Martin-Lavaud, a 59-year-old whose daughter Leonora Lavaud, 24, was killed in Gravesend in 2013. "We need to take action and we need to stop waiting until after something happens.”

Mayor de Blasio did not attend the event but released a statement shortly after.

“To say the March crash in Park Slope hit close to home would be an understatement,” de Blasio said. “We cannot undo that terrible afternoon five months ago, but these safety improvements will help prevent future tragic crashes on this busy street."

Photo courtesy of the Department of Transportation/Flickr