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Cars hitting buildings

I tried to find the thread about cars hitting houses but failed, so here's another!


Apparently a car ran into Trees Hall at the University of Pittsburgh. I can't find a news article, so I haven't verified the story, but it looks plausible:





jeg
2011-09-15 13:25:58

I was at Trees Hall last night, an hour or two after the accident.


The story I got there was an eminent Karate instructor was messing with his flip flop and ran through the door and into an internal wall.


So not only is this car hitting buildings ("Well, it didn't have any warning lights on it, did it?"), but it is also "flip-flops in the news".


mick
2011-09-15 14:44:20

So wait... the karate instructor karate-chopped the wall in his flip-flops? Impressive.


atleastmykidsloveme
2011-09-15 15:54:45

this summer, LOTS of trees were hit by cars. especially near the corner of negley and penn and in a one mile radius from there.


caitlin
2011-09-15 17:29:26

Coordinated effort? Or random stupidity & bad luck?


stuinmccandless
2011-09-15 22:45:18

There was another car that had a house jump out in front of it in Baldwin overnight. I hate people.


stefb
2011-09-16 09:08:32

oh I was there! I was changing in the locker room and heard the LOUDEST noise, it sounded like a piece of roof fell in or something. When I went to leave, there was a white SUV that had crashed through those rear doors by the pool and went ALL the way through - the whole car was in Trees hall. Paramedics had a guy on a stretcher, no one was seriously hurt, and there was water EVERYWHERE.


poboy
2011-09-16 13:46:50

Those Damn pools should stay on the trails!


marko82
2011-09-19 11:41:39

Sorry to bring up a sad event, but flip-flops were also to "blame" when the teen killed cyclist Donald Parker (RIP) with his car.


These stories add to my general dislike of flip-flops and I wish to see them in the news no more! They only bring bad news.


rachel_ding
2011-09-19 13:34:33

did anyone see this video posted on urban velo? not in pittsburgh, but HOLY HELL!


http://urbanvelo.org/car-smashes-into-rock-and-road-cyclery/


watch it, then keep this in mind


Three people suffered minor injuries when an 86-year-old driver barreled completely through the store at about 5 p.m. Tuesday....The car continued some 100 feet or more through the store, plowing through a concrete wall into a newly built studio and slammed into the back wall with the back wheels still spinning.


When store employees reached the woman, she still was pushing the gas pedal to the floor. The car was leaking some kind of fluid and the spinning tires had melted a hole in the floor, filling the store with smoke.


erok
2011-09-19 13:46:51

@erok did anyone see this video posted on urban velo?


Erok, is there a story behind that? Did she have a stroke? Was she angry at the mean bicyclists that are stealing her roads? Dementia?


mick
2011-09-19 14:15:45

don't know. there is a link to the story from the UV post. she apparently went back to the shop the next day to view the video


erok
2011-09-19 14:21:29

oh, she was parked in front and hit the gas pedal instead of the brake


erok
2011-09-19 14:22:03

And, of course, the standard question for cases like this (aside: you wouldn't think this would be common enough for there to be "cases like this" but - alas! - ther are quite a few of them.):


Did the store have blinkie lights in front? Was it wearing reflective clothing?


Obviously the store wasn't watching traffic vigilantly enough.


mick
2011-09-19 14:58:11

C'mon, Mick, that store had no business being so close to a road anyway. AND, it had no helmet on. That store was clearly just another scoff-law bicycle shop.


atleastmykidsloveme
2011-09-19 15:00:09

The scraps of black plastic left behind made it look as if the woman had driven between two concrete pillars about 15 feet apart, straight through a narrow space between the curve of David Lawrence and another pillar about 10 feet away, and then down the nearby stairs before making impact with the Barco Law Building.


Is that supposed to imply this might have been intentional? also:


Kyle Deroner, a Pitt senior, was in Towers Garage when he saw the crash. Deroner, who was also driving at the time, saw the woman was about to leave the garage when she abruptly reversed. The car then “floored it across the street ... and head-on into the building,” he said.


salty
2011-09-21 01:39:45

Another One! Woman hits house for the second time...


sloaps
2011-09-21 13:02:26

"First time it happened, my daughter's car was parked right there," Stocke said. "The same lady actually ran into the car and knocked it halfway off the wall."


He added that he thinks it may be time for the woman to give up her driver's license.


erok
2011-09-21 13:37:15



http://www.wtae.com/news/29251874/detail.html

PITTSBURGH -- A car slammed into the first floor of an apartment building on Memory Lane in the Hill District overnight, crashing directly into a bedroom occupied by a woman and her boyfriend.


According to the woman, her boyfriend -- who was already paralyzed from the waist down from a previous car accident -- was sleeping in bed and has been taken to a hospital for injuries.


Police have said that they do not plan to file any charges against the driver at this time and are still investigating as to how this crash happened.


erok
2011-09-21 13:59:13

Sweet Baby Jane! I think that guy who's paralyzed from a previous car accident would now move to a place where cars are verboten...


sloaps
2011-09-21 14:04:38

Wait- there is a memory lane in the city?


stefb
2011-09-21 14:48:52

I don't know what you have to do in order to have charges filed against you. Her high heel got stuck therefore she was DOING IT WRONG and she be held liable for everything and have her license suspended until she can prove she's responsible enough to have one.


Here is another one. This woman has run into the same house twice now.


rsprake
2011-09-21 16:11:41

Someone crashed their car into Barb's Corner Kitchen on Butler a few weeks ago, too.


floggingdavy
2011-09-21 16:18:14

high heels and flip flops are out for me when driving. I know that I CAN do it and have in the past, but now I always take off my right shoe if it's iffy for driving. As for driving barefoot being a no-no, I say whatever. In a time sensitive situation I can't be worried about the placement of my shoes on the pedal.


tabby
2011-09-21 16:19:17

It's about time we had some laws to prohibit these buildings from being so close to these roads. Roads are for cars. Period. Buildings, light poles, bridge abutments, etc., all need to be removed to a safe distance to permit the free unfettered use of automobiles. Flip-flops get stuck. High heels get stuck. God forbid that should happen and a building should get in the way and damage a vehicle.


atleastmykidsloveme
2011-09-21 19:08:05

Jeez now I have to worry about cars hitting me inside my house too!!!


willie
2011-09-21 19:15:42

it's incredible how much money goes to repair private and public property because of damage from bad drivers. i wouldn't doubt that more money is spent fixing the infrastructure that is destroyed by cars than that goes into all the bicycle infrastructure combined


erok
2011-09-21 20:05:59

On the up side, if these news reports are any gauge, it might be safer to be out on a bike than sitting around at home.


pseudacris
2011-09-21 20:08:24

I am never sitting around at home again.


erok
2011-09-21 20:18:35

who can say cars and houses cannot be together?


All these barriers to keep then apart; so bigoted.


sloaps
2011-09-21 20:24:21

double post?


ejwme
2011-09-22 15:03:26

we should ban all buildings to special trails outside the city limits. That would leave the roadways and parking lots inside the city limits safe for cars. One giant demolition derby. The winner can have a bicycle and is permitted to rejoin civilization AHEM venture out to where the buildings have been banished too.


ejwme
2011-09-22 15:03:26

A "transport U" van is smashed into a

building in the strip right now.


They and A1 transport are the worst drivers

(outside of towtrucks) int he city.


steevo
2011-09-22 22:01:28

http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2011/09/23/vehicle-shears-utility-pole-overnight-in-oakland/


Officials say police have found the driver who sheared a utility pole early this morning in Oakland.


The accident happened around 12:30 a.m. on Morewood Avenue.

The impact of the crash brought live wires crashing to the ground.

Authorities later found the vehicle abandoned at Morewood Avenue and Castleman Street in Shadyside.


Police have reportedly located the driver, but the circumstances surrounding the crash remain unclea


erok
2011-09-23 13:31:20

Details such as those that are missing here rarely come to light. Maybe the police and a precious few will ever know what really happened, when what really happened is all we (I anyway) care about. i.e., "yeah I know the power went off at 12:30 a.m., and yeah I can see the pole down and the damaged car, but wth happened, really?"


stuinmccandless
2011-09-23 18:13:01

Clearly the telephone pole was drunk and made the guy swerve right into it.


salty
2011-09-23 20:13:50

Drunk car driver, totals a pole and probably the car, darkens the whole neighborhood for a couple hours, multiple sets of personnel involved in cleanup (police, fire, EMS, utility crews, tow service, etc.). Easily a hundred thousand of dollars in damage and man-hours-equivalent of labor involved. Someone pays for all this, eventually.


Drunk bike rider, runs smack into a pole, gets a bloody nose, tacos the front wheel, carries bike the rest of the way home. $40 for a new wheel, all on him.


Any questions?


stuinmccandless
2011-09-23 20:28:16

Ya ever notice how those poles are always hanging around on street corners? They get what they deserve. Get a job!


Edit: telephone poles. Not that it doesnt apply to others (kidding)


marko82
2011-09-23 20:43:26

Yeah, I've got a few questions.


Drunk cyclist riding along a road, wobbles into traffic, is struck and killed by a passing motorist who was not suffering a flip-flop malfunction. Motorist has to live with that the rest of her life. Family and friends of cyclist have to live with the loss of their brother and friend.


Any answers?


atleastmykidsloveme
2011-09-23 20:45:51

Sounds as if a house on Herron Ave took a hit today as well. Heard it on the scanner.


lou-m
2011-09-23 21:12:34

@ALMKLM barring drunk zombie cyclists your example can never be a repeat offender. So his upper bound on damage to society is lower than if you put him in a car. Still he should clearly be in the back seat of a cab.


sprite
2011-09-28 13:29:05

Somewhat on topic...I watched a Semi take the roof off its trailer trying to squeeze under an overpass in the west end. There were only two giant orange signs displaying the clearance height!


dom
2011-09-28 14:45:56

I said a big "wtf?!?" this morning when I heard this. I bet the guy was drunk. I also heard on the 6pm news that another car hit another building but not too many details other than the driver was unresponsive.


stefb
2011-10-17 00:50:26

Holy crap, I can see the Vocelli sign from my street when the leaves are off the trees. I heard the sirens & wondered what was up.


Edit: That truck would also had to have taken out a sizable piece of the wine & liquor store. I don't see how the truck could have avoided it, if it went right into the opposite parking lot. That's gonna cost someone's insurance a bundle.


I'll go up in the light of day and have a better look. This is only a quarter mile from my house.


stuinmccandless
2011-10-17 01:01:18

I am glad it wasn't your house. I think I know where this is, but as it was shown on the news, it looks like vocelli sits on the corner and the truck went through diagonally.


stefb
2011-10-17 02:22:42

That would be exceedingly difficult to do from driving along Perry Highway, though not impossible. There is a raised divider between the road and the building, though I suppose they could have entered from the far end of the parking lot (StreetView). The front of the pizza shop is about where the front of the white car is. Assuming there were no cars in the lot (I suppose that's possible at 2am), he would still have to cover 200 feet before clobbering the building.


stuinmccandless
2011-10-17 02:41:25

THe owner said that he doesn't understand how his business was hit, as there is a huge parking lot around the building


stefb
2011-10-17 03:53:20

Another one, car vs. Washington and Jefferson maintenance building.


sloaps
2011-10-17 09:15:30

Those college buildings are the worst – what’s with their elitist attitudes anyway? They expect the rest of us to just get out of their way or something. I say they should just stay on the sidewalk where they belong, or go use one of those trails or something.


marko82
2011-10-17 12:39:00

I went up by the pizza shop. It doesn't look that difficult to come flying off Perry Hwy and traverse the lot. And no it didn't appear to mess up the liquor store. Still, this could not have happened unless he was drunk or asleep.


stuinmccandless
2011-10-18 16:44:01

Given how many people I observe texting while they drive, I would imagine this uptick is because of that... such a culprit is much easier to hide than, say, intoxication


noah-mustion
2011-10-18 16:47:57

@noah as if talking and driving werent bad enough! from what ive witnessed, most people text and drive with the phone in their lap. its like theyre hiding it because of shame or fear of getting ticketed. if they held it up at eye level, they might still be able to see oncoming hazards in their periphery, and they wouldnt be wasting what could be a few very important seconds by tilting their heads up and down. i think this is a super serious problem and it needs immediate attention because it looks like its becoming much more common. :(


melange396
2011-10-19 19:07:27

I was riding on Liberty this morning next to an older dude who had no qualms about holding up his phone at eye level. He was clearly not really with it as he was driving way under the speed limit. :)


rsprake
2011-10-19 19:13:56

You know how there are DUI checkpoints? I almost wish that vehicles were equipped with some sort of serevailence cameras that were able to monitor people while they drove, and there were spot checks to see how people were driving. If people are driving dangerously, they gets their license suspended. But I am sure people would Say that it violates some sort of something or other.


stefb
2011-10-19 20:23:54

pfft, why just suspend their lisence? while we're at it we could implant a device into the car that would automatically shut off the car and they would have to walk home. mwahaha. as long as it doesn't apply to me, of course. ;)


tabby
2011-10-20 19:40:54

Can you imagine if some fully capable people HAD to walk some place?!? I work with someone who lives 0.6 miles from the office, but drives and pays for parking.


stefb
2011-10-20 23:47:46

wow


erok
2011-10-24 15:56:09

Seriously? Which office? I would love it if I lived that close to work and could walk.


rsprake
2011-10-24 16:13:47

So not really a house crash but my wife had an altercation with someone who fits this description.


She was stopped in her car with her left hand turn signal on at the Braddock and Hutchinson traffic light when she looked back at the woman who was tailing her the entire way down Braddock. The woman who fits the description in the article was screaming at her to move up in traffic, two feet. When the light turned green the woman sped around her and zoomed through the Regent Square business district to tailgate more traffic.


Age, car and location all fit. Strange.


rsprake
2011-10-24 16:21:19

I knew a woman who lived on/near The Boulevard in Carrick (that's the name of the street), a block off of Brownsville Road, and worked somewhere around South 8th a block off of East Carson, and drove every day. Her commute was identical to the 51C Carrick bus route. There was every-10-minute peak service on the 51C at the time, easing off to every 30 at night, about 22 hours a day. Her excuse: "I didn't know the schedule." I think I had a longer walk from where I parked my car in the Westinghouse lot than she would have had on both ends of her trip combined.


Some people are hopeless.


stuinmccandless
2011-10-24 16:24:27

You don't need to know the schedule when it comes every ten minutes!


rsprake
2011-10-24 16:28:46

> I work with someone who lives 0.6 miles from the office, but drives and pays for parking.


i know a guy who had a 1.6mi round trip walking (or biking or bussing) to/from work vs a 2.3mi round trip driving... and he still drove EVERY day. im not sure if it makes it better or worse that he had an effectively free parking pass (paid for by his employer).


melange396
2011-10-24 19:11:27

@noah Carjacking suspect runs jacked car into building, has siezure.


Smart bets are that the tox screen shows high blood levels of cocaine and alcohol.


mick
2011-10-25 14:19:16

how to end a car jacking before damage is done - drive a manual transmission. (or, more obviously, ride a bike - I guess clipless pedals are the cycling equivalent of difficult to operate without planning/experience?)


ejwme
2011-10-25 15:15:55

@ejwme: One could also set up one's bike with the backwards-pedaling half of a retro-direct drive, and allow forward pedaling to simply freewheel...I suspect most thieves would not think to pedal backwards to get moving.


reddan
2011-10-25 15:22:18

I think fixed gear might be more of a cycling equivalent of difficult to operate without planning/experience than clipless pedals, which might be just uncomfortable... It is my understanding, at least, that fixed throws or bewilders a lot of unprepared riders, and they don't get far. I could be wrong.


backwards-pedaling half of a retro-direct drive sounds very exciting, though.


aryn
2011-10-25 15:59:14

I almost wish that vehicles were equipped with some sort of serevailence cameras that were able to monitor people while they drove, and there were spot checks to see how people were driving. If people are driving dangerously, they gets their license suspended.


Such schemes are already in the works that would involve lower insurance rates in exchange for your insurance company being able to monitor speeding habits. If there's one thing that people listen to, it's money.


chemicaldave
2011-10-25 19:16:51

I don't know why, but I never expected this thread to be such a consistent source of depraved entertainment. I never realized that, even in this small town of ours, multiple vehicles careen into structures daily. I'm now totally amazed that I haven't done it myself.


ejwme
2011-10-25 20:55:33

Not really a building, but this just happened outside the BikePGH office. dude in the passenger seat was taken away on a stretcher.




erok
2011-11-07 16:49:23

stretcher? For a car going over a curb? Some curb.


ejwme
2011-11-07 20:08:36

who knows what happend inside. if dude wasn't wearing a seatbelt, a whole bunch of stuff coulda happened


erok
2011-11-07 20:40:21

Augh!! Scaffolding! It's *after me*! Gotta get awaaaayy!!


stuinmccandless
2011-11-07 22:51:34

Those curbs can be vicious.




jeg
2011-11-08 00:28:14

That curb looks it came out of nowhere.


pseudacris
2011-11-08 00:38:55

I want that gal's reflective vest that says "traffic". It's perfect.


It is highly visible, and identifies the wearer as part of traffic. Perfect.


edited to correct gender. i think. the vest is so bright!


ejwme
2011-11-09 19:12:22

^ +1!


pseudacris
2011-11-09 19:50:09

My guess is the driver was turning left onto 7th and trying to make it through way after the arrow had changed and pedestrians started to cross.


dmtroyer
2011-11-18 13:32:19

The night before, some guy was unloading groceries out of his car in Wilkinsburg and was hit by a woman who, according to eyewitnesses, "appeared to be reaching for something inside her car", i.e. texting.


noah-mustion
2011-11-19 00:09:24

Another one: Thanksgiving night a guy ran off of the road in front of my house, took out my next door neighbor's first retaining wall, concrete stairs and railing, second retaining wall, and the next neighbor's bush. He never touched the brakes.


I came outside and screamed at him to put in park - he was trying to take off despite not having a right wheel. He ended up with a DUI, and the two (I'm pretty sure) prostitutes in his car got a ride home from the cops.


Cars are a reoccurring problem at our house. See my handy diagram here:


Crafton tells us they can't do anything because it's a PennDOT road.


Does anyone have ideas for where I should start complaining? This is the third major car-in-yard accident on my block in three years.


*edited to add*


My neighbor has been complaining to the state rep, but that's getting us nowhere. I really want to start making some noise before I end up with a car on my front porch.


pinky
2011-11-26 13:42:55

What about your Borough Council? If you can convince them of the problem, they should be able to advocate with the State, which may be more effective than an individual resident trying to contact the rep.


atleastmykidsloveme
2011-11-26 20:25:44

That's a good idea. Unfortunately it really only affects 3-4 houses on the road, so it's hard to make the case that it's a huge problem. Though since we're right next to a park that often has kids, there's that angle on it too.


I'd love to see a 3-way stop at the intersection by the house. That would solve the problems 100%.


The hubby and I already plan to install steel supports when we redo the low rock wall that separates our yard from the sidewalk.


pinky
2011-11-26 22:26:13

It doesn't need to be a Borough-wide problem. Its not as though you are asking for an ordinance to be re-written. You just need them to advocate with the state about the risk that intersection represents. Start with your Borough Manager, and make sure to follow-up in person at the next Council Meeting. Get your affected neighbors to attend as well. Good luck.


atleastmykidsloveme
2011-11-26 22:38:11

The solution in my neighborhood is to install some really large rocks in the yard.


Seriously, though, the problem isn't cars running off the road, it's drunks getting behind the wheel. Put some teeth behind drunk driving laws -- mandatory impoundment of one's car on the first offense, for instance -- and head off the problem in the first place.


stuinmccandless
2011-11-26 23:25:12

I am uncertain to the truthfulness but I have heard that installing such things can backfire should someone get injured on the large objects installed as a deterrent. The example I heard was a mailbox within a mailbox to combat people hitting it with bats. A car clipped the mailbox and had substantial damage and a passenger was injured and the land owner had major issues. I never spent the time to find out the truthfulness but I can certainly see how a lawyer could twist things around.


I agree with Stu, make the penalties mean something. Life altering penalties work pretty well. Loss of license and impounding the vehicle certainly will change someones life enough to think about their actions.


orionz06
2011-11-26 23:37:30

Since when has loss of license prevented people with multiple DUI's from driving?


atleastmykidsloveme
2011-11-27 00:07:09

Who pays for the repairs to your lawn and such after such an offroad excursion?


As with anything in this world nowadays, you probably need to file a lawsuit. Probably against PennDOT for negligence and forward them the bill for lawn repair? Idunno. Try to find a lawyer who is willing to listen.


rice-rocket
2011-11-27 01:01:27

I had the bashed mailbox problem when I lived in New Stanton. The problem went away for me and everyone when I installed a piece of 8-foot angle iron, buried in the dirt about two feet upstream of the mailbox and angled upstream a bit, pounded in as deep as I could get it to go, about three feet. One night, I heard a car come along, followed by a thunk and the crash of side window glass. The mailbox remained untouched. The car kept going. I left the angle iron there the rest of the summer, but neither I nor my neighbors had another such incident.


@ALMKLM - Kinda hard to drive a car that's not in your possession.


stuinmccandless
2011-11-27 04:47:58

impounded cars can be gotten back. perhaps you mean permanent loss of their automobile? that would be unamerican! and besides, there are more teeth behind drunk driving laws than any other driving offenses. you still have to convince drunk people that it might happen to them.


at the notion that installing protective boulders might be detrimental in the instance that someone crashes into them: i am not a lawyer (though i did help one pass the bar exam!) but that strikes me as pure poppycock. there are a lot of sue-happy urban legends, and that sounds like it fits the bill. if that were a real issue, it would be impossible to install guard rails. which, incidentally, is something i would consider pursuing. a house on ellsworth got one after a few too many cars crashed on their lawn. and another, come to think of it, at the base of canton.


hiddenvariable
2011-11-27 05:03:12

@stu - but its not that difficult to drive a car that is in someone else's name


atleastmykidsloveme
2011-11-27 05:22:34

@HV... guardrails are designed to be impacted, rocks are not. I agree that it is probably an urban legend but you never know.


That being said, a nice boulder landscaped into the yard with a flagpole looks much nicer than a hunk of galvanized steel.


orionz06
2011-11-27 07:37:24

rice rocket - my neighbor tells me that he has to file with his homeowners, and pay his deductible. His insurance company then goes after the driver's insurance company (if there is one). If they succeed, and the driver has insurance that will cover it, neighbor gets his deductible back. If they don't, it's on neighbor to file a lawsuit against the guy for the deductible. Now that we know the guy was driving a rental car, I'm not sure how that impacts the process.


Re: rock walls. We actually have a rock wall, which stopped a car this winter. It's original to the house, which makes me suspect horse drawn carriages also ran off the road in 1890.


My fear, and hubby's fear, is that due to its slope (see image), a car going fast enough will use it more as a ramp into the porch. In fact we know it happened at least once in the 80s. So we plan to rebuild it and reinforce it after we finish the rest of our house renovations.



The drunk drivers are the ones who end up in our yards. One even died before we lived here. But every day dozens of cars speed past that park full of kids and through the bend fast enough to bump the curb and squeal tires. The speed limit is 25. A dedicated speed trap would be a good first step, in my eyes.


pinky
2011-11-27 11:55:15

Truck crashes into PNC Bank branch in Cranberry

Wednesday, December 07, 2011


Cranberry police are investigating after a man crashed his pickup truck into a bank this morning, narrowly missing a toddler inside.


