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Issue 519 January 27 2006
A hotel worker, a graduate student, a philanthropist and a Holocaust survivor were among the pedestrians killed by NYC drivers this week. The dead, all women, were: · 49-year-old Haggar Frempong-Manso, crushed Saturday by a backing beer truck on W. 44th Street. · Hannah Engle, 25, killed by an allegedly drunk driver at E. 14th St. and Second Ave. early Sunday. · Andrea Bronfman, 60, mowed down on Monday in an East 65th Street crosswalk by a cab turning from 5th Avenue. · Eva Schweizer, age 81, run over by a NYC Transit bus on Gun Hill Road in the Bronx on Tuesday. None of the drivers has been charged with more than a traffic violation. Yet not even the death of Bronfman, wife of billionaire Seagram’s heir Charles Bronfman and arguably the most socially prominent New Yorker in decades to be killed crossing the street, is likely to ruffle the city’s “drivers uber alles” culture. Seven years have passed since Killed By Automobile identified “car turning into pedestrian in crosswalk” — the m.o. in Bronfman’s death — as the city’s Number One cause of traffic fatalities. Yet the Bloomberg administration has no programs aimed at protecting pedestrians’ right-of-way (see MTR #’s 212, 214 and 215 or www.panix.com/~jlefevre/cars-suck/research/kba.html). Mayor Bloomberg this week announced sweeping changes costing $25 million at the Administration for Children’s Services following the beating death of Nixzmary Brown. No shake-ups are reported at DOT or the NYPD, which is expected to again arrest bicyclists at tonight’s Critical Mass ride.
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