CLEVELAND — Noemi Ortiz and other residents living along the narrow Cleveland W. 25th Street corridor shared their safety concerns over speeding and irresponsible driving, as we move further into the summer.
Ortiz and others living at the Lofts of Lion Mills told News 5 there are too many accidents and other issues at the intersection of W. 25th Street and Meyer Avenue.
“It’s dangerous the way they fly up and down the street, you have souped-up cars racing, motorcycles, even giant trucks they fly through here," Ortiz said. “Kids going to school and elderly people coming out of different high rises, we got people here in wheelchairs. We had an RTA bus and a city truck smash each other the truck was up on the pole. And what do you do, I called city hall, I called the councilwoman, I get no answer no nothing.”
Resident Ray Combs and West 25th Street businesses like Belky's Hair Place are also hoping the city will take action to improve street safety, especially with school children on summer break.
“No matter what time of day it is morning noon and night, they come flying through here all the time," Combs said. “I've sent them and I’ve been out here, I’ve seen the light turn red and they’ll just run it, run right through it they don’t care.”
While News 5 was on the scene at the intersection on June 30, we witnessed a car and bicycle collide. The young boy riding the bike was knocked to the pavement on Meyer Avenue, and the driver of the car stopped to assess the situation. Fortunately, no one was injured in the crash, but residents said the incident was a typical example that outlines their safety concerns.
News 5 also used its radar gun to get an unofficial idea of how fast drivers were traveling up and down West 25th Street, and our unscientific sample showed a large number of drivers were not doing the posted 25 MPH speed limit. A significant number of drivers were found to be doing 12 to 15 MPH over the limit.
Both Cleveland Traffic Commissioner Gordon Holmes and Ward 14 Councilwoman Jasmin Santana responded immediately to our story. Santana told News 5 she will work with the neighborhood and the traffic commissioner in the coming weeks to improve safety along the narrow corridor. News 5 requested West 25th Street accident numbers from the city, we hope to get those in the coming days.
Meanwhile, Holmes pledged to take action to look into resident safety concerns and had a word of advice for drivers during the upcoming Fourth of July weekend.
“We’re definitely going to take a look at it, I’m going to see if we can get traffic and engineering involved and see if they can give us what the median speed is over there," Holmes said. “Joe, we don’t want people to feel like if they make a phone call that we’re not going to be responsive.”
“I want motorists to just act like your children are living there and how would you drive, or how would you want people to drive through these dense corridors.”