Sgt. Chuck Mascellino said 45-year-old Donald Dunkle was headed east on Freedom Road when he crossed into opposing traffic, crested an embankment and slammed into a PNC branch on the 1300 block at about 9:15 a.m.


A bank employee pushed a 3-year-old out of the path of the truck as it crashed into the building. The employee was struck by flying debris and was checked by medics at the scene, but declined to go to the hospital.


Mr. Dunkle was taken to UPMC Cranberry by ambulance after he appeared "incoherent," Sgt. Mascellino said, though he suffered no apparent injuries from crashing his truck.


"We're not sure if its medical or if there's other contributing factors," Sgt. Mascellino said.


He said police will determine if Mr. Dunkle will be charged after further investigation.


http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11341/1195201-100.stm


quizbot
2011-12-07 18:43:54

"bad luck" - that's exactly how i'd describe it.




Meanwhile, police say the lot has had some bad luck recently.


The cite three occasions in the last 18 months, counting today’s, in which a motorist drove into a building, including one into the front of the Chuck E. Cheese, and another in which a student driver slammed into the front of the DMV center.


According to police, there was a fourth incident in which a man, suffering from Alzheimer’s, drove across the parking lot, out of control. The only thing that kept him from driving into a building was a cement walkway, which ripped the front axle out of his car upon impact.


http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2011/12/30/vehicle-crashes-into-k-mart-in-collier-twp/


salty
2011-12-30 21:29:45

Saw an SUV being extricated from a phone pole on the corner @ Doughboy Square today.


pseudacris
2011-12-30 23:48:13

If you fail three tests in a month, then wreck a couple weeks later, that to me is a strong indicator that it's time to hang up the keys.


There is no God-given or Constitutionally protected right to drive a car.


stuinmccandless
2011-12-31 00:47:04

"When he heard something hit his car, he thought it was a deer so he kept driving, he told police.


...Police suspect he actually hit a 17-year-old girl who was found in the road with serious injuries. The girl survived the accident."


http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11356/1198626-57.stm


pseudacris
2011-12-31 05:43:59

image028

I'm trying to figure out how this pole got mowed down. This is at the corner of Perry Hwy and Highland in West View, looking west. Behind me is a very low speed one-way street, where residents 95% of the time have to stop at a red. Coming across Perry (the I-279 Bellevue-WView exit feeds this) one would not go across since it's one way; everyone turns. Southbound 19 is waaay out of the way. Northbound 19 is both uphill, and at least 10 feet off the path of travel on the inside of a curve. How could anyone hit this pole? The direction of clobber says low-speed one-way, which would only make sense if a car is 2nd in line and clobbered the pole to avoid clobbering the car stopped at the light, which is possible if they're not paying attention. Also, this is a very new pole, just replaced Fall 2010.


stuinmccandless
2012-01-01 23:52:55

I'd guess somebody in the parking lot to the right knocked it down into the traffic lane. Suppose the maroon car in Street View backed up a little too fast.


That might have knocked the sign off the pole too, or perhaps somebody ran over it again while it was in the traffic lane. Then someone moved the broken pieces out of the traffic lane.


But I figure if none of the buildings at that intersection have car-shaped holes in them, the driver who merely plowed into a sign practically deserves a commendation. Or at least some kind of citation....


steven
2012-01-02 06:01:17

Maybe now the authorities will do something. An Olive Garden had to close! ;)


edmonds59
2012-01-02 11:20:19

Seems like the vehicles most involved in these kinds of incidents are larger, SUV types. Would you agree? Well, I guess morons drive any size vehicle. People should have their licenses suspended for 10 years if this kind of thing happens. The charge: Too stupid/dangerous to drive.


stefb
2012-01-02 13:45:01

End the thread right now. Nothing will EVER beat that!!


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-01-05 23:35:28

Santa came in a car this year?


mick
2012-01-06 03:39:38

Ridiculous.


rsprake
2012-01-06 14:09:55

Another house....just jumped out of nowhere.


pseudacris
2012-01-06 14:53:35

Meanwhile, police say the lot has had some bad luck recently.


"Bad luck"? That phrase coming from the folks who fail to enforce the speed limit?


That's a lot like blaming the weather for the predictable results of bad driving.


mick
2012-01-06 15:41:59

"police are investigating the cause of the crash"


Uh......


wojty
2012-01-08 05:24:30

Also, if causing damage to beer doesn't get people's attention in this region, I don't know what will.


wojty
2012-01-08 05:25:15

Wojty- I just heard that story conclude with the same line: "police are investigating the cause of the crash." I would have to say that it was caused by some moron who wasn't paying attention and should probably have his or her license taken away for a while.


stefb
2012-01-08 11:18:26

@stefb: "police are investigating the cause of the crash." That line is practically boilerplate for this type of story. But I'm most curious about your statement: "I would have to say that it was caused by..." Can you share the evidence your investigation turned up?


Half of my frustration with the scarcity of information provided by local PDs in these cases is it invites all kinds of speculation. I understand that right after the accident happens, a story has to get published, and the PD may not be in a position to make an accurate statement relative to what happened. I would love if there was some reliable means of media follow-up to explain what did happen (ie: the results of the investigation).


I'm no Cyril Wecht, but it seems to me there are (off the top of my head) a lot of possible causes for car v. beer distributor, car v. house, car v. bike, car v. pedestrian: stroke, heart attack, over-medicated, over-steer to avoid something in road, old-age... Not every accident is negligence.


This is not to say that plenty are not caused by texting, cell phone use, not paying attention, etc. But not ALL are.


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-01-08 15:21:55

Not like it matters, unless the driver was drunk there won't be any consequences regardless.


Half of those excuses are negligence anyways.


salty
2012-01-08 15:37:37

Well let's see.......Toyota camry.......my guess is a stuck accelerator. Even if he/she was texting, they can always through that excuse out there, one of perks of driving a Toyota!!


b-s
2012-01-08 15:37:42

I want to get past the cause of the accident, and look instead at the cause of the cause of the accident.

* Distractedness? Will tighter laws make more of a difference than social peer pressure, like drunk driving has (after 40 years of tolerance, and 20 more years of effort) finally started to bring down drunk driving accidents.

* Unnecessary trips? Why was this person driving in the first place? If there is no reason to get in the car, there is no chance of being the next wreck.

* No usable public transit? Were they driving at all because there was no bus to ride, or a bus they did not know how to ride?


I'm sure there are others, but IMHO as much effort needs to focus on the upstream cause as in those last four seconds of travel.


stuinmccandless
2012-01-08 22:18:46

The car had to have had a mind of its own! A lot of times when you do hear the cause, it is because the driver hit the gas instead of the brake. I dont understand how there would be some cause other than the driver was just being a dumbass. Though I wonder, how does a stuck accelerator cause the car to go forward instead of backward if the car was placed in reverse? Are there any other causes that could be beyond the control of the driver? I don't know all that much about car malfunctions, but it would be amazing if all of those car vs building crashes were caused by mechanical malfunction.


stefb
2012-01-09 00:21:55

Not drunk, just loaded up on legal hardcore prescription medication.


quizbot
2012-01-09 05:23:46

Unmanaged diabetes can cause blackouts, too.


pseudacris
2012-01-09 13:00:27

Sudden drop in blood pressure and seizures can also cause a blackout.


marvelousm3
2012-01-09 16:02:19

The news can usually report on that right away and they do, but good point.


stefb
2012-01-09 21:36:08

Well, not hitting a building but I personally witnessed a car sideswipe a parked car on Shady Ave. tonight, going up the hill from 5th.


The jackass had just passed me, maybe he (or she, I dunno) was a few hundred feet up the road - just far enough that I couldn't read the plate. They knew what they did because they put on the brakes and almost stopped, then took off. I was waving my arms in the air. I stopped but there didn't seem to be anyone home at the two closest houses. I called 911 but I didn't have much of a description to give them, all I knew was it was a black or dark-colored car.


What a complete piece of shit. At least they didn't hit me.


salty
2012-01-18 01:52:00

@ erok "Breaking" news! HAHAHAHA!


mick
2012-02-07 20:04:47

But the GPS thingy said "turn right!"


There was a bumper and lots of glass at the end of Saline Street today where you meet up with the gravel trail coming down from the tracks (end of jail trail). Maybe the drivers are related?


marko82
2012-02-07 20:09:30

hmm... seems the driver is at large. wonder if my building will go on lock down.


dmtroyer
2012-02-07 20:13:11

The driver was likely blinded by sunlight reflecting off the glass doors.


reddan
2012-02-07 20:18:18

heard he ran into 200 ross st, where city planning and the ura are housed


erok
2012-02-07 20:21:04

now with photo:



erok
2012-02-07 20:33:27

@erok heard he ran into 200 ross st, where city planning and the ura are housed


No doubt to make a timely complaint about the unfortunate placement of buildings downtown.


mick
2012-02-07 20:35:39

I'm sure the driver was merely testin 'aht the sante fe's urban offroading capabilities.


dmtroyer
2012-02-07 20:38:56

Oh, so that's what the stupid helicopter is all about. I can half see the building, but not the crash scene, from my balcony at Grant & Forbes. Explains why the helicopter is RIGHT overhead.


stuinmccandless
2012-02-07 20:46:01

In a This American Life episode (here: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/248/transcript ) Act One: If It Drives, Go Live, there's a story about an extremely traffic law abiding, slow speed chase that goes on for ~4 hours.


"There are people who study pursuits. Yes, there are actual people who do this. And they say that trying to figure out the reasons behind why people run, the cause behind the effect, is the wrong approach. What these experts have discovered is that there aren't any reasons behind why people run. There's just a type of person runs. They don't stop to weigh the consequences or to factor in all variables. They just run. They run because it doesn't occur to them not to."


When I first heard that, it blew my mind. Then it occurred to me that I could be one of those people. I've been stopped before, and always just stopped, but maybe under the right circumstances, I'd be an inexplicable runner.


Humans are so strange.


ejwme
2012-02-07 21:21:56

heard he ran into 200 ross st


So hitting one building a day wasn't enough?


Another PNC building was hit exactly two months ago. Lesson for PNC: Add more drive-through banking, or your customers will do it for you.


Ejwme, that's an interesting quote. It makes me think about the Jordan Miles case (though that was on foot of course). Thanks for sharing it.


steven
2012-02-07 22:21:15

@ejwme There's just a type of person runs. They don't stop to weigh the consequences or to factor in all variables. They just run.


"Poor impulse control" they call it. It's part of a lot of different kinds of crime.


Probably self-reinforcing - the guy that "forgot" to go to that hearing about his case, is a bit more likely to flee an accident.


But we should remember, in Pennsylvania, the penalties for leaving an accident are mild compared with the penalties for drunk driving. Sometimes it *IS* a decision.


"I heard some say better run away. Others say better stand still."


mick
2012-02-07 22:38:18

ahh whoops bad word choice. i meant after the crash, he got out of the car and actually ran into 200 ross to hide


erok
2012-02-08 01:03:58

Marko, I noticed that debris on Saline too, I wonder what happened. Looks like a car just randomly rammed into the gravel ramp to the train tracks


sgtjonson
2012-02-08 01:52:36

thanks for the heads up. i ride through there on my commute, but often i am too focused on traffic to see glass until i am nearly on top of it.


stefb
2012-02-08 03:04:31

to "hide"? What do you say to the people in that building: "Uh, I need to use your bathroom to clean up this blood and broken glass I got from... falling on the sidewalk, yeah." Let alone the security cameras.


Mick, I think "poor impulse control" might be a little different. I'm sure it plays into it, and it's a horrible habit, but I could see it being different.


I am a complete This American Life junky. Chances are, I can relate almost any experience to a This American Life story. That and Radio Lab. My husband thought I was recovering from my chronic ludditism when I asked for an mp3 player for xmas, but was dismayed when I promptly filled it with TAL and Radio Lab podcasts. I am a dork, yes I am.


ejwme
2012-02-08 15:42:18

@mick: I caught that New Speedway Boogie reference (~);}


quizbot
2012-02-08 15:58:58

I always have problems with This American Life.


Like the story ejwme referred to. This American Life says, "Dr. Richard Kimball ran because he was born to run."


Typical.


I sez, "Crack cocaine."


mick
2012-02-08 16:00:56

"What these experts have discovered is that there aren't any reasons behind why people run."


False. The correct sentence should read: "Scientists have yet to discover the reasons why people run." Just because they don't yet know the answer doesn't mean there is no answer.


kordite
2012-02-08 17:03:39

They did follow it up with the reason that they run because it does not occur to them to NOT run.


Careful assigning scientific method to human behavior. Seems to always be a 2D map of a 3D world. All of our knowledge is tainted by what we do not yet understand.


ejwme
2012-02-08 18:21:28

"Careful assigning scientific method to human behavior. Seems to always be a 2D map of a 3D world. All of our knowledge is tainted by what we do not yet understand."


Whoa. I need a few weeks to let that one settle in.


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-02-08 20:42:31

Hey, what about us 1D people?


marko82
2012-02-08 21:13:28

I've actually known this guy for the last 10 years. Older Ex-drug addict, off the wall kinda guy, I'm gussing he was scared, and confused, not an excuse, but perhaps an explanation. I could see a coughing fit, long time smoker, has the smokers voice, earned him the nickname "Froggy". Just glad no one was hurt.


b-s
2012-02-08 23:22:24

Working with the public in northside has given me the oppertunity to meet alot of interesting folk.


b-s
2012-02-08 23:33:39

Marko, I think in Flatland that makes you a woman, and obligated to emit a "peace-cry" as you walk to warn others of your presence.


First thing I thought of when I read that update was "Poor guy." Glad he's managing to make some better decisions now. Thanks for the perspective, BS.


ejwme
2012-02-09 21:32:30

1 Dead After Vehicle Slams Into Building In Butler County


BUTLER (KDKA) — City of Butler Police are investigating after a pickup truck slammed into a building overnight claiming the life of one man.


Police say 31-year-old Matthew Aaron Scott of Butler was traveling north on Hansen Avenue around 3 a.m. when he jumped a traffic island and careened into a vacant building.


Scott was pronounced dead at Butler Memorial Hospital.


Police say the pickup truck Scott was driving was totaled in the crash.


Meanwhile, the building has substantial damage.


A side wall collapsed during initial repairs.


The building had recently been put up for sale and the owner was unsure how long repairs would take.


quizbot
2012-02-17 16:47:04

http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/car-crashes-new-castle-home-narrowly-missing-sleep/nLPt9/


A New Castle mother is counting her blessings after a near-miss involving her 11-week-old son.

Brandi Kyle said she had just put her son down for a nap in his playpen in the living room of their Pearson Street home when a car crashed into their house.

“I just heard an incredibly loud crash,” Kyle said. “I thought the fish tank fell over.”

Kyle’s 95-year-old neighbor hit the gas instead of the brake and crashed into the side of their house.

The impact was the exact spot where the baby was sleeping on the other side of the wall.

Kyle said a bottle of baby powder in the boy’s playpen threw off a cloud of dust after the impact.

“It was hazy and I couldn’t really tell what was going on at first,” Kyle said. “I saw the wall was broken and couldn’t figure out what was going on. Then I saw the car in the window and realized it almost came all the way through the wall.”

The baby escaped the crash unharmed, Kyle said.

“It was pretty scary,” Kyle said. “I was definitely worried.”

Kyle said she plans to move the playpen away from the outside wall.

The driver, whose name has not been released, was checked out by doctors and is doing OK, officials said.


pseudacris
2012-03-09 23:26:16

"The baby, who was not wearing a helmet, escaped the crash unharmed, Kyle said."


reddan
2012-03-09 23:58:57

"The baby, who was not wearing a helmet, escaped the crash unharmed, Kyle said."


HiddenVariable likes this.


hiddenvariable
2012-03-10 05:37:56



Driver crashes vehicle into Moon Township convenience store

MOON TOWNSHIP, Pa. — Police are investigating what caused a driver to crash into a popular convenience store in Moon Township on Friday.

The crash happened at the Unimart along Fern Hollow Road near Hometown Pizza.

The building suffered extensive damage, and photos from the scene show the car inside the front of the store.

There is no word on whether the driver was injured.

http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/driver-crashes-vehicle-moon-township-convenience-s/nLbf9/


erok
2012-03-23 21:04:46

A hit and run in Greenfield!


GREENFIELD, Pa. -- A vehicle crashed into a Greenfield business Friday night.


WTAE cameras arrived just moments after the crash at the CoGo's on Beechwood Boulevard.


The impact knocked out power to parts of the building.


Emergency officials said police arrived to find the driver had fled the scene.


No further details were immediately available.


http://www.wtae.com/r/30751264/detail.html


dwillen
2012-03-24 15:50:51

I know that GoGos; not a single helmet in the store.


sloaps
2012-03-24 17:34:22

Say! Why don't we hit the convenience store on the way home?


mick
2012-03-28 17:38:40

At least the police car hit a semi-forgiving pole and not head-on into a 17-ton bus.


stuinmccandless
2012-04-07 17:29:18

car into a house outside Grove City causes $50,000 in damages. Driver admits to speeding...


sloaps
2012-04-08 12:09:09

And in Oakland last night, Someone runs SUV into telephone pole.


stefb
2012-04-08 12:41:42

27 pages!?


check yur h t emml hotlinking, ryan.


sloaps
2012-04-08 13:51:10

Edited. Not sure what happened there.


Can you imagine how many there would be if I actually tried to keep up with it all?


rsprake
2012-04-08 13:56:31

I imagine alot:


alot of accident


sloaps
2012-04-08 14:39:01

Ha!


stefb
2012-04-08 21:22:09

and here's someone's house in north huntington...wrecked




erok
2012-04-17 18:58:03

some sort of police chase this evening led to some scraped up cars on my street and the chasee's grand cherokee stopped by the porch pillar of a house near elb and n euclid.


dmtroyer
2012-04-17 23:39:03

Yea I just missed this. Saw all the cops heading that way though.


lou-m
2012-04-18 01:09:44

I just bike through and saw this, there were 3 cop cars talking with some people in front of a house on the corner of Hays and as one was leaving he went after this SUV. The SUV decided to take off down an alley. Both men in the car were caught, even after one took off on foot. There usually is lots of kids playing in the street that time of day, glad no one was hurt due to this reckless driving.


BTW what block of Euclid do you live on Dmtroyer?


zjc2a
2012-04-18 01:49:47

@that block, the 500 block. you are right there are almost always kids playing on the sidewalk, in the street, or people chatting it up. especially when the weather is nice like it was today.


dmtroyer
2012-04-18 02:07:13

Should we stop posting these stories? It seems a little self-righteous to me. ;)


rsprake
2012-04-18 13:50:07

FWIW, last night at 9:30 cops were swarming with dogs & maybe 6 cruisers around Stanton / Chislett / Baywood looking for someone. Wondering if it was related to the earlier incident on Euclid.


quizbot
2012-04-18 13:58:13

Saw this incident last night too. I live up on the 600 block.


I'm surprised things like this don't happen more often the way people drive up N. Euclid like it's a highway rather than a side street.


The list of charges against the guy on today's police blotter fill almost a page (pp. 23-24).


http://www.city.pittsburgh.pa.us/police/blotter/blotter_tuesday.pdf


mwkozak
2012-04-18 14:01:52

Should we stop posting these stories? It seems a little self-righteous to me. ;)


I like this thread. it's good to point to when people tell us that they don't have money for bike infrastructure. more money is spent fixing shit that autos break than putting in infrastructure so that people don't need an auto in the first place.


erok
2012-04-18 14:10:45

I was actually there when that woman crashed at Duquesne yesterday. My friend actually had to dive out of the way to avoid being crushed!



dom
2012-04-18 14:35:45

Terrifying.


rsprake
2012-04-18 14:46:15

Terrifying indeed. I used to sit on that ledge there and eat lunch between classes. The car's trunk would have landed on my lap.


@Dom, how did that lady manage to get her car turned over and into that spot? My GF and I looked at the photo in complete disbelief. The only thing we could figure was that she exited the parking garage, tried to go around the "roundabout" or head back toward the music school, and hit the island (not visible in the photo), flipping the car over, all of which would (or should) have occurred at under 15 mph. The incident seems to defy physics.


jmccrea
2012-04-18 14:56:15

@Dom, how did that lady manage to get her car turned over and into that spot? My GF and I looked at the photo in complete disbelief. The only thing we could figure was that she exited the parking garage, tried to go around the "roundabout" or head back toward the music school, and hit the island (not visible in the photo), flipping the car over, all of which would (or should) have occurred at under 15 mph.


We couldn't figure it out for sure, but she was coming up the hill from the downtown side, and I think when she saw the line of stopped cars (waiting for crossing students), and hit the gas instead of the brake. She flew up on the side walk and hit another car and swerved and that's when the car flipped. Still not sure how exactly she pulled it off it happened so fast.


dom
2012-04-18 15:00:32

man, i feel like i keep hearing about elderly drivers hitting the gas instead of the brake.


erok
2012-04-18 16:15:07

well, you've got a 50/50 chance, unless like my husband or grandmother, you use one foot for each...


ejwme
2012-04-18 16:22:00

@ejwme - "NO! YOUR OTHER LEFT FOOT!!"


@erok - ...more money is spent fixing shit that autos break...


I'd like to see a cost accounting of what it takes to clean up a half-dozen wrecks of various sorts: Car into a pole, car into a building, car into another car. What does it cost, really, for just ONE, and we do this 50 times a day just in metro Pittsburgh.


Add up:

* Fire crews, what's it cost to send out even one truck on a call?

* Ambulance, the same, even for minimal treatment at the scene.

* Hazmat cleanup if there's a fuel spill.

* Utility crews who have to replace a pole, transformer, hydrant.

* Road crews who have to replace broken signage, guiderails, etc.

* Insured auto losses.

* Insured property losses.

* Uninsured losses and other costs.

* Emergency health costs.

* Rehab health costs.

* Losses to people whose utility service was disrupted until repairs were made.


...and that's just off the top of my head. I'm sure I missed some. Each one of these has a cost, and someone is paying for it. I'd be surprised if nobody has totalled this up sometime recently.


Now, on the bike infrastructure side, rattle off some like-to-have projects, and what they cost. I'd be really surprised if, in even one week's time, the cost of some of once-only, long-duration, bike infrastructure projects is not exceeded by the cleanup from a bunch of wrecks. And this goes on constantly!


Who would have each set of numbers?


Once in hand, we have a tool, nay a weapon, to use in fighting for what we want. EVERY SINGLE ONE of the wrecks was preventable. Put those people on bikes, and we reduce the cost of transportation in general.


stuinmccandless
2012-04-18 16:42:56

But Stu, you’re missing the other side of the equation. If everyone biked and ditched their car, how many people would be out of work? Ambulance drivers, tow truck operators, body shops, doctors & nurses, etc.


marko82
2012-04-18 17:04:46

man, i feel like i keep hearing about elderly drivers hitting the gas instead of the brake.


i've been suggesting to friends that perhaps we're seeing an uptick in cars hitting buildings because of the increasing age of the population. this would be especially prevalent in areas like pittsburgh, or buffalo, which had its own crazy rash of car-building collisions last summer (i think something like 19 in two or three weeks, maybe?). they seem to mostly involve older drivers, many of whom hit the gas instead of the brake.


hiddenvariable
2012-04-18 17:55:01

I think the uptick may be due to the 4-foot rule. Drivers are obviously steering into buildings to avoid cyclists. Buildings need a 4-foot rule.


jonawebb
2012-04-18 18:07:15

I don't remember which thread it was where someone noticed the subtle language differences in referring to "drivers" or "vehicles" depending on whether the vehicle is a car or a bicycle. This is an excellent example of the next level up from a bike-car collision: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/local/breaking/motorcyclist-bus-collide-in-fairywood-631979/


"A motorcyclist and a Port Authority bus collided in Fairywood Wednesday night, sending the bike into a tree."


Now the P-G is generally very good at not assigning fault, and that's the case in this article as well, even though judging from the incident location fault seems to fall entirely on the motorcyclist passing on a double yellow, at an intersection. But the first you hear about a sentient being in that bus is in the last paragraph in the article, whereas the operator of the motorcycle is mentioned in the headline.


The general rule appears to be that the bigger/more common vehicle in the collision is just a force of nature, acting predictably as always, and the collision would not have occurred but for the presence of a rare actor not as commonly seen on the road. Again, not a great example to champion the little guy, but watch for this the next time you read an article about a bike-car collision. Vehicles don't cause collisions, drivers cause collisions.


mpm
2012-04-19 02:58:00

Look at a bike, and the human on top is obvious. It's easier to ignore or forget that there's a person inside the huge metal box.


Instead of "Motorcyclist, bus collide in Fairywood", the headline could say "Motorcycle, bus collide in Fairywood". But is this better? Seems like it dehumanizes the rider. Reminding readers that a vulnerable person was hit seems like a good thing.


They could try to write a headline that refers to both the bus driver and the motorcyclist, and how their vehicles collided, but it's hard to make one nearly as short as what they've got.


steven
2012-04-19 03:17:29

Oh, look, another one:


A woman lost control of her car which crashed into an enclosed walkway at Pittsburgh International Airport this morning.


What is this world coming to when even airports need helmets?


epanastrophe
2012-05-02 14:05:00

spooky, I was at the airport this AM, just before that crash. really glad my parents were safe and sound in the terminal by then.


ejwme
2012-05-02 18:17:53

A chap tried to drive his car onto the Metro in Paris


"It's not fair! People get to take their bikes on the Metro!"


reddan
2012-05-02 18:51:38

Admittedly, during my short experience living in Europe, I nearly wandered into those underground garages thinking they were metro stations a few times. They do look weirdly similar sometimes. On the other hand, I try not to wander absentmindedly in a car the way I do on foot...


2012-05-02 20:23:15

I guess since this guy was already on the sidewalk (note curb at lower left), that made it safer to ride a bike in the street at that moment.


stuinmccandless
2012-05-02 20:33:00

Not exactly a building, but some lady pulled off an awesome parking job up in Meadville. Image and video hosting by TinyPic


churchill5
2012-05-02 21:22:03

This thread is great, never know what act of stupidity you might get when you click on it. And just when I think I've seen it all "BAM" another car ends up in a absurd location


willie
2012-05-02 21:39:43

I guess the sign said to park at an angle, but didn't specify the plane of rotation.


steven
2012-05-02 22:10:14

Ohmy god.


"Allegheny County police said the driver was rushing to catch her flight and got a flat tire on Interstate 376, but she kept driving on the rim, which damaged her brakes so she couldn't stop.


"She looked like a young lady, a nice-looking lady who was upset. I don't know that she's ever been in a car accident before," Dennington said. "She was really worried about making her flight, and I think they had to convince her that there was probably no way she was going to make her flight."


Should go on her permanent record "Too stupid for a drivers license."


edmonds59
2012-05-02 23:33:11

That car on the wires in Meadville is almost as good as the car on the roof a few pages ago. This thread never ceases to amaze me.


Also, on Brownsville Road in Carrick there is now a hole in St. Joseph's Cemetary's wrought iron fence. Not surprisingly, the hole is the same width as a car, and is in the path a car would take if it failed to negotiate the curve. It might make a good Tag-o-Rama tag.


jmccrea
2012-05-02 23:48:25

In absurd defense of the Paris Metro driver, the difference between sidewalk and road there is... poorly demarcated and also amorphous. At any given time, someone can leave their house, move a couple posts, and drive over 15 feet of sidewalk with cafe tables (and metro entrances) inches away. My husband called the posts "tourist traps" because people (me) would be looking at maps or architecture or crazy drivers and walk straight into them.


The lady who thought missing a flight was a good reason to destroy her car, then destroy a building and further destroy her car? No. That's why you're always nice to the check-in people at the airlines. They have the ability to put you on the next flight. And there's always a "next flight". If she was really in that much of a hurry, she should have left earlier. Sigh. What's that saying about lack of planning and urgency?


ejwme
2012-05-03 17:45:40

@Jacob McCrea ...a hole in St. Joseph's Cemetary's wrought iron fence.


Probably get to the cemetary quickly enough even if you drive safely. Just sayin'.


mick
2012-05-03 17:49:36

So that State Farm (?) commercial where the guy runs his car up the pole, and into the side of a building isn't really a stretch of the imagination.


icemanbb
2012-05-04 03:06:52

There was another one today that crashed down a hill and into a building after trying to turn around. A garbage truck smashed into the corner or someone's house on the south side, too


stefb
2012-05-04 03:23:40

There was a story a few years ago here in McCandless of a garbage truck that lost its brakes on a hill. It rolled backward, nailing the side of a house full on, and sending the house's main beam nine feet out the other side of the house. The house had to be torn down.


stuinmccandless
2012-05-04 04:26:31

@buffalo buffalo crashed his personal vehicle into a local taco restaurant


Lunch time- my first reaction was "Do they have fish tacos?"


mick
2012-05-04 17:58:25

tacos de pescado a la el camino?


ejwme
2012-05-04 18:56:32

yeah, actually, reading that made me hungry. too bad there aren't any taco trucks at pitt.


epanastrophe
2012-05-05 04:53:36

Yeah, but "the brakes locked up..." that has to be about the stupidest "explanation" I've ever heard - and then the reporter repeats it at the end like it's a fact.


I can almost hear it now - "I hit the brake instead of the gas!"


salty
2012-05-07 03:40:25

[on screen] "...after car clams into..."


Yeah, he was being shellfish.


Really, though. Entirely overlooked in this is the phrase "came around the corner at a high rate of speed". Where can you legally exceed 30 mph anywhere in Garfield? Aren't most streets 25?


I always come back to that time when I was passing an accident scene on foot, and overheard the cop asking the driver, "400 other cars went past this spot in the past couple of hours and didn't run off the road. What makes you so special?"


Also, car full of kids, everyone goes to the hospital. This begs the question, wasn't everyone belted in? (onus on the parent) Or it was that everyone was belted in, nobody was actually hurt, everyone goes to the hospital to be checked out as a matter of routine? (stupid reporting)


Mindless reporting, anyway. Why is this news? Guaranteed no follow-up will ever get airplay. It's entertainment, no real news value.


stuinmccandless
2012-05-07 05:24:55

The driver was kelpless!


salty
2012-05-07 05:34:43

What I want to know is if the driver will be charged with anything.


A woman in Atlanta was convicted with "vehicular homicide" because her 4 year old son was hit by a drunk driver. Here is a situation where it's pretty clear that the driver put their passengers (children) and home owner at risk by driving recklessly.


rsprake
2012-05-07 13:39:29

Ok, I'm having one of those days. My first thought was "are Jon and Odie ok?"


I've seen the bruises a seatbelt can result in after a crash, looking at the photo, I'd rush kids to the hospital after that too. Depending on the size of the kids, they may have been at that awkward inbetween car seat, booster seat, regular seat size. Also, I spent most of my childhood sneaking my shoulder belt behind me when my mom wasn't looking because it rubbed my collarbone funny (those seats are built for people 5'3" or taller, I swear). I could see a situation where the parent tried like hell to keep the kids safe (other than not going around the bend too fast and hitting a building) and the kids still needed medical attention after that.


That woman's case in Atlanta is infuriating. I didn't realize the kid followed his bigger sister - that little girl has got to be hurting. First her little brother dies trying to follow her, then her mother has to fight to stay out of jail.


I do not understand our society's apathy towards healthy infrastructure.


ejwme
2012-05-07 17:51:04

We've had houses, businesses and the occasional ravine, but this one believed he piloted a submarine .


sloaps
2012-05-08 00:02:11

Props for going multimodal though.


steven
2012-05-08 00:10:32

Ancient news, but still fun enough to post I suppose--now that I realize I still have a photo.


Back in January of 2011, I witnessed a two-vehicle accident on the corner of Parkview Avenue and the Boulevard of the Allies, my then and current (apartment) home. It involved two SUV-type vehicles of course. The one in the photo (SUV #1) was coming from Schenley Park going west on the Boulevard, another SUV (SUV #2) was attempting to cross from the one side of Parkview to the other across the Boulevard. There's no signal at this intersection and a blind curve on the Boulevard right before it. I think it's dangerous to attempt anything other than a right turn here. Well, SUV #2 hesitates and begins to slowly cross. SUV #1, upon seeing SUV #2, decides it is best to speed up and swerve around SUV #2. SUV #1 then decides it is best to avoid SUV #2 by speeding up also. SUV #1 dodges SUV #2 initially, but SUV #2 manages to T-bone SUV #1 on their rear right side. SUV #1 loses control slides through the snow pile in the center median before sharply turning right and colliding head-on with the Boulevard-facing side of my small apartment building.


Image and video hosting by TinyPic


Fortunately, my apartment was adjacent on the first floor and the side impacted was (and still is) vacant commercial space. Still it was surreal watching a car accident like this in real time (I was on the sidewalk a block away shoveling snow). My girlfriend and roommate inside were utterly shell-shocked by volume of the crash and my landlord was in disbelief when I made the call. Both vehicles each had only a driver in each. Aside from dizziness with the driver who ran into the building, there were no injuries.


I was just relieved no one got hurt. A pedestrian on that sidewalk caught by the out-of-control SUV could have been put in critical condition or even killed.


Funny aside though, my girlfriend was actually the one and only person on the scene interviewed. And delivered one of those classic Pittsburgh post-car accident interview lines of "we've seen so many near-crashes here that this isn't that surprising." Hahaha


Really though, I wish additional safety measures could be done for the intersection. I 311'd it once, asking for anything from a traffic light, to a "SLOW Dangerous Intersection" sign on approach, possibly with flashing lights, to even a "RIGHT TURN ONLY" restriction on my side of Parkview Ave. during at least rush hours. No avail, same intersection today, same knuckleheads going freeway speeds out of the park and other dunderheads trying to cross the Boulevard (even on foot) despite virtually continuous traffic around rush hours.


impala26
2012-05-08 09:02:17

For some reason your account makes me envision a pair of giant pinball flippers at the intersection to control traffic, with an angry crossing guard at the buttons. 311 it.


edmonds59
2012-05-08 11:09:35

What they need to do there is slow down traffic through (and into) the PARK. You know, that green space, where children play with puppies, and raccoon families frolic with squirrels, and little old ladies feed pigeons. Not a parkway, where traffic inexplicably comes to a standstill, but a park. Heh, if they just put a tunnel in, the cars would slow right down ;)


ejwme
2012-05-08 14:47:00

another failboat


A.DuiePYLE Failboat


sloaps
2012-05-08 14:55:19

i never understood why they thought that was a good name for a trucking company.


erok
2012-05-08 15:03:03

@Impala

I wondered what had happned to that side of teh building. I thought they might be trying to build a garage, because the hole was roughly car-sized.


mick
2012-05-08 15:04:52

++tunnel!


edmonds59
2012-05-08 15:07:44

@erok it's more confusing when a Dywidag Pile shipment is delivered by A. Duie Pyle carrier...


sloaps
2012-05-08 15:51:23

Another one in Garfield. Little detail.


May 9, 2012 9:37 AM


Accident, Car Into Home, Crash, Garfield, Kincaid Street


PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — Firefighters and emergency crews were called to Garfield this morning where a car crashed into a home.


According to emergency officials, the accident happened in the 5400-block of Kincaid Street.


The vehicle reportedly started smoking after the crash.


There is no word yet on whether there were any injuries.


quizbot
2012-05-09 15:44:55

Poor car, if someone wrecked me into a house I'd probably want a cigarette too.


salty
2012-05-09 15:51:30

Crashing into houses and smoking...


rsprake
2012-05-09 16:53:32

Are they sure it was the car that was smoking? I once had a guy plow into my parked car from behind. He was lighting up and dropped his cigarette lighter, then leaned over to pick it up.


jonawebb
2012-05-09 17:08:32

Ok, I call shenanigans on the Cranberry one. I drive that stupid road every morning. There's currently a big puddle at the I76 interchange, but nothing I'd call a retaining pond, and nothing 6' deep. But right there people do crazy things trying to get around trucks exiting and entering from 76. These crazy things seem to always happen at 80-90 mph, and just about daily there's somebody done something stupid and smashed up their car there. The funny thing is, cops could (but rarely do) sit at a utility turn-around *right there* and just by sitting there being visible, slow people down and make them smarter.


sigh.


ejwme
2012-05-10 20:03:45

That’s four cars in the drink this week and it’s only Thursday. I guess I should consider wearing a helmet when I go fishing.


marko82
2012-05-10 20:16:23

most motor vehicle incidents are seen as an "act of god" so maybe she was just trying to induce a miracle.


ejwme
2012-05-12 19:31:54


this.


stefb
2012-05-13 22:02:13

@stefb: Shame it's out-of-bounds...would make a great tag.


reddan
2012-05-14 00:16:52

I know of one much like it that's within bounds. My chances of grabbing the tag back from steeld55 are non-zero, but not great.


EDIT: Aw crap, no it isn't, but it's soooo close to the line, I might just drop it there anyway. It's a helluvalot closer to the center of things than some of the tags that are within the rectangle. (Hint: Little Nash Rambler.)


stuinmccandless
2012-05-14 00:47:14

The link isn't working, but the headline explains it pretty well. A voice told her to do it. I don't understand the logic.. CRAZY!


stefb
2012-05-14 09:06:04

http://www.wpxi.com/gallery/news/local/woman-drives-through-church-demonstration-her-fait/gf7X/#1524529

I initially found that story as a link off the previous story. Since then, I found out through a Facebook friend:


"A kid plowed straight down Merit Ave., across Brownsville Rd. and right into the door of the closed PNC bank. Lucky that he didn't hit any cars going by or a person with a baby stroller. (There is a pediatrician's office next door.) A firefighter said the car was stolen, the kid was high and drugs were in the car."


stuinmccandless
2012-05-14 10:21:35

Society's response - easily rationalized by the stoned kid (or an elderly driver or bad weather or poor visibility or, or, or...). So let's go after the drugs, and not the cars. Oh if only we could get rid of (x or y or z....) then cars would be safe.

No.


edmonds59
2012-05-14 11:10:49

I don't think we will ever be able to get rid of people's need to feel like they are the most important thing in the world at the moment; or that anything is ok, no matter how dangerous, if they are in a hurry to get some place either!


And seriously, people need to man up to family members and take their cars away when it is time.


stefb
2012-05-14 11:59:27

It's harder than you might think to take away a car from an elderly driver. My mother-in-law tried to get her mother's doctor to remove her mother's driving privileges and he refused. This was in Ohio, after her mother had had two accidents, driving off the road, causing property damage but no injuries, fortunately. There was no other way to get driving privileges revoked than to have a doctor do it, and he just wasn't willing -- perhaps because of their long relationship.


jonawebb
2012-05-14 13:01:13

Ultimately -- ultimately -- the problem is bad land-use policy. The fact that we even built suburbia after WW2 means that the people who bought and/or grew up in those houses when they could drive, now find themselves having to drive when they no longer should.


Just how IS grandma (jonawebb's or anyone's) going to get around when the only way out is by car, and the car is not a realistic option?


Ditto your young punk with his veins full of booze and crap, who has no business behind the wheel. The REAL problem is that the car is necessary to get from A to B. If he could stumble from A to B, or grandma hobble from A to B, we wouldn't have cars crashing into buildings, because the cars would not be necessary in the first place.


I'm less sure what to do about Crazy Church Lady, but if she walked or biked to church instead of drove, this likely would not have happened.


stuinmccandless
2012-05-14 13:42:18

@Stu, agree.


jonawebb
2012-05-14 13:46:22

@Stu -- agree also. That's as good a summary of the problme as I have ever seen on this board. We really do reap what we have sown.


cdavey
2012-05-14 14:32:30

unfortunately, we also reap what people have been sowing for 50+ years. And we continue to sow it (my own grandma lives in a brandy new development in exurbia, because people keep buying further out to escape from the rifraf that follows them (their kids' no-good friends)).


Just look at Atlanta - it will be uninhabitable for centuries.


ejwme
2012-05-14 20:38:54

I don't think we will ever be able to get rid of people's need to feel like they are the most important thing in the world at the moment; or that anything is ok, no matter how dangerous, if they are in a hurry to get some place either!


And seriously, people need to man up to family members and take their cars away when it is time.


this applies to SO MANY situations.


rubberfactory
2012-05-14 22:39:09

Ej, I don't think you need to worry about places like Atlanta being "uninhabitable" for centuries, Given modern construction methods, no one will be interested in taking care of McMansions for long, and they'll quickly degrade into mini landfills. 50 years from now there won't be any quaint old McMansions to restore, in fact there probably won't be much of anything left from this era. We aren't building anything to last now.


edmonds59
2012-05-15 04:08:47

Atlanta is uninhabitable right now...


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-05-15 10:56:21

edmonds, that's what makes it so sad. All the money people are pouring in to 5 bedroom 4 bathroom 3 car climate control garages on cul de sacs 45 miles from their offices... That could have been spent restoring houses that have actual 2x12 framing and decorative cornices. Think of all the dumbwaiters that have fallen into disrepair while people pursue jacuzzi baths in guest suites. I weep for the dumbwaiters.


ejwme
2012-05-15 19:03:03

I weep for the dumbwaiters.


that's how i feel every time i eat at mad mex. ba-ZING!


hiddenvariable
2012-05-15 19:55:52

hey! dont make disparaging remarks about the best restaurant EVAR! ...though their beer prices have risen to ridiculous levels recently


melange396
2012-05-15 20:53:25

my first thought when i saw that earlier was, "great, are we going to have to get helmets to mow the lawn, now, too?"


then i started to wonder if that car perhaps had a driver, but quickly had to shut down that line of thinking as unlikely to be fruitful...


epanastrophe
2012-05-16 05:00:25

Eons ago, my high school girlfriends father was killed by a car, in his front yard, while cutting the grass. Insanity.


edmonds59
2012-05-16 11:11:33

I knew there was a more rational reason to dislike mowing my lawn. Weird.


ejwme
2012-05-16 13:38:13

Detroit Free Press: "Man... dies after his car slams into a commercial building in Trenton"


"A 50-year-old man suspected of being involved in an armed robbery early this morning was killed when the car he was driving slammed into a commercial building in Trenton."


So many weasel-words. If they wrote it straight, it'd be a stoatally different article--and you wouldn't think it'd be so hard to ferret out the truth in a case like this...


(I'll be here all night. Don't forget to tip your waiter.)


epanastrophe
2012-05-17 23:20:51

well, they obviously otter put more time into writing better articles. but then they'd be badgering their consumers, and it might hurt their bottom line. i'm not a conspiracy theorist, but i smell a skunk.


hiddenvariable
2012-05-18 04:16:56

Street view of the yard shows a couple of good sized trees that the guy had to negotiate. Do we give bonus points?


http://g.co/maps/b3wfn


marko82
2012-05-21 01:22:30

Second Penn Ave car crash into a building in about a month. Makes me feel so safe and secure when I walk to lunch.


rsprake
2012-05-21 16:13:28

@rsprake: I hope you're wearing a helmet during your walks. ;-)


reddan
2012-05-21 16:39:15

That Overbrook guy gets a few bonus points from me just for the angle that his car got stuck in. I wonder if he was wearing a helmet?


mick
2012-05-21 16:53:21

@Mick: why would he wear a helmet? He was wearing a car.


I think, from now on, I'm going to refer to cars as garments, not vehicles, in order to better delineate who's actually responsible for this sort of thing.


"A man wearing an Escalade crashed into a neighborhood UniMart this morning..."


reddan
2012-05-21 17:04:02

lol reddan, that makes so much sense. Define motor vehicles as clothing, and all of a sudden it seems normal to fret over water spots and scratches, clean it every week with a diaper, and get all offended if somebody just touches it with their hand. After all, the clothes make the man!


ejwme
2012-05-21 17:08:19



In Easton, PA

Pa. Couple Tired of Cars Crashing Into Home

Schenewolf said Tuesday's accident was caused by a speeding driver. She believes he was going approximately 65 mph in the 30 mph zone.


"He was actually airborne when he hit," she said. The driver is in the hospital with injuries, but is expected to make a full recovery, according to Schenewolf.


The couple has wanted to put a boulder in front of their house to prevent accidents from damaging their home, but they said they have been told that such an obstacle would make them liable for any damage to a rogue driver.


erok
2012-05-24 16:19:07

random internet find:




quizbot
2012-05-24 16:30:11

Y'know even a plastic picket fence could slow down a low flying object.


[editted to add: written before Quizbot's post. It'd have to be a kinda high fence...]


mick
2012-05-24 16:30:58

Wow. I hope their horn played "Dixie" when they were making the jump.


reddan
2012-05-24 16:46:19

...such an obstacle would make them liable for any damage to a rogue driver.


Another case where perhaps the law is wrong.


Makes me think of a case from my childhood. In this StreetView scene, you can see a guardrail and a tree in a fenced-in yard. The guardrail was put there in 1963 after a car rammed the house. (Rotate the view 180 degrees to see that that's a T intersection. I grew up on this street.) The fence and tree were added since. Then, as now, someone was going way too fast, on a street barely 200 yards long.


But the City of Buffalo had no problem with adding a guardrail to help protect the guy's property.


stuinmccandless
2012-05-24 16:51:12

I also can't believe that after the first or at least the second time this happened someone didn't think "hey, crazy idea, maybe we should put in some traffic calming measures on this horribly-designed bridge."


2012-05-24 17:03:33

@quizbot - spectacular image. That seems like it would be nearly impossible to accomplish if you wanted to do it on purpose.


re; "...such an obstacle would make them liable for any damage to a rogue driver." I sure as heck hope "someone" is giving them bad information. If that was indeed the case, I would buy an old pickup truck, park it in line with the road, and fill the bed with 3/4 ton of brick until my local road department installed a proper railing. Heavens no, sir, it's not "intended" as a barrier.


edmonds59
2012-05-24 17:17:05

@stu Another case where perhaps the law is wrong.


"The law is a ass" (sic)

-Charles Dickens


mick
2012-05-24 17:37:26

yeah, I call shenanigans on the liability issue. It's not a boobytrap - paint "no trespassing" on the side of a big ass boulder, nobody could possibly call foul. A pickup parked with a ton of bricks could be considered a boobytrap by the most litigious, and some of the ideas in the comments are definitely booby traps (moats, camouflaged stuff).


But a huge ass boulder that looks like a huge ass boulder and has no tresspassing painted in huge, legible, retroreflective paint on it is a pretty clear "you do not have my permission to drive your stupid ass car into this rock" message.


What if God had put the boulder there, before the road and bridge and house? Would they still be responsible? I think God could drop a boulder there at any minute, he's omnipotent and likes to help out the downtrodden. Likely most effective as an over night miracle, and most persuasive if an image of a saint appeared on it, perhaps a saint saying "11. thou shalt not drive recklessly".


ejwme
2012-05-24 17:38:12

My pickup truck is only a booby trap if I add a piece of wood with a pointy spike pointing at the half-filled gas tank.


edmonds59
2012-05-24 17:46:12

I reality, there are plenty of things you could put there to stop, or at least slow, a car without being a hazard.


Wood piles, mounds of dirt, hedges, fences and small trees come to mind.


Not as gratifying as that dynamite and and scrap metal storage shed, but...


mick
2012-05-24 17:56:04

A row of child- and adult-sized mannequins with their arms linked, dressed in street clothes and filled with red food coloring, should produce a nicely photogenic result.


I'm not entirely joking.


reddan
2012-05-24 18:17:10

also calling shenanigans on the liability issue. you're not allowed to put things out that punish people for, say, trespassing, but you can put things that prevent it. it's not there to hurt the driver, it's there to protect the house. i think you'd have to have a pretty crappy lawyer to not have a suit like that thrown out.


hiddenvariable
2012-05-24 18:26:32

hm. double post. my first one didn't show up for about a minute, though. and i reloaded a few times.


hiddenvariable
2012-05-24 18:27:22

all good..


erok
2012-05-24 18:52:17

Not a car hitting a building, but the news reports a car going the WRONG WAY through the fort Pitt tunnels last night. No crashes or injuries, but what the fuck. How do people not notice!?


stefb
2012-05-25 10:52:28

My guess: because they are drunk.


pinky
2012-05-25 11:43:22

Are ATV's allowed on the Yough river Bike trail?


helen-s
2012-06-02 15:02:05

No, they're prohibited. The trail folks say they damage the trail.


steven
2012-06-02 15:20:08

And once again, the operator of the two-wheeled vehicle is responsible for hitting a person and building, while that ATV apparently just drove into a rock of its own volition...


epanastrophe
2012-06-02 20:57:24

Let me fix that according to edmonds59's suggestion a few posts back:


"A Fayette County man died late Wednesday night after the all-terrain vehicle he was wearing crashed into a rock on the Yough River Bike Trail in Dunbar"


stuinmccandless
2012-06-02 23:04:54

test


erok
2012-06-04 20:01:31

test


??


dmtroyer
2012-06-05 02:35:03

@Dmtroyer, I don't know about anybody else, but for me this is showing up in the listing as a new thread (yellow dot, title link goes to first post) rather than as an updated thread (blue arrow, link goes to last read post)...


epanastrophe
2012-06-05 03:26:09

It's showing up correctly for me, as are all the others.


Firefox on Linux, FWIW.


stuinmccandless
2012-06-05 09:52:39

The yellow dot thing happens to me from time to time, and often the yellow dot won't clear after I read the thread either. Then it magically fixes itself sometime later. My theory is the board only tracks so many threads per person and when you go over the limit weird stuff happens for a while... but it's just a theory.


salty
2012-06-05 14:34:25

wow. text from articles (can't see video at work) indicate he bounced out:


"while navigating a high speed bumpy turn"

when "the bus driver's wheel left the roadway", and

"when making a turn too wide and hitting the curb"


I know those bus driver seats are impressively bouncy, but how badly does one have to be driving to bounce out of one's seat? (hitting a building seems inevitable at that point).


ejwme
2012-06-06 15:53:14

Police looking for truck that knocked out Squirrel Hill Tunnel lights


One would think this thread could start getting old and repetitious. But NO...


mick
2012-06-14 15:29:14

*According to police, the car drove into Nickels Bakery just after noon Thursday*


shouldnt this be posted in the thread about robotic self driving cars? I mean, it couldnt have been the DRIVER's fault...


marko82
2012-06-14 17:41:44

don't they have cameras in the tunnels? Or wouldn't the twitterverse have a slew of "omg yinz guys, this truck just hit the tunnel, we gotta slow down more thru 'der..." accompanied by pics and videos?


ejwme
2012-06-14 18:07:00

Aren't they refurbishing the Squirrel Hill Tunnel and won't those lights have to be removed anyway? Maybe they should give the guy a bonus for saving PennDOT the money of having contractors do the job.


kordite
2012-06-18 15:19:46

Accident involving dump truck shuts down part of Neville Island Bridge


NEVILLE ISLAND, Pa. — An accident involving a dump truck shut down a portion of the Neville Island Bridge Monday.

Current traffic conditions Investigators said the truck was carrying dry cement when it tipped over.

The driver of the truck suffered a head injury, emergency officials said.

There is no word on what may have caused the accident.


And to think that we're going thru all the trouble of "permits" and "Special Events" to shut down a bridge for Pedal Pittsburgh. All we have to do is crash something


erok
2012-06-18 15:37:43

Truck crashes through bridge detour, flies over railroad tracks


A man was rescued after he drove through a roadblock at a "bridge out" detour and went airborne over railroad tracks, taking about a 50-foot drop early Tuesday morning, the Mahoning Township fire chief said.


The man's pickup truck was headed east on Route 224 (West State Street) when it approached a construction area where a bridge is being built near Route 551.


Failing to negotiate a turn at the detour, the truck traveled several hundred feet through the air over the train tracks and hit the bridge pier, according to the fire chief.


The driver (pictured below just before the incident) was able to get out and walk around his vehicle, but he couldn't get back up to the highway from the railroad bed to alert someone and ask for help.


Eventually, construction crews began to arrive for work at about 5:30 a.m. and reported the accident, state police said.


The fire chief said the call came in just before 6 a.m., but the accident itself may have happened around 4 a.m.


Police said the driver, a 24-year-old Ohio man, told them that he fell asleep at the wheel. He was taken to a Youngstown hospital.


No charges have been filed while the investigation continues.


Read more: http://www.wtae.com/news/local/Truck-crashes-through-bridge-detour-flies-over-railroad-tracks/-/9681086/15158284/-/9802ntz/-/index.html#ixzz1yIGV0AHO




erok
2012-06-20 01:46:57

Toonces, yay!!


edmonds59
2012-06-20 01:51:10

How can you admit to falling asleep at the wheel and not have your license taken from you?


rsprake
2012-06-20 13:36:57

sounds like a nice excuse to not have to say you were drinking


erok
2012-06-20 13:55:47

hey, 4AM he could have soberly fallen asleep at the wheel. It's a very sleepy time of day (for diurnal people).


Sometimes people naturally make incredibly bad decisions without the aid of mind-altering substances.


ejwme
2012-06-20 14:03:50

My favorite highlights:


"...I don't even like golf..."


"...consumed half a liter of vodka at 10 AM..."


"...unfinished alcoholic drink in Burger King cup..."


Awesome!


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-06-24 13:47:03

...driving with a suspended license...


That's the scary part, for me. Yanking DUI-offenders' licenses is ineffective. Seems there needs to be a *real* way to keep drunks off the road, even/especially at 10 a.m. Incarceration does not sound like a purposeful method, either. I'm more of the GTFU school of thought, or whatever gets the job done. If you don't have drunks, you don't have DUI.


stuinmccandless
2012-06-24 15:01:14

> Yanking DUI-offenders' licenses is ineffective. Seems there needs to be a *real* way to keep drunks off the road, even/especially at 10 a.m.


Ignition interlocks have been proposed many times in many places, but there seems to be some DUI-offenders' lobby (perhaps related to the Busch/Coors lobby?) that objects on "privacy" or somesuch grounds, so we're stuck with tiny "Enjoy Responsibly" text on beer ads and dumb PSAs from the Pretrial Services office in the City Paper.


epanastrophe
2012-06-25 14:11:18

Seize the car when found being driven on no/suspended license, let 'em earn it back via community service at a nice hourly rate (say, minimum wage).


reddan
2012-06-26 11:20:27

reddan: earn it back to the tune of the blue book price BEFORE they wrecked it, you mean. Earning back a hunk of junk the insurance wrote off as a paper weight wouldn't be difficult.


Plus impound and storage fees.


ejwme
2012-06-26 15:34:16

Channel 11 had a story last night of a 6 year old girl driving the family’s car over a hill into a house - but it's not on their website. Apparently she took the keys, started the car and shifted it into gear all by herself. See, it’s so easy even a kid can do it!


marko82
2012-06-26 17:27:39

another hit-and-run pedestrian on Wightman...


sloaps
2012-06-26 19:07:55

Yanking DUI-offenders' licenses is ineffective


HAve a license that needs to be physically displayed while driving, like a fishing license, could do it.


mick
2012-06-26 21:30:41

Ah crap that's a block from my house. When I left for work there were tons of cars plugging up the road and a cop car blocking traffic on that block of Wilkins at Negley, I wondered what was going on. Hope the guy is OK, wonder if it was one of my neighbors. :(


salty
2012-06-27 00:49:06

BETHEL PARK (KDKA) –An accident in Bethel Park brought down power lines Tuesday evening.


Authorities had to block off Irishtown Road around 8 p.m. when a car rolled over and hit a utility pole.


The pole was knocked to the ground and the car ended up on its roof.


Live wires fell down across the road.


Power crews were making repairs at the scene well into the night.


http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2012/06/26/car-flips-brings-down-power-lines-in-bethel-park/


erok
2012-06-27 15:27:50

Not a building, but I saw the tow trucks, boat, and divers(?!) attempting to extract the vehicle this morning after this happened.


reddan
2012-06-27 16:22:55

That Wightman/Wilkins H&R is bs. I hate that intersection, I've spent 3 years of my life living within three houses of it. People use Wilkins as a Forbes or Fifth bypass, thinking they're gonna go fast, and the lights are timed to prevent it. Not that this guy did or that H&R is excused in any way by it, but pedestrians in the area usually don't do much for their own self preservation, myself included, crossing willy nilly. Speed humps would do a lot to cool off traffic there.


I don't understand why the jail driver isn't getting a drug/toxicology test just to hedge bets, provide proof. "alcohol and drugs are not suspected to be involved and police will not conduct toxicology tests." I'd insist on it so that there could not possibly be any doubt if I were the idiot that soberly drove into the river.


Why doesn't insurance require that in the event of any property damage at least a breathalyzer is required? They're cheap, decently reliable, why not use them?


ejwme
2012-06-27 18:36:18

^This. This is precisely what was wrong with the investigation into Dr. Varacallo's death in Dubois a couple years ago. Dunking a van is different from running down the town doctor, but still.


stuinmccandless
2012-06-27 19:07:05

@ejwme I don't understand why the jail driver isn't getting a drug/toxicology test just to hedge bets, provide proof.


I guessing (and it's just a guess) that the police union is involved.


mick
2012-06-28 15:36:07

Mick, I would have thought any union involved would be interested in ensuring their members are on the up and up. But I'm naive like that.


Shady behavior, whether necessary or not, makes everybody look bad. When it's not necessary it just looks worse.


ejwme
2012-06-28 15:44:19

"failure to drive in the established lane"


I love legalese.


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-07-05 16:19:53

^What? !!! How can that even happen in Mkt Square without getting people in the process?


pseudacris
2012-07-05 20:52:12

During police questioning, the driver clammed up


sgtjonson
2012-07-05 21:05:24

How shellfish of the driver.


pseudacris
2012-07-05 21:12:21

They said he'd blown a seal.


salty
2012-07-05 21:25:07

@salty Hey! Isn't this supposed to be a family type board?


mick
2012-07-05 21:39:17

I bet the driver had been drinking like a fish.


mick
2012-07-05 21:40:37

is it true the driver was just out of school?


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-07-05 22:01:58

From the photo, it doesn't like it was a mussel car or some kind of crashtacean wagon.


steven
2012-07-05 22:05:46

they're gonna have to shell out for a new window


erok
2012-07-06 04:36:55

Drivers shuck.


quizbot
2012-07-06 04:49:36

I broke the thread. Seems that there is a going past 7 page issue on a thread. Config file setting?


quizbot
2012-07-06 05:06:23

i think the thread was fighting back against the bad jokes


erok
2012-07-06 11:32:35

Even the forum software gets crabby in the heat.


reddan
2012-07-06 11:43:51

Thanks for that Perl of wisdom.


pseudacris
2012-07-06 12:53:39

We're really dredging the bottom here...


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-07-06 13:18:32

Casting about for apologies?


pseudacris
2012-07-06 13:31:06

best thread.


erok
2012-07-06 17:50:39

Had a nice little police chase end with the suspect vehicle slamming into my apartment building last night. Lots of tire squeal as they slid up hill, over the curb, and into the building. FEELING the impact three floors up is such a strange thing...











2012-07-11 14:22:50

Was the driver drunk?

I'm glad you were not injured & hope the building is still structurally sound.


pseudacris
2012-07-11 14:29:29

I don't think they were drunk. Both occupants squeezed through that half-open sunroof and were in a full-sprint halfway down the block within 20 seconds of the impact.


I poked around the basement and things looked OK...but I don't really know what to look for. The landlord was there & presume he'll be having someone over to look/fix. The building is still standing as of this morning.


2012-07-11 14:34:12

ugh. sounds like it was a "borrowed" car - hope they catch them.


a bicycle would have fit fine in that space.


ejwme
2012-07-11 16:23:15

I wonder if it was the curb or the building that set off the air bags.


stuinmccandless
2012-07-11 19:11:54

This is fairly irrelevant but a person would have to be so desperately and inconceivably incompetent to lose control of an Audi A3.


edmonds59
2012-07-11 19:31:15

Cars hitting buildings makes me worried, because buildings are bigger than a bicyclist.


Cars hitting wires make me laugh, but don't worry me 'cause I'm way bigger than a wire.

On second thought...there /is/ the whole "what were they doing driving on the grass/sidewalk" question. That's cause for concern.


2012-07-11 20:50:46

This is our second "run the car up a wire" incident in this thread.


I tell ya, I'm starting to have some serious doubts about my "ride-on-the-sidewalk-when-there-are-too-many-drunk-drivers" strategy.


mick
2012-07-11 20:58:52

Yeah, like this which came to my attention yesterday. I don't have the heart to look up whether the driver was charged with anything. And/or I already know the answer.


salty
2012-07-11 21:11:08

Yeah, like this which came to my attention yesterday. I don't have the heart to look up whether the driver was charged with anything. And/or I already know the answer.


salty
2012-07-11 21:12:10

I know this isn't a building, but still stationary so I guess it counts? Scary.


http://youtu.be/8qnC5gRPX0Y


"Last month, a Dallas area Paratransit driver didn't even attempt to stop and plowed into an entire line of cars that were waiting to get off at an exit. Multiple cars were totaled and one man is still in the hospital with a fractured skull, broken hip, and almost a dozen broken ribs.


The driver, who had 11 years of service under his belt and a squeaky clean service record, was just fired according to MSNBC


So what made him crash into these cars? The operator of Dallas' Paratransit vehicles, Veolia, has said that they have no reason to suspect the driver was violating cell phone policies or under the influence of drugs or alcohol.


The official accident report states that the driver caused the crash by "not slowing down." That might be an understatement."


(article: http://jalopnik.com/5925117/watch-the-dallas-bus-driver-barely-react-as-he-plows-into-a-line-of-cars )


2012-07-11 21:25:19

> On second thought...there /is/ the whole "what were they doing driving on the grass/sidewalk" question


Not that I read the story, but from the picture you posted it looks like there's a driveway or some sort of track next to the wire. Headline mentions "new driver"--perhaps they pulled some dumb cartoony rolling the steering wheel back and forth even though i want to just go straight thing--or perhaps they just flipped out...


epanastrophe
2012-07-12 00:42:03

Story says the girl took the turn into the driveway too wide. I've seen that before with new drivers, simply not knowing how to point the two-ton missile they are piloting.


stuinmccandless
2012-07-12 01:32:50

it's interesting that they released the footage of that bus crash. yikes


erok
2012-07-12 14:06:48

1930 Boulevard of the Allies



1950 Wood Street & Boulevard of the Allies




marko82
2012-07-13 14:24:12

Hey, I was just following the signs – 1950




marko82
2012-07-13 14:36:37

good ones!


erok
2012-07-13 14:41:33

Awesome


rsprake
2012-07-13 15:07:14

"Hey, I was just following the signs"


Is that a road sign, or dance steps? Put you're right wheel in, ya put you're right wheel out...


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-07-14 12:01:33


Maybe pee wee was driving.


stefb
2012-07-15 00:47:00

[edit - it was Herron]

I wasn' t able to get a photo, so youll just have to take my word that this morning someone managed to crash into the staircase near the hairpin curve of Herron (Polish Hill), while going uphill!


pseudacris
2012-07-15 17:42:27

You know, it's funny. Getting hit by the car, they were killed for the same reason as they would have been had they not gotten hit by the car. The article states:


"All three cows hit by the vehicles had to be put down."


What that really means is, it was more economically feasible to kill the cows than it would have been to treat them. If they were cows bred for producing milk, the same thing would have happened when they stopped producing milk at their peak efficiency. If they were beef cows, they would have been slaughtered when they were at their peak weight.


So the only difference here is that the car expedited the inevitable outcome of their deaths and maybe the cow's owner and the insurance companies lost some money


sgtjonson
2012-07-16 21:16:20

A driver attempting to flee from police crashed his car into a former bar in Rankin early Wednesday morning, sparking a fire that destroyed the building....Officers said they had to stop their pursuit of 29-year-old Gregory Lamont Watson Sr. because they knew a bad bend was coming on the road. Minutes later, police said, the car reached speeds of 100 mph, rolled three times and crashed into a building.


Investigators said the car then caught fire and the flames spread to the building.


http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/driver-smashes-car-rankin-bar-sparks-fire-followin/nPxWz/


This stuff is so sad to me sometimes. destroying already destroyed neighborhoods


erok
2012-07-18 14:07:27

again, driving without a license.


with all of technology available, why don't we have license-swipe activated starters? I'm not under the illusion that it couldn't be hacked/circumnavigated in a myriad of different ways, but can't we come up with something better than "please don't drive your car since we took away your personalized little piece of plastic"? Perhaps something slightly commensurate with the serious consequences of an irresponsible person getting control of several thousand pounds of metal propelled at high speed?


Sorry. Consider it a rhetorical rant. I know why intellectually. I just may never accept it emotionally.


ejwme
2012-07-18 14:23:13

@ejwme As usual it would serve people who obey the laws. If I am without license and want to ride knowing that its illegal then I would seek the way to go around/hack system.


2012-07-18 14:30:35

That guy was uninjured. Amazing.

If that makes you sad definitely do not read the sidebar story about the guy who has to sell a Jeep to pay for his daughters funeral.


edmonds59
2012-07-18 14:43:56

Mikhail, they could make it difficult enough that, if it were applied to all cars, it would drastically reduce offenders. They don't have to catch 100%. Just those too lazy or resourceless not to figure it out (which, pending design, could be most). Much the same way DUIs have to blow in the breathalyzer to start their cars, yes, there are ways around it. But they care about drunks (mind you, only enough to install them after-market and by court order, instead of as a prophylactic on all cars). Thanks to MADD, drunk driving is now considered to be poor taste and taken seriously. Driving while an Unlicensed Idiot (the other DUI), is not.


Society simply doesn't care enough about irresponsible people wrecking cars and killing people to try to stop them. I just rankle at the idea, because either I'm one of society and I don't care, or I'm fringe and don't matter. I suppose I should accept it or forget about it while working to change it, but threads on this board have a habit of reminding me of the glacial pace of change.


I think I need a nap, usually this thread doesn't make me as angry.


ejwme
2012-07-18 14:44:16

@ej, I like the low-tech solution – impound the car for a month. And for those who would argue that someone else may own the car (spouse, friend, etc.), if you are dumb enough to let an unlicensed person use your car so be it.


Enjoy your nap.


marko82
2012-07-18 15:08:27

@ejwme I would not elaborated on how easy to hack breathalyzer. just two minutes of thinking. :)


"Thanks to MADD, drunk driving is now considered to be poor taste and taken seriously."


Every time I ride or bike on E.Carson street close to 10 pm I see lot of drunk drivers. Moreover, going out to meet former coworkers I see the same story. I can say that at the time I was interviewing students at State College for company I worked for -- I saw hundreds drunk students behind steering wheels. I hope situation is going to change. I don't know enough about situation with unlicensed drivers. It's hard to spot. And don't know anyone who drives without license. Even one girl whose license got revoked after she entered freeway in a wrong direction first got a temporary license (driving to work and back only) and then got behind the wheel. So i can comment here.


2012-07-18 15:19:04

There is some space but not a lot of space on that side of that building. I suppose with a big enough engine, which this vehicle would have, you could wind up enough oomph to jump a curb and plow into the side of an Arby's, from just the parking lot.


If I haven't posted this before, it's worth a listen: "Fast Food", by Stevens and Grdnic


stuinmccandless
2012-07-19 17:39:00

Evidently, misunderstood the "Drive thru" sign.


mick
2012-07-19 17:41:41

I laughed embarrassingly loud at that post.


rubberfactory
2012-07-19 20:19:17

Must have forgotten his horsey sauce.


atleastmykidsloveme
2012-07-19 23:08:55

actually, it looks like they just mistook the gas for the brake. It also looks like the Arby's has paper thin walls. Man I could go for some curly fries right now, hold the minivan.


ejwme
2012-07-20 14:50:30

so wishing i thought of the "drive thru" joke


erok
2012-07-20 18:14:13

@erok


Yeah, I kept trying to think of something witty, to no avail


sgtjonson
2012-07-20 18:42:12

The menu does state that a combo meal comes with a drink and a "side".


2012-07-20 19:19:38

Sometimes, trying too hard to be witty is like hitting a brick wall.


reddan
2012-07-20 22:10:34

+1 reddan. you just won.


2012-07-20 22:19:05

That is some dry wall humor.


edmonds59
2012-07-20 22:52:57

reddan always wins the wit games


erok
2012-07-20 22:55:26

he battles the unarmed...


ejwme
2012-07-20 22:56:07

he battles the unarmed...


Oh, c'mon...that's not really giving them a fair (jamocha) shake...


reddan
2012-07-21 02:51:24

A stolen Chevy Malibu was spotted early this morning sinking in the Monongahela River off South 18th Street on the South Side

http://old.post-gazette.com/pg/12206/1248841-53.stm


"...along with two other vehicles thought to have been submerged for years."


marko82
2012-07-24 17:38:42

That's what happens when you don't choose an Indian guide help cross the river


sgtjonson
2012-07-24 22:20:47

Some claim that "Malibu" is an Indian name meaning "Noisy Surf." So, perhaps the driver thought his Indian guide needs were covered by his car...


reddan
2012-07-24 23:59:11

@marko82 I read that article and all I can think is... free car, you haul.


benzo
2012-07-26 14:08:07

Wow, they don't remove the vehicles? Leaking all those fluids into the river isn't a concern?


It IS the Mon, but really?


rice-rocket
2012-07-26 14:10:02

That's the third car hitting a strip district building in as many months I think.


rsprake
2012-07-26 17:18:23

I was thinking about this thread on my way in this morning. I was guessing one maybe two a week, on average. But four in 24 hours in the metro area? Is that unusual? Were these being underreported?


stuinmccandless
2012-07-26 18:14:43

Stu, my gut tells me that these are way underreported - as most vehicle accidents are. They only become "news" if a camera truck isnt busy somewhere else.


marko82
2012-07-26 18:49:33

@Rice Rocket - The same stuff probably washes in to the river every times it rains in way larger quantities... spilled oil, gas, chemicals, anti-freeze, paint, tire dust, solid waste, etc... I doubt the city cares to spend money to remove the small amount created by one single vehicle.


I'm not saying it would be a bad idea to remove it.


However, I wonder if it's even worth the price of scrap metal / parts for an independent contractor to extract it.


benzo
2012-07-26 18:57:25

If leaving the car in the river is the policy, I'm wondering why they pulled out that correctional van a few weeks ago


sgtjonson
2012-07-27 02:08:50

This just occurred to me, what happens if you drive a Chevy Volt or similar full EV into water? Seems potentially extremely bad. No pun intended.


edmonds59
2012-07-27 11:02:59

As the # of posts on this thread continues to rise, I've started to wonder if there is some kind of parallel universe where car drivers are playing a game of Crash-O-Rama.


pseudacris
2012-07-27 11:51:57

[copied from @southsidepgh twitter account]


Someone tried to make Rite Aid a drive thru at 23rd & Jane (temp. closed)


http://yfrog.com/nux8onkj


beth910
2012-07-31 16:23:26

Wow, it's amazing that the driver didnt lose the trailer. I hope that no one was home at the time.


marko82
2012-07-31 19:23:20

Just found out my street is going to become a detour for another busy Crafton street for the next 3-4 weeks.


My neighbors are already proposing an over/under on how many cars will end up in our yards.


I'm considering buying this: http://www.amazon.com/STOP-Signs-And-More-Slow/dp/B004LDO3DM/


pinky
2012-08-02 15:52:28

What street is going to be closed?


edmonds59
2012-08-02 15:58:10

Go steal some PennDOT cones and make REALLY narrow lanes. :)


Or a slalom course, whichever floats your boat.


rice-rocket
2012-08-02 16:07:15

so would the cost of installing and maintaining (and repairs to snow ploughs for) speed humps be less annually than the cost of pulling cars out of front yards / houses / businesses? Wouldn't it be less than the emergency response calls these things generate?


Why do people hate speed humps so much?


ejwme
2012-08-02 16:40:39

Why do people hate speed humps so much?


because speed humps inhibit their speeding.


hiddenvariable
2012-08-02 16:50:00

Edmonds, it's West Crafton Ave, which is the bumpy brick hill by St Philips. They're detouring people up Steuben onto Noble, which is my road.


At the very least I plan to buy one of those yard sale signs and make a SLOW DOWN sign out of it.


pinky
2012-08-02 17:14:16

Don't tell me they're getting rid of the bumpy brick hill? That's the greatest traffic calming device ever. Makes it safer for kids going to St. Phillips. Did anyone object?

If you get a Slow Down sign, I think you should mount it to the end of a 2" thick 8 foot long pointed steel spike in a concrete base pointing directly at oncoming traffic. Just a thought.


edmonds59
2012-08-02 17:23:06

Oh and ejwme, this is a PennDOT road. The cars get towed and damage paid for by the drivers' insurance companies.* It's no skin off PennDOT's teeth if they end up in our yards. PennDOT just keeps maintaining the road.


*Disclaimer - it's actually more complicated. Towing and car repair = the driver's insurance pays. Driver pays deductible. Property damage = the homeowner turns it in to his/her homeowners insurance and pays his/her deductible and gets repairs done. Homeowners then goes after driver's insurance for costs including deductible. Whole thing takes months and keeps the home owner's $500 deductible ties up forever. Sucky system.


pinky
2012-08-02 17:24:17

pinky, that just means it should be easier for us to get the insurance companies, who no doubt make huge campaign contributions, to do our lobbying for us. sigh.


ejwme
2012-08-02 18:33:50

Solution, Install large concrete bollards in your yard. Just like they do at federal buildings to stop the terrists' from winning.


benzo
2012-08-02 18:41:36

that hill on 910 is scary steep. The bridge from the turnpike looks like a visual joke, it's so steep.


ejwme
2012-08-02 18:44:06

Edmonds, I don't know what the plan is - if they're going to smooth it out and redo the brick, or if they'll (hopefully not) pave over the brick. I didn't even know they were detouring traffic until one of my friends posted in on Facebook. Lots of little kids walk to and from school around there, for sure.


Benzo, my husband's eventual plan is to replace our sloped rock wall (ramp for speeding cars) with a retaining wall that has steel I-beams embedded in concrete buried behind it.


Until then we cross our fingers that people turn the wheel. If they turn the wheel, they go in my neighbor's yard. If they don't turn the wheel, we'll lose our front porch.


pinky
2012-08-02 19:05:44

Saw this in West View, just off of Center at Harvard. I'm sure the rain just washed this into place, like it does gravel. It's the only logical explanation, right?

Rock on sidewalk, West View


stuinmccandless
2012-08-05 14:12:57

Stu - could it have washed down that hill?


Why did the boulder cross the road?

To get to the other slide.


ejwme
2012-08-05 14:43:16

i think, with the way the news has gone lately, and the general sentiment of the public, it's time that we call for buildings to be moved to alternate routes. i mean, there are a lot of streets in the city and the surrounding area where it's just too dangerous for buildings to have buildings as close to the road as they are. we risk property damage and death every day we allow these buildings to be so close to the roads.


hiddenvariable
2012-08-11 03:34:17

^uh, HV, I know you're joking, but that's pretty much template PwnnDot thinking.


edmonds59
2012-08-11 14:52:03

@stu --Maybe it's a parking rock, a new variation on the parking chair??


cdavey
2012-08-11 16:30:31

It's not a building, but it somehow seems appropriate. Fail on all levels, by everybody:


http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/local/neighborhoods-east/parkway-crash-closes-inbound-lanes-near-churchill-648738/


I count 7 degrees of fail:


1. Car owners leave keys in ignition.

2. 14 y.o. steals car (owners see from house, call in as it's happening)

3. Police chase, then stop chase for safety.

4. Crash.

5. Mother of 14 y.o. blames car owners and police on tv news interview this AM.

6. Car owners respond in comments on news web site.

7. News adds tit-for-tat as "news" to an article online.


Replace the car with a bike, and it becomes really surreal.


ejwme
2012-08-13 18:02:35

"Mother of 14 y.o. blames car owners"


Leaving the keys in the car is not an invitation to theft. Leaving a house window open or a door unlocked is not an invitation to burglary. Leaving a ladder outside is not an invitation to a 2nd story invasion. A freshly paved road without a painted centerline is not an invitation to drive on the wrong side of the street. Carrying a lot of money in your wallet is not an invitation to robbery. Being a woman is not an invitation to rape.


Do not blame the victim.


kordite
2012-08-13 18:28:06

Kordite, it's likely she sees her son as a victim. Otherwise she'd have to hold him responsible for his actions, but he's clearly too young for that. His age makes her responsible for his actions, and that's a lot for a parent to think when their kid is in the hospital after being thrown from a car.


I don't agree with her but I can see irrationality being the only comfort in the situation. The tremendous fail, in my view, is the news agencies decided her (hopefully pain induced) irrationality was "news", thus in some small way lending her arguments some kind of credence (like forcing biology teachers to teach creationism in biology classes).


ejwme
2012-08-13 18:34:47

"the boy's mother needed a "reality check.""


kordite
2012-08-13 18:38:43

From WPXI's web site:

"My son was wrong for taking that vehicle but someone jumped out of their car and a 14-year-old seen the opportunity to take the car. He didn't break the car to steal it. They left the keys in the car. I think as an adult we have some type of ownership to being responsible for our vehicles," the boy's mother said.

Troopers said the chase was called off before the teen flipped the jeep on the Parkway East. The boy's mother said she doesn't think police should have followed her son.

"He had to no right to chase my son. It could have been a situation where maybe it was just a joyride down the street. Maybe he wanted to go further than he felt like walking," she said.





When I think of my life and responsibilities at age 14, I just can't imagine myself or either of my parents making these kinds of excuses for something at this level.


At the same time, since PA is a "three strikes" state, I hope the kid gets suitably punished but that it is not harsh enough to be one of the strikes.


pseudacris
2012-08-13 20:50:46

Maybe its just an indicator that for the most part (beyond learning to cross a street) people are not taught that cars are dangerous.


pseudacris
2012-08-13 20:54:54

Epic comments from the mother.


rsprake
2012-08-13 20:56:12

Maybe he wanted to go further than he felt like walking


This is probably the real reasoning behind who so many cars hit so many buildings.


pseudacris
2012-08-13 20:59:56

Perhaps something was added to the water supply to try to get people to drive through the highway tunnels at speed, but instead has just resulted in widespread aggressive driving and behavior.


mboyd
2012-08-13 21:43:25

^lolz!


pseudacris
2012-08-13 21:51:22

"Maybe she just had a very bad day. It’s possible."


Having a bad day may explain the behavior, but does not excuse it. Parking lots are scary places.


ejwme
2012-08-14 14:43:32

^ haha good one! "war is not the answer" lolz


pseudacris
2012-08-14 16:20:08

I love the picture of unopened Jack and duct tape. Oh, it's in the corner of the one posted above too, lower right hand.


It doesn't look related, but maybe they pulled them from the cars. But they're unopened so only represent potential nefariousness, not incriminating evidence (unlike the two cars half in the guy's dinning room).


ejwme
2012-08-14 19:06:41

jack daniels... classy


melange396
2012-08-14 19:10:57

I finally read the stuff about the mother/14yo. All I have to say is, "she seeeeeeen it!". Oh I love when yinzers say that.


stefb
2012-08-14 19:38:03

Jack Daniels and duct tape, looks like someone was planning a hell of a evening. Or getting ready to kidnap someone.


willie
2012-08-14 20:37:30

shoot, a fella could have a pretty good weekend in vegas with all that stuff.


hiddenvariable
2012-08-14 21:30:09

@ pseudacris what is in the water?!?!?!?


Gasoline.


mick
2012-08-14 21:34:15

Oh I wish I could find it, but someone sent me a someecard that said:


"If you start a sentence with 'I seen' it probably won't end with 'the inside of a book.'"


pinky
2012-08-15 12:05:23

Driver Hits Building In Neshannock


NESHANNOCK TOWNSHIP (KDKA) — A woman is in custody after apparently crashing into a medical building in Lawrence County.


The accident happened on State Route 18 in Neshannock Township shortly after 10 p.m. Tuesday.


There is no word on the condition of the female driver.


The building reportedly needs to be shored up.


quizbot
2012-08-15 17:55:51

well, at least she didn't have to go far?


epanastrophe
2012-08-15 18:24:17

wow. someone, long ago, decided to name their town Bullskin


erok
2012-08-24 15:39:13

It's where the buffalo roam, too.


sloaps
2012-08-24 15:50:33

^^I was waiting for stef to comment on that one.


marko82
2012-08-24 17:33:42

TRAINS hitting buildings!



“In 1920 a freight train jumped the tracks and crashed into Edgewater Station. The building, while almost completely destroyed, was salvaged. It was closed in the 1920s and the building was moved to Archie St. and Cedar Way and used as a house until it was torn down in 2001. Curious onlookers climbed up onto the train car to pose for the photographer. It is said that the accident scared the station agent Rebecca Fisher so much that she was afriaid to be in the building every time a train passed by the station.”



“View of engine #26 wreck, showing the clean-up crew, tracks and extensive damge to building.” November 14, 1906


marko82
2012-08-26 15:42:32

Huh. Didn't that branch just get robbed a month or two ago, too?


epanastrophe
2012-09-04 20:20:04

I gave a speech this morning at Toastmasters, part of a humorous speech contest, in which I parodied my blog post about the four-foot passing law, instead pointing out the buildings that aren't obeying the four-foot law. Several of the pics from this thread, or the links therein, were used in a PowerPoint presentation accompanying it.


Hyla's "That rowhouse came out of nowhere!" line from page 1 on this thread got a few giggles.


(btw, I didn't win, but had fun preparing it.)


stuinmccandless
2012-09-07 17:20:00

From Michigan:

The Biggby Coffee on Ford Road in Canton unexpectedly got a drive-through today when a customer mistakenly hit the gas pedal instead of the brake on her car.


epanastrophe
2012-09-14 18:35:40

this is completely a car-on-car collision, but I didn't want to start another thread, and the extensive permanent damage that happened seems to be appropriate for the thread (though it was to a person, not a building):


http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/local/neighborhoods-east/monroeville-woman-finds-power-to-forgive-driver-who-struck-her-vehicle-653554/


oddly, the part that pissed me off the most had nothing to do with the accident and was about half way through: "When doctors removed her staples, the pain was so bad that Nettie Gibson broke her nurse's hand squeezing it." I'm not a medical professional, but it seems to me they ought to have meds to help with that. The few times I've had major injuries or surgeries, I've learned if you don't pipe up ahead of time, they won't medicate the pain they don't feel. (why do they even offer tylenol as a serious suggestion? If it was a problem solvable by tylenol, it wouldn't require professionals to fix... end rant, sorry.)


I'm also slightly disturbed that a judge can be notorious for being tough on DUIs but then sentence in the middle of the sentencing guidelines... Maybe the judge regularly hands out the max but didn't for some reason?


I don't think jail will fix this one. That's the problem. Punishment after the fact /might/ convince the perpetrator not to do it again. It solves no part of the root problems - primarily alcoholism, secondary a dearth of mass transit.


ejwme
2012-09-17 20:49:18

I don't think either of these cars actually hit the building, but how the hell did this happen?



This is ELB @ Penn, right outside my window. It looks like everyone is ok, which is lucky since there's a bus stop right there and a lot of peds in general. It's hard to tell due to the shadow but the front of that black car is pretty well destroyed.


salty
2012-09-19 19:41:29

That's right. Only mail should go through post offices. When cars try to go through post offices, the Postal Services doesn't have big enough stamps to mail them. :)


cdavey
2012-09-23 22:59:26

Eight words: If you must be a dumbass, don't drive.


stuinmccandless
2012-09-24 13:44:12

Oh when are they going to require testing, registration, and insurance to put a stop to this madness.

Oh wait. Not working.


edmonds59
2012-09-24 14:17:12

@edmonds, I don't think you should have to pass a test and get insurance to go to the post office. The post office is... oh wait, - never mind.


marko82
2012-09-24 15:00:32

+1 Mick, Thanks for the Neil Young link. I read the article and had to order his book for my Kindle.


josgood
2012-09-25 02:38:18

Evidently written for TV. "Authorities said their still investigating the incident..."


epanastrophe
2012-10-15 21:57:44

They just renovated that building a few months ago after it sat empty for years.


stuinmccandless
2012-10-16 01:09:31

Well Stu, it looks like it’s (very) open for business now.


marko82
2012-10-16 01:30:38

I'll have to check the trajectory of travel, but that's also very close to a very busy bus stop that I myself use every couple months or so.


Also also, PennDOT just rebuilt this intersection within the past year to reduce the likelihood of crashes.


Also also also, cyclists should pay more than passing attention to this incident. When you come off the trail and head into Millvale, and are waiting at that first light, you are looking directly at that building. If you go up to the second light, as if to head toward Mr. Small's, that building is now on your left and a bit behind you. So if it's possible for non-drunk drivers to wallop a building, they can just as easily take out a cyclist.


stuinmccandless
2012-10-16 01:58:52

"My other car is a Porche, too."


mick
2012-10-16 18:42:04

Just saw a car drive into a stop sign. Knocked it right over. Dude got out and laughed about it.


callahan
2012-10-18 18:14:38

i saw this, totally devastating


erok
2012-10-22 18:41:03

This is why I like pets better than most people.


stefb
2012-10-22 23:35:28

Wow super shitty.


pinky
2012-10-23 11:45:01

Umm, the rocky montage to trucks crashing into the bridge is great


sgtjonson
2012-10-25 22:25:15

i miss the old bates st bridge...


cburch
2012-10-25 23:32:35

That might be the best video I've seen all week. The music is perfect.


pinky
2012-10-26 12:06:37

OMG, the video @buffalo buffalo posted is hilarious. Love the 2 hay trucks in a row - doh!


pseudacris
2012-10-28 15:27:37

On my ride in this morning (approx 6:30) I saw that an inbound tanker truck had crossed the oncoming traffic lane of Second Avenue, jumped the curb, gone through the ornamental shrubbery, across the parking lot, and was finally stopped by the wall of the parking garage in front of the Union RR building.


I wonder by how much he was exceeding the posted 35mph speed limit.


kordite
2012-11-03 11:13:21

Ops, sorry. The accident I was talking about was on Tuesday.


2012-11-05 13:10:30


KDKA contacted the City of Pittsburgh and PennDOT to find out whether that section of road is a single lane (with no passing) or two lanes. PennDOT was adamant that section of Second Avenue is Pittsburgh’s responsibility, while the City says it’s a PennDOT roadway.



So this is why that road is so terrible. Paint a shoulder and make it one lane. Install signs and paint that say to merge. Someone take responsibility for crying out loud.


rsprake
2012-11-05 14:17:31

how many other roads are penndot and the city playing hot potato with?


erok
2012-11-05 15:29:39

The City and PennDOT are probably both correct. Although the road may predate PennDOT, the city may have conveyed all or part of the roadway to PennDOT. Then there are intergovernmental maintenance agreements which often confuse bureaucrats and the general public as to which entity "owns" a problem.


Most likely, the City will have to use PennDOT and Federal DOT procedures and protocols to investigate and engineer a solution to whatever warranted issues are found. Depending on the findings of several investigations, the City and PennDOT may jointly design and build solutions to problems, or the City will enforce traffic laws and ordinances pertaining to that road.


Either the road is or the motorists are terrible.


sloaps
2012-11-05 15:35:57

I don't think it's either, it's both.

Those vehicles are obliterated. Somebody, maybe everybody, was exceeding the speed limit significantly.


edmonds59
2012-11-05 15:43:18

For anyone who doesn't drive that road, imagine a 1/4 mile drag strip that turns into a one lane left hand turn at the end of the 1/4 mile. Drivers coming inbound floor it at Bates Street like they're John Force and Don Garlits, then pick up a ton of speed as the road loses elevation, then merge together in a way that reminds me of the first turn at a C class motocross race. Add in all the tractor trailers and tri-axles coming in and out of the factory and cement plant on the left and it's quite an ordeal.


jmccrea
2012-11-05 16:06:58

combine that with the fact that you can't tell if it's one lane or 2 along a chunk of it


erok
2012-11-05 16:10:39

And when you dare drive somewhere near the speed limit but certainly over it but don't move over you will surely have someone on your ass until it widens again.


rsprake
2012-11-05 16:20:11

Well, I drive it almost everyday. And try always to take a middle. Going just above speed limit (2-3 mph) just to not piss off all motorists. :)


2012-11-05 23:15:20

All of this is why I hate having to ride that road when the trail is unridable. I still do it sometimes, but it is one of the few places where I consider it scary to be there.


helen-s
2012-11-06 12:54:41

Riding home from work two nights ago at around 11:30PM, I was heading down through the zoo and saw an H2 smashed into a tree. It was totaled with airbags deployed. What was really odd about it was the location. It was about 20 yards from the hairpin bend going down hill. He must not have stopped at that stop sign I guess? Anyway it was a mess and the cops were there.


2012-11-06 14:10:45

2helen s On a bright side... I rode jail trail diring lunch today and saw a big "sucking" truck. :) City Public Works were removing leaves.


2012-11-06 21:14:00

@pinky - How convenient! The police could write up the accident report and get some donuts at the same time!


mick
2012-11-21 01:36:52

@Stu - Great site. It surely puts the reckless action of buildings that lack registration and r insurance in persective.


mick
2012-11-26 19:17:09

Of course, this had nothing to do with it: "The driver told police she was going too fast..."


stuinmccandless
2012-11-29 17:46:03

@Stu going to fast does not mean over speed limit. Any avoidance maneuver has it's own "speed limits". Consumer Reports tests vehicles for rollover speed during certain avoidance maneuvers and reports them (and this is exactly the case where cars are better than SUV). On two lane road going 35 mph I can try to avoid dear if I have to go left but I would prefer ti hit deer if I had to go right because at speed 35 mph leaving pavement while trying to avoid is exactly the problem.


2012-11-29 23:35:14

@Mikhail (and this is exactly the case where cars are better than SUV


"THE" case????


I believe that should read "one of the many cases."


mick
2012-11-29 23:54:01

@Mick Almost the case. If SUV would not try to avoid crash in case of car vs SUV, car would always loose except when car T-bones SUV. In later case SUV will rollover. But if SUV T-bones car then there is no passanger compartment at all.


2012-11-30 00:09:41

§ 3361. Driving vehicle at safe speed.

No person shall drive a vehicle at a speed greater than is reasonable and prudent under the conditions and having regard to the actual and potential hazards then existing, nor at a speed greater than will permit the driver to bring his vehicle to a stop within the assured clear distance ahead.


stuinmccandless
2012-11-30 00:14:23

i dont think i've ever seen safety referenced in any suv ad. they are all about POWER. its the minivan ads that stress safety.


plus you really dont see many suv ads anymore. mostly medium size sedans and subcompacts on tv these days.


cburch
2012-11-30 02:44:38

Well if our cars weren't parked outside of our house this morning and took the impact, our house would probably have been hit by a sleepy driver. Ugh.


stefb
2012-12-02 18:10:21

Yikes, that sucks.


Did he/she stop?


rice-rocket
2012-12-03 02:28:28

I saw the pictures. There was no question of the driver stopping. They would have needed both a flatbed and a shovel to take care of that car.


stuinmccandless
2012-12-03 02:39:18

Yep and they needed both of those things, stu


stefb
2012-12-03 02:46:43

That sucks.


2012-12-03 03:15:56

Did Colin's stickers survive the impact?


sgtjonson
2012-12-03 03:17:04

Yes but they are attached to the car that is wrecked.


stefb
2012-12-03 04:01:11

Saw this in the print edition of the Cranberry Eagle.



http://www.thecranberryeagle.com/article/20121219/CRAN0101/712199818/-1/CRAN


McClymonds’ vehicle ended up wedged on the restaurant’s porch. Several customers were seated at booths that line the outer wall of the eatery, and restaurant owner Jim Leahy said the situation could have been much worse.


stuinmccandless
2012-12-22 05:05:09
EPIC... http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/local/neighborhoods-south/13-year-old-boy-driving-suv-crashes-on-rankin-bridge-after-police-chase-683180/ excerpt::: A 13-year-old boy being chased by police crashed the SUV he was driving on the Rankin Bridge early this morning, East Pittsburgh police said. East Pittsburgh police Chief Lori Payne said one of her officers saw an SUV driving the wrong way down Bessemer Avenue about 1 a.m. and tried to pull the driver over. The SUV, reported stolen today, turned onto South Main Street then sped off, driving partially on the embankment, Chief Payne said. KDKA-TV reported that speeds were near 100 miles per hour, but Chief Payne said she could not confirm that detail. The boy drove onto Braddock Avenue, then turned onto the Rankin Bridge, where he lost control, hit the sidewalk railing and flipped the SUV before it stopped between a railing and a telephone pole. Chief Payne said her officers had chased the boy about three miles but backed off just before the crash because they knew that turn was coming. The SUV caught fire and a North Braddock police officer put out the flames with a fire extinguisher, Chief Payne said.
pseudacris
2013-04-12 17:14:34
AT the age of 13, that driver certainly can be expected to have a long career in front of him!
mick
2013-04-12 18:02:51
@Kordite, haha, on my way home I got this photo of the guy fixing it:
jonawebb
2013-04-30 18:35:57
haha - love the guy's shirt: "SEE YA WOULDN'T WANNA BE YA"
pseudacris
2013-04-30 19:09:01
Had kind of a Jamaican accent, too.
jonawebb
2013-04-30 19:13:10
Just saw a blurb on WPXI that a motorist just drove into a building on North Craig. Trying to find the story online to paste a photo, but can't seem to find it.
scott
2013-04-30 22:07:59
@Allegheny_Co 12:12 am May 4: "Vehicle accident, 5400 block Baum Blvd, car hit building next door to Wendy's car, 1 person trapped in vehicle." (5400 block Baum is between Aiken and Graham, in that border zone between Shadyside and Bloomfield.)
epanastrophe
2013-05-03 23:35:42
Went to check it out a little while ago. Looks like someone was in the drive thru line and gunned it. The impact was pretty hard, it went through the cinderblock wall. The building is in the old Blockbuster parking lot, and looks like it houses dumpsters. Photos are poor, they had some official inspectors there and asked that I keep my distance.
that_tickles
2013-05-04 07:32:53
@Marko82 Excerpt; Police are trying to figure out if charges should be filed against the driver of a vehicle that went airborne and crashed into a house, starting a large fire at the home on Sunday evening. Man, what kind of "figuring" does it take?
mick
2013-05-06 12:01:48
I suppose theoretically the driver could have had some sort of medical emergency causing them to lose control...
epanastrophe
2013-05-06 12:02:45
This could go in the "media reporting" thread too. Instead of "the driver freely admitted her complete irresponsibility and lack of judgement" the tone is clearly more like "the poor driver had a good excuse".
salty
2013-05-06 22:23:00
Pretty sure the driver had already fallen asleep... hitting a storefront and rolling your vehicle seems like a thing that ought to wake a person up...
epanastrophe
2013-05-07 08:20:43
Police: Drunken driver hits four parked cars, lands on top of one in Brookline Ryan Peterson arrested after crash at Best Auto Mart on Route 51 Pittsburgh police say 24-year-old Ryan Peterson drove the car into the Best Auto Mart along Saw Mill Run Boulevard a few minutes after midnight and crashed into several cars parked at the lot. One of the cars was pushed into the building causing heavy damage to a door. The crash also knocked over six fence posts and a sign mounted on a pole. A fifth car was damaged by flying debris. SLIDESHOW: Photos of the crash and damage When police arrived, they found the car on top of another car, but the driver was gone. An officer later found Peterson on a hillside behind the car lot. Authorities say Peterson smelled like alcohol and had bloodshot eyes. He also allegedly failed a series of sobriety tests. Police say Peterson’s license had been suspended as well. He’s now facing four charges, including driving while operating privilege is suspended and driving under the influence. http://www.wtae.com/news/local/allegheny/police-drunk-driver-hits-four-parked-cars-lands-on-top-of-one/-/10927008/20059766/-/f49643/-/index.html
erok
2013-05-08 07:49:43
Police say Peterson’s license had been suspended as well. He’s now facing four charges, including driving while operating privilege is suspended and driving under the influence. He'll be driving again in no time. Boys will be boys.
erok
2013-05-08 07:54:47
Well, at least he took a few other cars out of commission in the process...
salty
2013-05-08 09:27:06
Again: * where was he coming from? * where was he going? * was transit an option? ** if so, why wasn't he using it? ** if it used to be and no longer is, make Harrisburg know this! ** if it never was, why was he attempting to use a car to get from here to there? Those questions are never asked, never answered, and certainly never reported in the media.
stuinmccandless
2013-05-08 09:54:08
Since he was driving after midnight on Route 51, I'd say transit was probably not an option. One other question (which I know the answer to): why did he think he could get away with driving with a suspended license?
jonawebb
2013-05-08 09:57:37
Because he was drunk and had only ever been caught once before, resulting in his having lost the license in the first place. "What are the odds of me being caught twice", I'm sure he "reasoned."
kordite
2013-05-08 10:07:17
@stu, I believe this is at the intersection where you were going to start your sawmill run bike sojourn.
marko82
2013-05-08 10:07:22
Looks to be a bit more than halfway from 88 to 19.
epanastrophe
2013-05-08 10:10:33
^ you're right BB, I have my used cage lots mixed up. Stu would be on the road for a mile plus by time he'd get here.
marko82
2013-05-08 10:26:49
@ Stu Again: * where was he coming from? * where was he going? * was transit an option? ** if so, why wasn’t he using it? ** if it used to be and no longer is, make Harrisburg know this! ** if it never was, why was he attempting to use a car to get from These are GREAT questions. It would be so nice to see on the news " There is a 54C bus that left Carson street roughly 10 minutes after Jones left the bar thaere that would have taken him to within two blocks of his home in Bloomfield." There are lots of reasons you won't see this, of course, but one of those reasons is that car ads "support" (read "suppress negative views of car culture") the news.
mick
2013-05-08 10:28:56
Not quite a building, but memorable nonetheless. This is what happens when you overdo the Dew:
jonawebb
2013-05-09 11:04:59
I bet every bottle will go to a landfill, unopened.
stuinmccandless
2013-05-09 11:19:02
Wow, can you imagine the sentient insect-based life forms of the future digging into that treasure trove.
edmonds59
2013-05-09 13:51:44
I went looking for the radio story I heard on KQV about the guy slipping out of handcuffs in the back of a cruiser then stealing the police car and crashing it into a house over the weekend -- somewhere up near Smicksburg, about 50 miles NE of the city -- but couldn't find the story. Instead, I found this, from last week: http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/car-crashes-ross-twp-home
stuinmccandless
2013-06-10 14:15:00
Yeah, that's the same story. The radio story said he actually hit a building. Whatever. Pretty bizarre.
stuinmccandless
2013-06-10 15:10:42
Y'know. Every time I open this thread, I expect to see a pic of my home with a car stuck in it.
mick
2013-07-01 13:17:38
it would be an interesting project to add up the total dollar value of the property damage in this thread alone.
erok
2013-07-23 20:28:07
CBS wrote:It’s unclear how the car went off the ramp.
It's interesting how everybody seems to be willing to just walk away from the story. Dunno how the car went off the ramp. Don't care. These things happen. Let's get on with our lives.
jonawebb
2013-07-24 13:04:32
On the noon news, it looked like the driver went up onto the sidewalk at the end of the bridge (jersey barrier on left, fence on right) and plunged through the fence when the sidewalk narrowed. They implied that this happened during a rain storm, bla, bla, bla... I guess the driver never thought to use the brake pedal when he became confused. Streetview: http://goo.gl/maps/uxEoZ
marko82
2013-07-24 13:28:11
I don't think they're walking away from the story. They're waiting for more details from the cops. The driver's now saying his brakes failed. We'll see I guess.
steven
2013-07-24 15:26:22
Cercone is now facing driving on a suspended license, driving under the influence and leaving the scene of an accident charges. Hat trick!
stuinmccandless
2013-07-25 15:23:53
^following one of the Atlantic's links reveals that the business with the distinction of having the most storefront-car-crashes is.... the US Postal Service. They do have a lot of storefronts though; and an older customer base.
marko82
2013-08-01 09:19:54
For the love of god... not the beer store!!! Binny's Highland Park - Chicago, IL
headloss
2013-08-08 13:31:01
Updated link But it says this is only the second hit. A mere two collisions in two years, why, that's hardly worth reporting.... ETA: And it says the shop in question is in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. Unless the paper is reporting an epidemic of bike shops sustaining multiple collisions. Nah, couldn't be. ETA2: Fixed link.
steven
2013-08-09 10:25:25
It looks like problems is in a parser. Both link should have a double dash character in "Drivers-smashs'-''-'218890351" but it has been parsed as long dash and one of then is substituted as one long "Drivers-smashs'–''-'218890351". I put all dashes in apostrophe brackets to avoid this type of conversion.
mikhail
2013-08-09 10:58:15
I hope she had good liability insurance. Can DSW claim lost income as well?
rice-rocket
2013-08-12 09:08:03
I'm familiar with that parking lot. There is literally zero run-up room to the wall she hit, she had to have been in a parking spot and floored it. Unbelievable. Another candidate for no license for-ever.
edmonds59
2013-08-12 09:31:10
I bet that's the last time DSW advertises a "doorbuster" sale.
reddan
2013-08-12 09:33:45
reddan wrote:I bet that’s the last time DSW advertises a “doorbuster” sale.
+1
rustyred
2013-08-12 12:32:23
She thought she was in reverse. Maybe the car industry should learn from the computer industry. Go forward? [ OK ] [ Cancel ] About to plow through building. Please enter your password to confirm. [ _______ ]
steven
2013-08-12 13:59:44
I don't remember the last time I used the accelerator in reverse. Maybe up a hill or something.
rice-rocket
2013-08-13 03:37:42
When I drive, I use both feet. If I'm in reverse, I have both feet engaged. I guess it comes from learning how to operate three pedals with two feet. I'm reminded of my father's frequent complaint that anyone who cannot drive a manual shift has no business driving an automatic. He was from that age when automatic transmissions became commonplace, making this sort of thing possible, so it's a bit of an overreach with today's ubiquity of automatic transmissions, but I think the point still stands.
stuinmccandless
2013-08-13 03:45:17
-
edmonds59
2013-08-13 05:53:54
Not quite a building, but this poor light pole (which is on the other side of a bike lane - as well as almost directly opposite the spot where I nearly got left-crossed last week) is no more. 95% sure it was mowed down by a driver based on how it was broken. I neglected to stop and take a picture before they hauled it away, but the stump is still there. http://goo.gl/maps/nUI5w
salty
2013-08-13 22:44:42
Marko82 wrote:No charges Bullshit!
Fingerprints on steering wheel, car door -- wouldn't they say that she was a last person driving car?
mikhail
2013-08-22 14:29:15
I'd love to see that kind of procedural excellence in a shooting investigation. "Well, we found the owner of the gun, but we're not going to charge them, because we can't prove they were holding the gun at the time of the shooting, and the evidence is all circumstantial."
reddan
2013-08-22 20:02:35
FWIW, apparently not all car accidents make the news either... I'm pretty sure these both happened this week, if not, then last week: There was a multi-car accident on Braddock Ave and Library St; (in Braddock) It looks like an SUV going downhill ended up on top of a parked car in a parking lot and another car was hit on Library St; didn't feel like gawking so I might have missed something A day or two later, a car crashed into a house in North Braddock on O'Connel Blvd; not sure if the car was going up hill or downhill, but it took got a decent portion of the corner of a house. There was a reported accident on the same street of a car hitting a gas line, not sure if that was the same one though
sgtjonson
2013-08-22 21:03:34
Tales from the Sharrows, "If Crime Reporting Were Like Crash Reporting":
A gun shot a man in Washington, D.C early this morning. The victim suffered serious injuries, but is expected to survive. Police found the man injured at the scene, but there were no witnesses. The man was not wearing a bullet-proof vest. It is also unclear if the man was drunk or distractedly walking. There is no crosswalk in that section of road. Distracted walking is increasingly common and studies show that it is responsible for more and more pedestrian injuries. Many state legislatures are considering laws to ban distracted walking....
(Related: NYC cab driver rams cyclist, jumps curb, maims tourist, then blames the messenger he hit*, bike lanes, and cyclists in general. Though he was not initially charged with anything other than not being authorized to drive the particular taxi he was in, his livery licence has been pulled and the Manhattan DA's office is apparently now investigating.) (* - Funny, I thought 'killing the messenger' was supposed to be metaphorical...)
epanastrophe
2013-08-24 12:09:50
Car slams into building near Strip District A driver lost control of their car and slammed into a building in downtown Pittsburgh Monday morning. The accident was reported on the corner of 27th Street and Penn Avenue. No injuries were reported, and the cause of the accident remains under investigation. http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/car-slams-building-near-strip-district/nZyG4/
erok
2013-09-16 14:05:28
This is the third building to be hit within 3(?) blocks on Penn this year. Rothschild Doyno Architects', Savoy, and now this.
rsprake
2013-09-16 21:01:52
Gotta say one thing about the driver that cruised into the fountain. He sure had great aim. Landing perfectly upside down on the middle of it, is amazing. Wonder if he used to be a stunt driver? On a more serious note, glad no one was hurt. I wonder what happened? I have a feeling the old man was in the middle of a stroke or something like that.
gg
2013-09-27 00:35:02
I didn't get a picture, but while I was locking up my bike in the 3rd/4th Ave parking facility, I saw they had one of the entrance lanes blocked off with cones. Apparently someone clobbered the box that operates the arm over the lane. Four Pgh Parking Auth people over there looking at it.
stuinmccandless
2013-10-14 09:12:24
Sorry. That was my dog's first attempt at driving a manual transmission...
rsprake
2013-10-16 13:23:10
Back when I was thinking about monkeys driving I ran across this.
jonawebb
2013-10-16 13:38:24
OK, trying to catch up with the activities of the last few weeks. Crash 1: “KITTANNING, Pa. — The driver of a car that crashed into a building at the Armstrong County Memorial Hospital in Kittanning on Wednesday was taken to the emergency room.” http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/car-crashes-building-armstrong-co-memorial-hospita/nbcfx/ How convenient is that? Crash 2: “PENN HILLS, Pa. — A man is facing several charges after police said he ran from the scene after crashing into a home in Penn Hills late Monday afternoon” http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/driver-runs-scene-after-crashing-penn-hills-home/nbTWK/ Crash 3: “SINKING SPRING, Pa. — Five people have suffered minor injuries after a car crashed through the glass windows of a hamburger restaurant in Sinking Spring.” http://www.wpxi.com/ap/ap/pennsylvania/car-crashes-through-restaurant-windows-in-pa/nbFdg/ Saving the best for last - From Utah… Crash 4: “Authorities say a woman who was trying to evade police was injured when the car she was driving crashed into a train and then was struck by a second train. She survived and faces possible criminal charges. (Oct. 15)” Watch the video http://www.wpxi.com/videos/ap/transportation/raw-womans-car-collides-with-2-trains-in-utah/vCFtwH/
marko82
2013-10-30 19:49:38
I wonder if the first train signaled to the second train that there was an obstruction on tracks
sgtjonson
2013-11-01 10:40:40
Pierce wrote:I wonder if the first train signaled to the second train that there was an obstruction on tracks
Usually through a dispatcher. Dispatcher should issue a bulletin but there is no way engineer see how car ended up. And it could be too late for the second train to get the bulletin and take actions since the second train was passing the first one and it has much higher speed.
mikhail
2013-11-01 13:39:45
...but was the building?
epanastrophe
2013-11-02 08:42:37
The store in the last one was named West Marine. Here's a freshwater version, a car going into Turtle Creek. It demolished a shed on the way.
steven
2013-11-02 12:03:31
@marko When I was younger I used to have a recurring nightmare of doing that behind another car. Since I cycle 99.9% of the time now, I guess that was replaced with the flat tire dream
sgtjonson
2013-12-04 12:15:19
"The accident happened around 3 p.m. at Deer Watch Road and Meeting House Road." So did deer watch road meeting house?
steven
2013-12-07 00:07:41
BTW, I heard of a car into building at Forbes and Murray Monday morning after the snow -- does anyone know anything else?
jonawebb
2013-12-12 12:13:33
If drivers don't want to run into buildings, first they need to obey the rules of the road How many of these cars do you think were driving under or at the speed limit?
sgtjonson
2013-12-12 18:40:56
Marko82 wrote:A cough or a sneeze may have caused a Comcast driver to crash his van into a Ross Township home, a witness said
For all the ones where someone claims they hit the gas instead of the brake.... This is the one that I've actually feared doing myself.
epanastrophe
2013-12-12 18:58:48
Yes, someone crashed into the Sq. Hill library on Monday (or Tuesday?) Can't find a link but I saw it on wpxi and it didn't really look like the work of someone obeying the 25mph speed limit.
salty
2013-12-13 10:14:01
Car crashes into an auto care shop in Stanton Heights A man crashed a car into a Stanton Heights auto care shop this afternoon, Pittsburgh police said. Officers from the city’s Zone 5 station in Highland Park were called to Hi-Tech Auto Care in the 6300 block of Butler Street about 1:30 p.m., Sgt. Ray Rippole said. Police suspect the driver might have been under the influence of drugs and are taking him for blood tests, the sergeant said. A 1-year-old child was also in the car and is being taken to Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC for an evaluation, he said. Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2014/01/16/Car-crashes-into-an-auto-care-shop-in-Stanton-Heights/stories/201401160282#ixzz2qalEEhXJ
erok
2014-01-16 14:36:40
saw this posted on facebook earlier, and couldn't not share. i feel like i probably mentioned earlier in the thread that buffalo thought it was having an epidemic a few years back; it really makes one wonder just how often this sort of craziness happens.
hiddenvariable
2014-01-19 02:10:11
I would say there is at least one a day on the ch 11 AM news. In general they spend half the show talking about car crashes, there are at least 3 a day bad enough to make the news. That's in addition to having a person dedicated to talking about traffic every 11 minutes or whatever, who also talks about crashes a lot. When that's not on, there are commercials, mostly about buying more cars. Maybe I should find something else to watch in the AM.
salty
2014-01-19 03:06:51
+1 salty. And the advertisements seem to always demonstrate irresponsible driving behaviors. I guess this helps sell more cars to replace those that their buyers destroy. It is eerily similar to the tobacco ads we used to have on TV. Encouraging bad behavior is morally reprehensible. I try to get my news from sources that don't expressly support views counter to my personal values.
screbner
2014-01-19 08:22:20
Four seconds of looking at the Buffalo map and I can tell you one thing: That pretty much describes suburban sprawl. Orchard Park, on the southern edge, has several. Six miles east is East Aurora, which has zero. OP is commercial Sprawlville, particularly on the north end, EA has so far managed to stay mainly sprawl-free.
stuinmccandless
2014-01-19 10:05:04
I'd say a wall counts the same as a building. What about the drunk who crashed in the tunnel with his family in tow today? If those don't count, Ch. 11 just showed a "DEVELOPING STORY" video of a car embedded in the side of a barn.
salty
2014-01-20 18:07:24
^Why his aim is so bad he couldn't hit the side of a... oh never mind.
marko82
2014-01-20 19:49:29
@salty He was a baaaad driver
sgtjonson
2014-01-22 17:04:47
How often does someone wreck at Liberty & 29th? Who is it among the cycling community that works there and sees the constant carnage?
stuinmccandless
2014-01-23 17:47:52
StuInMcCandless wrote:How often does someone wreck at Liberty & 29th? Who is it among the cycling community that works there and sees the constant carnage?
If I recall correctly, 8dot3 works nearby.
epanastrophe
2014-01-23 17:50:44
i work right near guardian, though i was out the day the car hit it. there have been three buildings hit within about a block since march, i think. it really is an awful place to be on foot, too. pretty terrifying.
hiddenvariable
2014-01-24 11:26:54
Marko82 wrote:A rare two-fer: a car hits a house in Butler Co. and then an SUV hits a tree in front of the same house fifteen minutes later. It comes at about 2:15 in the video
Black ice is not to blame as the story states, people driving too fast when the road is obviously half covered in snow, that's who I would blame.
benzo
2014-01-27 12:28:33
That's like making a 7-10 split! Congrats to the driver!
salty
2014-02-03 00:41:26
salty wrote:That’s like making a 7-10 split! Congrats to the driver!
Those are not drivers fauts. Those are that damn building faults. Buildings either stays in incorrect places or they try to cross the road when one does not expect it!
mikhail
2014-02-03 08:58:21
Mikhail wrote: Those are not drivers fauts. Those are that damn building faults. Buildings either stays in incorrect places or they try to cross the road when one does not expect it!
Any word yet on whether either of the buildings were wearing helmets?
rgrasmus
2014-02-03 09:21:51
Mikhail wrote:
Those are not drivers fauts. Those are that damn building faults. Buildings either stays in incorrect places or they try to cross the road when one does not expect it!
Any word yet on whether either of the buildings were wearing helmets?
No, but they were moving far more slowly than prevailing traffic.
reddan
2014-02-03 09:37:23
I usually get profound thoughts in the morning as I take a shower. This morning, it occurred to me that there needs to be penalties for crashing a motor vehicle, and that the penalties need to be equivalent to discharging a firearm unlawfully in public. If the logic of penalizing the discharge of firearms unlawfully (i.e. usually a criminal offense and relatively severe) is that a bystander might be hurt or killed, regardless of whether or not anyone actually is, then it is exactly equivalent to crashing a vehicle. In that circumstance, "it was an accident" does not fly. To NOT penalize motor vehicle operators for an action exactly equivalent to discharging a weapon is patently unfair to gun owners. Feel free to discuss.
edmonds59
2014-02-06 13:07:28
Yes, but there should NOT be a penalty for shooting your car. ...and it all comes back to enforcement. If police don’t bother to arrest, DA's don’t bother to prosecute, and judges hand out get-out-of-jail-free sentences (see teenager in Texas who got off because he was too rich) no amount of laws will change anything. Also, I like the idea of the insurance companies being the heavies in some of these accidents. Rather than there being a law that you need to wear a seatbelt, allow the insurance company to refuse to pay if you are not wearing one. Hit a fixed object; let the insurance company pay for the damaged property but not for your vehicle. I think that might change some behaviors.
marko82
2014-02-06 15:12:16
Vehicle Crashes Into Arnold Home, Comes Out Back Wall The entire vehicle traveled into the home. It crashed through the front door, took out a staircase and ended up in the kitchen. The car could be seen coming out of a backside wall of the home....Inside the home, a mother and her children were inside at the time of the crash. http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2014/02/11/vehicle-crashes-into-home-in-arnold/
erok
2014-02-11 13:33:39
I missed that HiddenVariable
erok
2014-02-11 13:36:57
I believe the entire thread was a response to the spate of such wrecks in metro Buffalo a few summers back.
stuinmccandless
2014-02-13 20:19:16
A Port Authority bus crashed into a building in Downtown Pittsburgh this morning. No one was hurt but the crash damaged the bus and a wall. The crash of the inbound 71D Hamilton occurred shortly before 11:30 a.m. near the intersection of Sixth and Fifth avenues. The bus hit a building in the BNY Mellon complex. Only the driver was aboard at the time, authority spokeswoman Heather Pharo said. uhhhhhh..... Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2014/02/14/Port-authority-bus-hits-building-in-Downtown-Pittsburgh-but-no-one-injured/stories/201402140148#ixzz2tJwJAua3
erok
2014-02-14 13:00:45
Ok, not a 'building' per se.... BWI jet tug attempting to hook up tow bar misses and smashes jet's nose cone.
epanastrophe
2014-02-17 12:15:22
Tally another one for Buffalo sprawlville.
stuinmccandless
2014-02-21 14:33:29
So dumb... Not only hitting the building but continuing all the way through it and running over 26 people. Amazingly, no fatalities. http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/nine-hospitalized-after-pickup-crashes-food-4-less-las-vegas Any charges for the driver? Surely you jest. -- The driver, who was not immediately identified, stood outside the store after the accident. She didn’t suffer any visible injuries and she wasn’t taken into custody. Later, her son came to the scene with a service dog and drove her home, he said. Romane said she was driving through the parking lot and then, “for some unknown reason still under investigation,” her pickup went through the front doors, then veered to the right inside before winding up in the rear of the store. ... Romane said he didn’t know if charges will be filed against the driver.
salty
2014-03-02 12:05:16
^ is it illegal to drive down the frozen food isle? What a nanny state... (sarcasm set at full)
marko82
2014-03-02 14:08:49
There are so many things to like about this story. One, the son arriving with a service dog. Why? Was he blind? And he then drove her home? So many wonderful quotes: "Romane said it’s not uncommon for people to crash into the sides of buildings or drive through the fronts of stores in Las Vegas, but what is uncommon is that the vehicle made it all the way to the back of the store." ... "'I’m still waiting until they find the keys to her Infiniti,' he said outside of the hospital. 'They’re somewhere in the store. They flew right out of her hand as she was buying groceries.'" ... "'They’d better hire a cleanup crew, ‘cause I’m not doing it,' said one worker."
jonawebb
2014-03-02 17:27:32
Maybe it was her service dog. I'm sure that poor blind woman was driving the best she could, without her dog to steer. But those reporters should be commended for describing the injuries to the truck only after describing the injuries to the people.
steven
2014-03-02 18:33:31
I’m a little disappointed in the local news media websites this weekend. On air they have mentioned at least four cars-into-buildings incidents, but they are not listed on their sites. There was a pickup truck into a home’s foundation, a minor hit to another home’s foundation, a car into a funeral home and a car upside-down in a driveway that I thought deserved special style points. Oh well, there was this fifth one: MURRYSVILLE, Pa. —A driver was taken into police custody after an overnight crash in Murrysville, Westmoreland County. Read more: http://www.wtae.com/news/driver-in-custody-after-murrysville-crash/24834834#ixzz2vVYxZ6qa
marko82
2014-03-09 17:51:59
There was a fatality mentioned on KQV this morning, somewhere south of town, Duquesne maybe? Car into a house. Happened yesterday. KDKA story
stuinmccandless
2014-03-10 05:42:44
^The impact sent the car flying and slammed into the victim’s very own first floor apartment “The guy just was speeding and just smacked him and just smacked him right into his house. Right into his bedroom,” Parker-Dulin said. Police not only believe that high speed played a role, but also believe the other driver was under the influence. “Where you going to be speeding like that? Nowhere. To probably catch the next red light that was coming up. There was no need to be speeding like that,” Parker-Dulin said. “I loved him so much. I just miss my dad.” http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2014/03/10/car-slams-into-duquesne-house/
marko82
2014-03-10 11:14:09
This is not into a building, but has such panache. Rte 8 near turnpike.
jonawebb
2014-03-14 08:15:05
^maybe the driver is a cyclist who is use to going up the ramp to the "bike" side of the bridge, and they just forgot that they were in van and not on their bike. Or maybe the driver had a bike in the van and got confused on which side they should be using.
marko82
2014-03-25 08:43:37
CRANBERRY TOWNSHIP, Pa. — A car crashed into a garage in Cranberry Township Sunday. The accident happened on Garvin Road when the driver hit the car’s gas pedal instead of the brakes. http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/car-crashes-garage-cranberry-twp/nfY6f/ It's not much of a crash, but I like the look on the woman's face - who me? I didnt do anything.
marko82
2014-04-15 08:09:54
How did that happen? Is there a huge electromagnet in that apartment?
jonawebb
2014-05-06 08:09:52
"Witnesses said the car was driving on the street at a high rate of speed, hit a car, spun around and hit into the home."
epanastrophe
2014-05-06 08:11:27
pic:
erok
2014-05-13 15:27:54
Truck into house in Hays, route 885. The video interview with a neighbor is priceless - BOOM! http://bcove.me/9t47pexn
marko82
2014-05-22 08:10:41
I saw that. Unbelievable. And people don't get that cars are deadly.
edmonds59
2014-05-30 12:39:31
Meanwhile in Kingston, UK... Kingston driver aimed car at cyclist, missed - and crashed into hair salon Some of the comments are worth reading.
stuinmccandless
2014-06-08 17:36:28
Some dude crashed into Union Pig & Chicken today, allegedly due to a "medical condition", luckily no one was hurt. I've only seen a non-public photo of it, looks like he hit the pillar right on the corner of Harvard & Highland, twisted metal and broken glass. Really close to where the host would stand.
salty
2014-06-16 21:57:53
Ah, to be fair, most of the collisions listed in this thread seem to be the result of a medical condition: "cognitive failure."
reddan
2014-06-17 10:51:50
Maybe they need a stop sign at alpine ave / henderson st intersection to get people to think about slowing down. Isn't this like the 3rd time in a year that these houses have been hit?
benzo
2014-06-30 09:02:33
To be fair, one of those houses hit was by a car going uphill. This street has been here 150 years. Is this a recent thing, or has it been going on at this pace forever? One more time, I'll drag out my question: What was the driver doing driving, #1? i.e., was driver impaired? And what was the driver doing driving, #2? i.e, was there no transit service? OK, at 3:30 a.m., probably not, ...but should there be? The Perrysville could conceivably support 24-hour service. The Brighton had it, when any did. Late evening Perrysvilles are anything but empty. Not "what was the cause of the crash" (DUI, bad brakes, unlicensed driver, etc.), but what was the cause of the cause of the crash? (bars that are trouble, faulty inspection shops, people allowing an unlicensed driver access to car keys) And what was the cause of the cause of the cause of the crash? (bus service, bad infrastructure, societal desire to own cars when it's not in their best interest) ... And I'm sure there are deeper things than that in play here, too.
stuinmccandless
2014-06-30 12:49:46
Dump truck rams 117-year-old church in Zelienople "The truck was going westbound on Route 68 when it hit a wooden electrical pole, street signs, a car in the church parking lot, and finally the church itself." Apparently the self-driving trucks of our future aren't quite ready for prime time yet.
epanastrophe
2014-07-14 12:41:02
whoa. i've never eaten there, but i've pulled into that Dairy Queen's parking lot a couple times, to recover from the hill + traffic on Verona...
epanastrophe
2014-07-24 16:16:48
I see those A&N trucks on Perry Hwy all the time, and one takes a particular liking to passing me at about three feet with the engine at redline. I wonder if this genius and that are the same person.
stuinmccandless
2014-08-25 20:00:20
"Police and neighbors said this isn’t the first time the building was hit by a car. According to people who live in the area, there have been three or four accidents in front of the building in the last two years. " Seems like the building must be ignoring safety rules. Neither the building I live in or the one I work in has been hit by a car ever, so far as I know.
jonawebb
2014-09-04 11:25:13
Sometimes, the jokes just write themselves, such as this breaking news story outside of Philadelphia. Police Car Crashes Into Dunkin' Donuts In South Jersey In the officer's defense, the sign clearly said "Drive Thru". How was he to know that it wasn't a literal instruction?
smarchit
2014-09-19 11:59:52
Not a building but last night a vehicle apparently veered off River Rd and across the North Shore trail and into the wooded area between the trail and river. The car was facing west. I don't see any news about the incident so presumably nobody (or at least no trail users) were hurt.
andyc
2014-09-25 08:21:06
Looks like they're using the term "house" kind of loosely.
edmonds59
2014-10-08 11:32:22
@ observer-reported The driver fled before police arrived. Good thing our legislature has the wisdom to forsee the terrible problems that could arise if they made leaving the scene of accident a more serious crime than driving drunk! I'm so slow at these things that I cannot even imagine what those problems might be.
mick
2014-10-08 11:41:34
Houses usually look better without jeep's half in them
sgtjonson
2014-10-08 13:07:00
I think the legislature tried to address this a few years ago, but there are still instances where fleeing gets you a lighter penalty. For a collision in which no one is hurt and there's just property damage, I think the penalties are: Fleeing the scene after damaging unattended property: fine of $300 or imprisonment for not more than 90 days, or both (section 3745) Fleeing the scene after damaging attended property: fine of $2,500 or imprisonment for not more than one year, or both (section 3743) DUI, first offense: six months' probation plus fine of $300 plus attend programs and stuff (section 3804) DUI, second offense: imprisonment for not less than five days plus fine of $300 to $2,500 plus attend programs and stuff DUI, subsequent offenses: imprisonment for not less than ten days plus fine of $500 to $5000 plus attend programs and stuff (The penalties are higher for various special cases like commercial vehicles or higher blood alcohol levels.) So you risk much longer jail time for fleeing, but you might just get a fine, since there's more sentencing discretion for fleeing than for DUI. For a first DUI with no special circumstances, it's better not to flee (assuming you're certain to get caught). For a tenth DUI with no special circumstances, it's probably still better not to flee, but the judge has a lot of latitude if you flee and get caught, and it's possible you could get off lightly for fleeing. The maximum penalty for fleeing is a $2,500 fine plus a year in jail. The maximum penalty for DUI (third+ offense, highest blood alcohol, vehicle occupant is a minor) is a fine of at least $2,500 plus 1 1/2 to 3 years in prison. I suspect many of the people fleeing are applying the same careful consideration to the question of remaining or fleeing that they applied to the question of whether to drive the car on the road or into the building.
steven
2014-10-08 13:17:43
I don't think it matters much whether the building you clobber is rivets and sheet metal or three-foot-thick marble blocks. Keep your car on the street. But even so, that building better have a helmet on.
stuinmccandless
2014-10-08 13:34:03
I know it’s just comical snark – but that IS someone's home. And it looks like they probably have more to lose than most would when a car comes crashing through the living room. I would also like to see leaving the scene of an accident be punished more heavily then it is, especially if there is injury involved. I mean what possible explanation can be attached to such incidents other than the driver trying not to get caught. We already have a law where fines are doubled in work zones, so why not a law that doubles jail-time if you flee the scene, or triples it if you flee and injury is involved. Edit: fines would be double/triple regardless of DUI etc.
marko82
2014-10-08 14:00:53
If i'm getting the right Pittsburgh Road, this is SR 917 just north of Bentleyville. And if I'm getting the right house, it's a good fifty feet--by the shortest route, which it doesn't look like that jeep took--back from a nearly straight section of road. Looks like someone took a very sudden right turn and then ran over twenty yards of lawn to hit that house.
epanastrophe
2014-10-08 14:27:10
I think this is the Google map location If you back up a half mile or so (both North & South) there is a 35MPH speed limit sign for this road. Ha!
marko82
2014-10-08 15:00:27
That's the one I found. The flag planted mid-yard looks to be the same one under the jeep's wheel in the news photo.
epanastrophe
2014-10-08 15:02:38
I keep forgetting to get a photo of the blown out bus shelter on Perry Hwy opposite Schars Lane in Ross Twp. It's a good 30 feet from the line of travel for northbound traffic, but that's the only thing that could have hit it.
stuinmccandless
2014-10-16 11:20:07
Maybe it was closer before it got hit. :-) If it's the one shown pre-damage in StreetView, it seems like it might have gotten hit by a truck going to or from the adjacent parking lot.
steven
2014-10-16 12:17:18
@Steven Drunk Man Drives Car Into Bar, Asks Owner For Drink http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2014/11/04/drunk-man-drives-into-bar/ He hit the bar, drove off, and hit a fence. Then, in the patrol car, he kicked its window and kicked an officer. This is the kinda guy for whom it makes legal sense for him to run if he hits a bicyclist and come back the next day to confess while sober.
mick
2014-11-10 12:25:23
Imagine if the PennDOT testing facility included a multi-acre lot coated in oil such that you had to put your car into a > 30-degree yaw at > 15 mph and pull out of it straight, in order to get licensed. Car clean-up at one's own expense.
stuinmccandless
2014-11-15 14:29:00
^Being 16 in Ohio, finding large, unoccupied, snow covered parking lots, putting a car into mad slides and keeping it under control has served me quite well, thanks.
edmonds59
2014-11-15 15:17:07
WPXI tweet this morning: car into AGH:
jonawebb
2014-11-18 08:59:11
[deleted wrong link] edit: there was video on the noon WPXI news of a car crashing into one of the buildings in Gateway center but I cant find it on their's or any other site. If a tree falls in the forest....
marko82
2014-11-20 22:53:34
This one is tragic. Why did this man's family allow him to drive? PITTSBURGH —A 30-year-old Pittsburgh woman who had been due to give birth soon was fatally struck by a vehicle in a North Side parking lot Wednesday afternoon. Witnesses told Pittsburgh police that Jodie Guthrie was pinned against a wall by a van that pulled into the Rite Aid parking lot on Pennsylvania Avenue. "According to our witnesses, we have an elderly driver who may have hit the gas instead of hitting the brake, jumping the curb and pinning the female, who was 8 1/2 months pregnant," Cmdr. RaShall Brackney said Read more: http://www.wtae.com/news/woman-hit-by-car-north-side-rite-aid-parking-lot/29949258#ixzz3KI3Cdko0
marko82
2014-11-27 12:18:15
@Marko, there are legal limits on what the family can do. If the old person is reasonably competent it's not really possible to stop them.
jonawebb
2014-11-27 12:33:04
The report says his family noticed he was showing signs of dementia. I think that's a good reason for the familyto take away his keys. Sure the old guy is going to fight them, but that's what should have happened. You don't wait until the old guy is completely senile and drooling on himself, you act when he starts to show incompetence. I remember our family taking away my grandfathers driving privileges years ago due to heath issues- it was very hard on everyone especially since my grandmother didn't drive. But it prevented him from doing exactly what this driver did.
marko82
2014-11-27 12:57:02
Police called it "a genuine accident" -- this is not an accident. :( Something should be changed in the law and those who cannot drive anymore should be prevented from driving.
mikhail
2014-11-27 16:24:47
Well, depending on the family, that may or may not be possible. I mean, literally. You can't just steal someone's property. There is a website i found a while back where you can report someone and have them retested. But i don't think most people know about that.
jonawebb
2014-11-27 18:20:35
^Holy Cripes! The loss of life is very sad. But with a new MRI machine costing about $2-3 Million (plus the cost of the building & truck), this might be the most expensive single vehicle crash I've ever heard of. "One of the challenges to removing the tanker from the building involved an MRI, which was powered down but its magnet was still charged. Abc27 reported that it was enough to suck a firefighter’s metal tools to the machine" http://www.abc27.com/story/27530565/fatal-tanker-crash-made-difficult-by-mri-machine-magnet
marko82
2014-12-02 19:29:56
well, this particular incident has other interesting aspects. The (tanker) truck was carrying 50k gallons of milk. Imagine the mess (I assume the tank ruptured). And the disappointment of the scavengers. Wait, I sense a conspiracy theory coming on: Why was that MRI shop built so close t the highway? And who left that magnet on overnight? (I have to assume it all happened at night.) Would not such a powerful magnet be capable of pulling a truck off the road, to its doom. And what do we know about the owner of the shop? Was he a Muslim? Did he support those terrorists who are are a mortal threat to the existence of our sovereign nation? And who ordered the cover-up? Was it Obama? Why are the media ignoring this?? Why didn't Marko tell us about this? What does that tell us?
ahlir
2014-12-02 20:03:57
The primary magnet in an MRI is superconducting. Charge it up, let it go. It keeps running so long as you keep it cold. I would imagine they would have some way of removing stuff that gets stuck to it. It has to happen every so often -- somebody forgets they've got a pen in their pocket. But they might have a hard time fixing the building; they have to use non-magnetic construction tools, which they didn't when they first built the building. Unless they discharge the magnet, I guess.
jonawebb
2014-12-02 20:12:56
Jon, Jon, you're missing the whole point! Obama is allowing a fellow-Muslim get away with a heinous crime against America. Surely this is an impeachable offence! I just pray to G*d that you will be distracted by those trivial science "facts" for only a short time. I just know that you will see the light, soon enough. I urge our readers to sincerely pray for you soul... May it be saved.
ahlir
2014-12-02 20:47:59
The deer may have been leaving a bar.
edmonds59
2014-12-04 08:56:26
Was the deer on the accellerator pedal?
mick
2014-12-08 18:08:37
that one is deserving of a picture
erok
2014-12-09 11:33:28
Not correctly though. Turn signals are only good for right or left. I expect you'd need a hand signal of some kind to indicate "down and through the roof". Story's moved to here now.
steven
2014-12-13 14:08:42
Dump Truck Hits House Firefighters from South Strabane and the city of Washington were called out around seven-thirty Friday morning, when a dump truck plowed into a house on Donnan Avenue. South Strabane Fire Chief Scott Reese says the driver of the truck said he was driving up Donnan Avenue when he saw flames coming out of the engine compartment, so he jumped out. Reese says, with no one operating the truck, the vehicle drifted backward, through two yards, before coming slamming into the corner of a house. No one was hurt and Reese says the fire that broke out was contained to the dump truck. http://www.wjpa.com/news.htm
marko82
2015-01-02 19:11:12
Do dump trucks have hand brakes? Guess not.
ahlir
2015-01-02 20:41:09
https://flic.kr/p/qEY35a Yesterday morning. 1-4-15. Three doors away from my house. Salt truck rolls over into my neighbor's house after freezing rain. Shaler. Weaver Drive. Me and several other neighbors scored about 250 pounds of salt each.
teamdecafweekend
2015-01-04 13:00:08
St Paul MN, apparently.
epanastrophe
2015-01-16 09:11:23
(see also: Distracted What?, by Charles Marohn, who in comments also refers to PennDOT as the "WORST DOT in the country, and that is quite an accomplishment"....)
epanastrophe
2015-01-16 11:41:36
Ha, drivers are so hilarious! Her license had been suspended six times, and was suspended the day before for DUI! What will they think of next? Also, I loved this quote from the state trooper: "About 10 years ago, I stopped a guy in the exact same spot... who had three or four syringes sticking out of his arm. It was just surreal and I thought, 'Nothing will ever beat this.' Well, this takes it."
jonawebb
2015-01-21 13:19:44
These people need to be on bicycles. Much as it seems more appropriate for them to be shackled to a wall, I suppose it's more humane if we could get them out in traffic on two wheels alongside us.
stuinmccandless
2015-01-21 15:18:27
From now on this is my example of why motorists shouldn't be allowed on the roads.
jonawebb
2015-01-21 19:41:05
@marko82 ARNOLD, Pa. — The owners of two homes in Arnold that were clipped by a car Wednesday said they’ve had other close calls with vehicles in the past. Well. Do those houses pay road tax? Do they pay for registration, inspection, and collison insurance? And tell the truth. Have you seen a house actually come to a complete stop at a stop sign? Ever?
mick
2015-01-22 09:56:39
And no helmets ...
mikhail
2015-01-22 22:23:02
^Have seen that before. The best. Spot on.
edmonds59
2015-01-23 07:22:46
Albuquerque, NM, July 2014: Driver who a few years ago killed a cyclist drives into a building. Link. I was looking for follow-up, but from what I gather, she got a heavier penalty for the building incident than killing the cyclist. I only found this one story from a couple weeks later.
stuinmccandless
2015-01-24 19:31:20
It's always nice when there's a happy ending. PS: I can kind of understand. A high speed police chase in a Mercedes that ends with a fireball and you walking away unharmed? Imagine the street cred.
jonawebb
2015-01-27 09:31:04
Two cents added to WTAE story.
stuinmccandless
2015-02-02 10:27:02
Arnold, PA follow-up: The neighbors want the street to be made one way going up the hill. But that would be just too disruptive to cars on a neighborhood side street - we'll just tear down all the houses at the bottom of the hill. “I do care about those houses at the bottom of the hill, but what the people need to remember (is) I didn't build those houses there, nor did I stand in the front yard and say, ‘You should buy this one,’” said Milito. http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/arnold-city-neighbors-frustrated-cars-speeding-cra/njxXB/
marko82
2015-02-03 09:37:33
Not exactly a building but too good not to share. From Wu-Tang Financial:
jonawebb
2015-03-05 09:55:11
^This happened to a friend of a friend, who posted a few more photos on Facebook. Sorry, can't share here. But they showed that the car had to navigate over/through/past large boulders in the front yard to hit the house.
stuinmccandless
2015-03-09 13:42:35
@Stu But they showed that the car had to navigate over/through/past large boulders in the front yard to hit the house. Car drivers sure are resourceful!
mick
2015-03-09 14:42:26
Imagine the driver: "I had just made it past all those boulders and then suddenly there's this house in the way!"
jonawebb
2015-03-09 14:55:24
I think it helps explain why the car is busted up more in front than usual. It doesn't take that much to crash through a wall, but three-foot boulders are a little less forgiving. I wonder how fast this guy must have been traveling.
stuinmccandless
2015-03-09 16:42:53
Imagine the driver: “I had just made it past all those boulders and then suddenly there’s this house in the way!” Too much agency. Try "I dodged all those boulders coming at me, but then this house just hit me out of nowhere!" I suspect Mr. Varrato's elderly father sitting in his living room wasn't even wearing a helmet. Did he really think being inside a building was sufficient protection?
steven
2015-03-09 16:50:38
^No blinkies on the rear of his couch AND he was wearing dark clothing. No doubt he didn’t come to a complete stop in front of the refrigerator earlier in the evening either.
marko82
2015-03-10 09:18:41
U-Haul Driver Who Struck Teen Was High, Had License Suspended 16 Times [link] A story out of NYC (courtesy of @BrooklynSpoke on Twitter), so could have just as easily been in the Out Of Town News thread or the Dangerous Drivers thread, but the photo says half of what needs to be said, and the title says the rest.
stuinmccandless
2015-03-15 17:55:16
I suspect the gun owner was scared to death due to being hit by the car. Car and gun are both deadly weapons, but only one left its victim in critical condition. Running away because your victim was armed too is not defensible.
steven
2015-03-24 12:30:04
Where did you see that the car driver had a gun?
offtn
2015-03-24 14:21:46
> Historic bridge in Edgeworth closed indefinitely after being hit by a vehicle on Sunday: http://www.post-gazette.com/local/north/2015/03/23/Historic-bridge-in-Edgeworth-damaged-by-vehicle/stories/201503230147 The driver will be charged with careless driving, Edgeworth Police announced today: http://www.post-gazette.com/local/north/2015/03/24/Man-whose-vehicle-struck-Edgeworth-bridge-will-be-charged/stories/201503240148 They believe he hit the gas rather than the brakes. (Plot twist: He's 26, taking a significant bite out of the average age of such drivers.)
epanastrophe
2015-03-24 15:04:36
Speaking of crashes, PennDOT released statistics on car crashes and other transportation accidents and fatalities: http://dotcrashinfo.pa.gov/PCIT/welcome.html The stats show: 1/10000 chance of a Pennsylvanian dying in a traffic crash each year (so about 1% chance over an 80 year life span). 1/150 chance of a Pennsylvanian being injured in a "reportable" traffic crash each year (so about 40% chance over an 80 year span). They have stats on drunk driving, speeding, cyclist deaths, and other categories. I wonder about the accuracy of the information. For example, their spreadsheet on fatalities over the years says that the number of fatalities from distracted driving crashes, per year, has gone from about 30 in 1997 to about 60 in 2014, but I suspect that the rise in distracted driving has been far steeper than that (because of smartphones).
paulheckbert
2015-04-08 19:57:20
I added a comment on the stats story to the effect that it would be helpful to have cross-referenced that information with vehicle miles traveled. Although VMT went up a bit in 2014, it's been on a decade-long decline. That's relevant. I don't know if the reporter failed to consider that, or whether the ones doing the initial study failed to consider that. Or worse, chose not to consider or report that. On the Westmoreland story with the truck ending up in the basement, (a) the driver died (may have had a seizure previous to crashing), and (b) they may have to demolish the house. There may be further updates; I'm working from 7 a.m. radio news.
stuinmccandless
2015-04-09 10:19:59
Oh, wow. I know that place. Says two people injured inside, one pinned under vehicle.
jonawebb
2015-04-15 08:05:53
I was just about to post about the donut shop. This is ridiculous. I pass that location every morning, whoever was driving has to be beyond incompetent, and should NEVER be allowed behind the controls of any motor vehicle ever again. The building is on the INSIDE of a wide turn with perfect visibility on a 35 mph street. That's right about when kids are walking to bus stops. I sincerely hope it was the driver who was injured and not someone else. At that level of stupidity, I would not weep if the driver had been killed, as that seems to be the only mechanism our society has for keeping incompetent drivers out of vehicles.
edmonds59
2015-04-15 08:11:52
That van crashed through the corner of a chain link fence before it reached the building. Do you think excessive speed might be involved? I hope the folks hit are going to be ok, and I hope the shop can be reopened - it's been there a long time.
marko82
2015-04-15 08:53:50
Excessive speed as in higher than the 35 mph speed limit, definitely. Excessive stupidity as well.
edmonds59
2015-04-15 10:15:59
> The building is on the INSIDE of a wide turn with perfect visibility on a 35 mph street. They hit the other side--from the direction they came from, it is on the outside of the curve. However, the road is posted 25. WPXI has updated on the injuries:
Two customers inside the shop were hurt. A man who was pinned between a wall and the van managed to free himself. He suffered leg, rib and chest injuries. A woman suffered an ankle injury. Both were taken to the hospital in stable condition. The driver of the van was not injured.
epanastrophe
2015-04-15 10:17:26
My Homeboy is upset:
We're all so sorry to hear about the accident this morning at Better Maid Donuts. A van ran into the building. Here's...Posted by Rick Sebak on Wednesday, 15 April 2015
rustyred
2015-04-15 10:41:13
2nd time this happened: "Back in the day when the fryer was up here in the front, basically the same thing [happened]. A guy came right through the wall and got grease all over the person making donuts. That person passed away. I was a little luckier today," said Smith.
jonawebb
2015-04-15 11:44:08
Yes, outside of the (slight) curve. Going too fast is the simplest explanation.
paulheckbert
2015-04-15 13:05:34
I biked past the place last night, pausing to take a phone call. You can see how serene traffic is under normal conditions, and how good the sight lines. How in hell do you screw something up like that? https://youtu.be/g_cc00_bmjE
stuinmccandless
2015-04-15 13:53:50
"the driver thought he saw a car in front of him, so he went into the other lane to pass it. When he saw an oncoming car, he panicked and drove the van through the building." Because that's a *much* better option than hitting the brakes.
rustyred
2015-04-15 14:28:14
Wow. Imagine being in a vehicle, on a road, and seeing another vehicle. On. The. Road. Utterly surprising. I'm guessing the police are primarily pressing charges because it was a donut shop.
edmonds59
2015-04-15 17:00:50
There was a tweet about a car going over the hillside near the intersection of Itin & Iona Streets. So I searched to see if it had made the news yet; no, but there were two other cars over the hillside at the same place, one May 5, 2012, and the other April 5, 2015. Ah, Pittsburgh!
jonawebb
2015-04-27 10:57:19
There should be a practice of erecting PERMANENT markers at the locations of car crashes resulting in death or serious injury. They would serve as regular reminders to DRIVE CAREFULLY HERE. Similar to the idea of ghost bicycles, or memorial crosses. I think a visual reminder of death is a much more effective than a speed limit sign.
paulheckbert
2015-04-27 11:12:18
@paulheckbert I think a visual reminder of death is a much more effective than a speed limit sign. I agree. I don't think it will happen. Car drivers hate any reminder of how deadly their use of automotive technology is. I've had several people who had been in horrid accidents say "You never think of something like this when you get in a car." Since the one I'm closest too is crippled for life, I have refrained (barely) from saying how much I believe that every driver should consider the potentially deadly consequences every single time they start a car. I believe the only reason you don't see a heartbreaking local car crash story several times a week on the local news is because of auto manufacturing advertising dollars.
mick
2015-04-27 11:43:30
Ireland, where people drive like maniacs, used to be covered with "black spot" signs meaning exactly that. As far as I know they are still there.
neilmd
2015-04-27 13:11:41
With all due respect to anti-motorist outrage and snark, look at this intersection: https://goo.gl/maps/dCtI6 It's absurd. Iona is downhill, and then there's a right turn onto Itin. There's two telephone poles, one with reflectors, the other of which has clearly been damaged. Also a fire hydrant, presumably for the comic effect when it gets sheared off, and a half-hearted attempt at an iron fence to defend the hillside. It's like a ride at an urban amusement park. The street need some major work done to make it usable. Right now it's just a sort of Pittsburgh prayer that things will work out somehow. And it's far from the only one.
jonawebb
2015-04-27 13:54:30
> Iona is downhill, and then there’s a right turn onto Itin. This is backwards, though understandable from how badly screwed up GMaps' tagging is. > The street need some major work done to make it usable. Right now it’s just a sort of Pittsburgh prayer that things will work out somehow. And it’s far from the only one. This doesn't follow from what you said before. The busted-up pole looks, based on the image, to have been hit, perhaps in one of the prior incidents you reported. Nothing else looks at all unusual for a Pittsburgh hillside--there's even a staircase hidden in the weeds. Nothing special needs to be done to this road, as far as I can see--it just needs drivers to slow the hell down so they can turn the corner without running off the cliff.
epanastrophe
2015-04-27 14:00:42
I agree it's not unusual, but that's not necessarily a good thing. I'm thinking speed bumps & make the sharp right turn less sharp.
jonawebb
2015-04-27 14:03:32
It's not up on their site yet, but wpxi interviewed the elderly drivers brother who claims she was going up the hill and turned right instead of left. He's puzzled why she would do that.
marko82
2015-04-27 17:13:57
Do we need a "Cars driving over stuff" thread? Woman drove over, damaged fire hose while going to store, Penn Hills official says “she told us she ran it over because she was thirsty and wanted to go to the BP to get a Red Bull,” Jeffcoat said. The woman damaged her car's oil pan going over the hose, and firefighters followed the trail of leaking oil to the car, which became disabled and had been abandoned a few hundred feet away http://triblive.com/news/allegheny/8307203-74/fire-crews-ammunition
paulheckbert
2015-05-09 21:44:07
"driverless pickup truck" rolls into Greensburg amphitheater, damaging seats, fence http://triblive.com/news/adminpage/8376419-74/damage-park-truck
Greensburg City officials are tallying the damage to the outdoor amphitheater at St. Clair Park Friday morning when a driverless pickup truck rolled down Maple Avenue, passed through a fence and slammed into the stage area of the popular concert venue. ...Security video shows a man chasing after the driverless vehicle as it drifted down the street, between two park vehicles and the fence, then into the park.
Autonomous vehicles clearly not ready for prime time...
epanastrophe
2015-05-15 12:17:51
@Stu Wow. This, to me, is a paradigm of car crime legal consequences. As long as you do this with a car instead of a gun, it's totally legal! "It was an accident" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMBZMane0Ts
mick
2015-05-21 11:02:01
^ best comment "Funny how people serve prison time for leaving a baby in a car but not for hitting a baby with one…
marko82
2015-05-21 11:13:04
I disagree. My comment: Suppose you are operating a piece of heavy machinery in a factory or at a construction site and you accidentally seriously injure or kill another worker. There will be an investigation, and if you are found not to have acted either intentionally or recklessly, you will face no criminal charges. This is the way the law works. People who make mistakes are not criminals. In the case of this crash, the driver’s insurance company will pay for damages to the house, and if there had been an injury to the baby, hospitalization, pain and suffering, and, if necessary, a death benefit would have been paid, too. In other words, the law treats damages caused by a person as a civil matter, not a criminal matter. This does not mean there is no law against it. It just means that it is not a criminal matter. As a regular cyclist, I think this should change. Requiring drivers who cause an accident to attend a training course makes sense to me. But I don’t think juries would go along with criminalizing unintentional behavior that is not demonstrably reckless. And I wish my fellow cyclists would recognize the difference between criminal and civil penalties, and realize that just because the law does not prescribe a criminal punishment for a behavior does not mean “there is no law against it.”
jonawebb
2015-05-21 11:16:30
Jon, I think I understand your point but I somewhat disagree. There is such a thing as 'negligence' that sometimes rises to the level of criminality. I'm not trying to say that these two events are equivalent, but here's one involving a gun that's being prosecuted http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Police-Corporal-Charged-in-Firearms-Training-Accident-That-Killed-State-Trooper-291432491.html So I guess the question we should be asking is 'is being negligent with a car being treated differently than being negligent by some other means?' and I think the answer to that is a definite yes - unless you are unlucky enough to have alcohol or drugs in your system. Don Parker was killed by a teen-aged driver who admitted to having his head below the dashboard (while moving) to untangle his flip flop - but no charges were filed. The gun instructor "...breached routine, yet critical, safety protocol..." So shouldn't having your head below the dashboard while driving be defined the same way?
marko82
2015-05-21 18:32:27
It happens that the public information officer of the Seattle Police Department posted on the blog about the legal issues. I've copied his comment below. On the issue of Don Parker, as I related here a while ago, I was on a ride with an assistant D.A. one time. He was completely supportive of bicyclist rights and had taken a personal interest in this case. He took the file and tried to find some way he could justify prosecuting the teen driver -- but he couldn't. He just didn't see himself getting a conviction. So I guess the bottom line is that the law doesn't exactly mean what we might like it to, or what it seems to on the surface. It's one thing to say someone is being negligent in the ordinary sense and another to prove they are according to the exact standards of the law, as described below. Hello Seattle Bike Blog and followers. My name is Officer Seth Tyler, and I’m the Public Information Officer for the Bellevue Police Department. I’d like to take a moment to respond to some of the comments that were made here and elsewhere regarding our decision to not cite or arrest the driver in this case. Any comments made to media about the decision not to arrest or cite the driver in this incident were made by me after consulting with the investigating officer, so allow me to provide some context in this decision. First, there is a big difference between criminal liability and civil liability. Someone may not be criminally liable in a certain case, but can still be held civilly liable. Our job as law enforcement is not to determine fault, that is the job of the various insurance companies that will undoubtedly be involved in this case. The accident investigator that responded to this incident, who has over 20 years of experience, is responsible for completing a thorough crash investigation, and determining if there is probably cause that any criminal offense has occurred. Criminal liability often times requires a mental state, or an intent to commit the crime. For example, in order for someone to be convicted of reckless driving, the prosecutor would have to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the driver involved displayed a willful or wanton disregard for the safety of persons or property. In laymen’s terms for this particular case, that means that the driver intended to drive her vehicle into the building. The facts of this case simply do not support that charge. So the investigating Officer would then move on to the next lesser crime of negligent driving in the first degree and see if that would apply. Negligent driving first degree is when a driver operates a motor vehicle in a manner that is both negligent and endangers or is likely to endanger any person or property, and exhibits the effects of having consumed liquor or marijuana or any drug. The driver in this case was not impaired by drugs or alcohol, so that charge wouldn’t apply. Moving to the lowest offense of Negligent Driving in the second degree, an infraction, a person is guilty of negligent driving in the second degree if, under circumstances not constituting negligent driving in the first degree, he or she operates a motor vehicle in a manner that is both negligent and endangers or is likely to endanger any person or property. It is an affirmative defense to negligent driving in the second degree, however, that the involved driver was operating the motor vehicle on private property with the consent of the owner. The parking lot of this apartment complex was indeed private property, and as there were no signs prohibiting entry it can be assumed that she had permission to be there. Other charges that were suggested by commenters, such as improper lane change or inattention to driving, are only enforceable on a public roadway or highway, so those wouldn’t apply here either. What we are ultimately left with in this case, then, is a driver who, through their insurance provider, and likely personally, will be civilly liable to pay for all damages caused as a result of this incident. Our investigator has assisted in this process by completing a thorough accident investigation, which will appear on the driver’s state accident record, and will also be made available to insurers for use in determination of fault and liability. In closing, we do not condone driving through buildings. Reply
jonawebb
2015-05-21 20:19:56
I think, BTW, that there should be a law that if you seriously injure or kill a pedestrian or cyclist, or cause significant property damage, intentionally or not, you should have to take a driver retraining course and not drive again until you've been retested. I think a law like that might get through some state legislatures (not PA, though). But we don't have that law right now.
jonawebb
2015-05-22 07:42:46
One more point from the Seattle bike blog, which is very educational. Apparently, as the law defines it, "Negligence" = deliberately doing something you're not supposed to do. "Absence of due care" = failing to do something you're supposed to do. So in the case of the driver driving into the apartment, they did NOT show negligence; driving into the apartment was not deliberate, it was a mistake. If, say, the apartment complex had signs up saying the public is not allowed to drive here, then the driver would have been negligent, because they presumably deliberately drove into the parking lot. But the accident didn't show negligence, because it wasn't deliberate. Same with flip-flop boy. He was not negligent; he didn't deliberately drive on the shoulder or run Don Parker down. What we want our laws to apply to is "absence of due care." The driver who drove into the apartment showed absence of due care, because you're not supposed to do that. Same with flip-flop boy. So we'd want a law that said if, through absence of due care, you significantly injure a cyclist or pedestrian, or cause major property damage, you would need mandatory driving education and a retest before you could drive again. BTW, "reckless" means something else again. It means you deliberately broke the law. So the driver who crashed into the Pink Box donut shop was reckless, because they told the cop that they drove off the road to avoid another driver. Bad idea. Watch what you tell cops. If they'd said, I lost control of the car, no reckless driving charge.
jonawebb
2015-05-22 15:58:15
I fail to distinguish between “Negligence” = deliberately doing something you’re not supposed to do and “reckless” = deliberately broke the law If the former is supposed to apply to some sort of "best practices" guide, that gets into murky waters in a hurry. If I can't tell from a high level, here, I do not see how legislation can be enacted, let alone be prosecuted.
stuinmccandless
2015-05-22 16:39:31
Yeah, you're right -- I was sort of winging it with "reckless." I'm sure there's more to it than that. The legal definition is something about "wanton disregard for the law" but I don't know what that means, really. OTOH I think that crashing into a donut shop is a pretty good way to get the book thrown at you, by a cop.
jonawebb
2015-05-22 18:19:25
BB....you may want to read the story again.
offtn
2015-06-18 07:18:55
Kdka edits their stories in place without notice. (note use of 'flees' in headline, which remains unchanged so far...)
epanastrophe
2015-06-18 07:22:25
Wow, editing stories in place without identifying things as corrections or follow-ups? Journalism, 2015, pathetic.
edmonds59
2015-06-18 08:04:57
The internet makes winston smith's job of rewriting the news from 1984 look so much easier now. You can keep your website current with the correct narrative without telling anyone you changed anything.
benzo
2015-06-18 12:16:50
I love copy-pasting text from stories here, just in case that happens again. No, when that happens again. Thinking as I type here, maybe I'll further amend that to add: Make a note to myself to tack on a timestamp when I do that.
stuinmccandless
2015-06-18 12:53:17
that made my day!
paulheckbert
2015-06-18 13:45:47
That used to happen all the time at the Bates Street exit from the Parkway on the way to Second Avenue, before they rebuilt the bridge where the bike path sits. I would drive that way and remember calling 911 when I saw a truck was stuck: "Is the driver still there?" It was such a common occurrence that they'd wait to see if things worked out.
jonawebb
2015-06-18 14:13:55
Two Men and 7/8 of a Truck.
edmonds59
2015-06-18 15:26:08
I saw lots of vehicles stuck under Bates Street over the years. By far the best thing I saw was the same company's tractor wedged under the old bridge two days in the row - it was like the Groundhog Day movie. Also, that old bridge generated a lot of revenue for a friend's heavy truck repair business; he spoke of its replacement the same way one might talk about the death of good old dog.
jmccrea
2015-06-18 16:30:54
Uh, aren't the wheels supposed to be on the pavement, not perpendicular to it? South Side Slopes story. Also, no license, existing warrants, and a police chase, though the story doesn't say why the car was stopped in the first place. H/T to @scott for posting the link on Facebook.
stuinmccandless
2015-07-04 10:50:35
"They face charges of unauthorized use of a vehicle, fleeing or eluding police, forgery, and firearms violations, according to police." Nothing about parking on the sidewalk? (PA state law is silent on whether cars should be parked wheels-down, wheels-up, or wheels-sideways, so they're OK on that score.)
steven
2015-07-04 15:47:56
BTW, Jonawebb ahs a point about how dangerous driving is not and probably should not, be considered criminal. However, we recognize that bad driving is a serious danger. The solution? Perhaps licenses should be revoked for non-criminal safety reasons. And suspensions shoudl be taken seriously. Driving is not a basic human right.
mick
2015-07-07 19:02:46
A semi hit the railroad overpass on Eckert St/McClure Ave going towards Riverview Park. We saw this as we were going towards the observatory. The trailer suffered significant damage.
chrishent
2015-07-11 09:17:53
Had he only had the presence of mind to bring along a cyclist and run them over on the pad... he'd be home watching himself on the news and not being subjected to the indignities that our legal system might visit upon transgressors. A truly accomplished motorist would have made sure that the biker had no helmet to wear and thereby guaranteed that the story would focus mostly on the perils of cycling.
ahlir
2015-07-12 17:18:59
Well, the driver is from Athens, GA, so that explains a lot ;-) Sorry, can't pass up the opportunity to pile it on Athens and UGA. Them college rivalries...
chrishent
2015-07-12 18:31:37
Whoa. And I thought Athens was kind of the "rational" part of GA.
edmonds59
2015-07-13 08:31:47
@edmonds59, I'm probably being unfair here. Athens is a fine town. It's UGA that I dislike. Our rivalry with them is called "Clean, old-fashioned hate" for a reason so for us, Athens tends to be synonymous with UGA.
chrishent
2015-07-13 14:28:08
Dateline: Kalamazoo, MI: Stone mailboxes in low-speed residential neighborhood ordered removed, citing safety concerns. I thought about putting this in the out of town news thread, but it's more relevant here.
stuinmccandless
2015-07-28 06:14:23
WPXI: Minivan badly damages truck, house after crashing off road "The van was traveling on Herminie West Newton Road when it went through a yard, striking a large rock and going through trees, before crashing into the truck and house.…Needles were found on the ground at the scene. Family members of the female driver said she is diabetic."
epanastrophe
2015-09-04 14:17:37
@Marko82 -- But was the cow wearing a helmet? Where was he going at 10 o’clock at night? Soo many questions – unfortunately the cow didn’t make it. I dunno. Maybe she was looking for the bull that ran away from her on Bull Run Road??
cdavey
2015-09-04 16:20:27
Weirton: A fire truck backing into the station hit the middle of the building's load bearing wall, bringing down the wall, part of the roof, and the front facade.
epanastrophe
2015-09-08 11:14:28
Hermitage, PA: Truck driver chokes on soda, loses control, plows into car dealership, trashing a couple dozen new cars. link
stuinmccandless
2015-09-08 18:32:11
The woman that crashed into the gates of Allegheny Cemetery a while back was sentenced to 6 months of house arrest. Link to news article. That video of the crash makes me want to grab some popcorn. It looks like something out of a Michael Bay movie.
njpearce22
2015-09-10 07:47:33
Holy crap! the only thing missing from that video was the car exploding upon impact with the gate, 1980's movie-style. At that speed, she was "lucky" to drive straight through the gate instead of crashing on one of the gateway columns. This is her second DUI, so that's supposedly at least a 12-month license suspension, depending on how high her BAC was. 6-month house arrest? She got off easy PS: The comment section of that article has some people begging to be banned from there
chrishent
2015-09-10 08:20:35
^how does one keep their license and vehicle after something like that? State should impound property after multiple incidents of DUI. Looked like a scene out of Serpico. She's lucky no one was seriously injured there due to her negligence.
ka_jun
2015-09-11 10:25:51
"...lost his breaks..." ...like can't catch a break? Dormont, truck hits house, shears gas line.
stuinmccandless
2015-09-12 20:31:41
Their paint scheme uses a lot of yellow. But I bet the Subway didn't have its lights on.
steven
2015-10-10 17:33:54
Yay! The donut shop on Steuben St has reopened. Page back to Page 23 of this thread, 15 Apr 2015, for our detailed analysis.
stuinmccandless
2015-11-15 09:37:22
There was another one we missed from a couple of days ago, of a car into a pizza shop. One report said Robinson, another said somewhere out Noblestown, I'm not sure who's right. Is there a particular pattern with pizza shops? I seem to recall that as a recurring theme. I suppose if I had nothing better to do with my time, I could go back and tally all these by category -- pizza, other fast food, supermarket, horse in a farm field, swimming pool, etc.
stuinmccandless
2015-11-19 09:04:57
The Mineo's pizza shop was in Noblestown shopping plaza, Noblestown Road, kind of on the butt side of Greentree, next to Crafton.
edmonds59
2015-11-19 15:46:04
I don't know whether the car actually impacted the house here, but it's pretty darned close, on its side in the front yard, and only a few blocks aeay from where James Price was killed. One killed here, too. Post-Gazette story
stuinmccandless
2015-11-26 08:53:45
That's my friend's house. Can confirm, house was not hit (only damage was to the retaining wall).
ratatosk
2015-11-26 10:22:30
About the crash on Penn (which appears to have been closer to Murtland than Lang), WPXI wrote: Michael Herring saw the crash and called 911. "I was at the intersection at Penn and Negley and this car passed me on the left on the double yellow line and was driving about as fast as that car would possibly drive." ... There was no immediate word as to what may have led to the crash. http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/local/1-dead-1-hurt-after-crash-pittsburghs-north-point-/npW7x/ I wonder if speeding might have had something to do with it? Penn & Negley is on the other side of East Liberty. Perhaps the Surtrac cameras recorded pictures of the car zipping thru? (Does Surtrac save video?) My armchair+streetview speculative reconstruction of the crash tells me that the car was eastbound on Penn at high speed, veered right for some reason, missed or scraped a telephone pole close to Penn, hit the retaining wall before 7020 Penn, the front end of the car got hung up on a guy wire for a telephone pole, the front end of the car went up in the air and the rear end swung around so that the car did a 180 in the air and landed on its left side. That car must have been going very fast. On WTAE they said that cinderblocks were sent 20 yards down Penn Ave by the crash. http://www.wtae.com/news/one-dead-in-thanksgiving-morning-car-crash-in-point-breeze-north/36673404
paulheckbert
2015-11-28 16:09:47
rustyred
2015-12-12 08:45:26
Did someone go shrub-surfing at Baum & Millvale recently? There's a quite prominent dent in the corner of the Chipotle I don't recall having been there a week ago....
epanastrophe
2016-02-23 10:43:17
Inside the house on Polish Hill: Oh, and the driver didn't have a driver's license, but that's OK because NO ONE EVER CHECKS.
jonawebb
2016-02-24 09:02:18
Another image of that, from the outside, via the Trib via WPXI. Link to the Trib story
stuinmccandless
2016-02-24 16:17:10
I love how, in the middle of the KDKA story, there is a car ad running!
mick
2016-02-24 18:34:48
And with @mick's post, we hit 1,000 for this thread! Woot! Since we'll likely have to create a volume 2 for this topic, I propose we name the new thread "Drivers (or motorists) hitting buildings, vol. II"
chrishent
2016-02-24 20:37:08
Let's see how far we get with this before it starts messing up. To the naming suggestion, since sometimes the vehicles in question are unmanned, I'm content to leave the original name in place and just add the "volume II".
stuinmccandless
2016-02-25 07:22:54
It's messing up. (1) As soon as I pressed the "Submit" button, it took me to the first page. Usually it leaves me on the page I was just on. (2) Upon clicking "Forums Home" page, I see that this thread is still marked in bold, indicating unread. (Which, obviously, it isn't, since it's my post five minutes ago.) (3) Clicking on the thread, it takes me to page 1. Edit: At least when I click "26" it takes me to page 26.
stuinmccandless
2016-02-25 07:28:48
Driver taken to hospital after crashing into Greensburg business http://www.wpxi.com/news/news/breaking-emergency-crews-respond-reports-car-colli/nqfkk/ GREENSBURG, Pa. — A person was taken to a hospital Monday after crashing a car into the side of a business in Greensburg, police said. Channel 11 News learned that the person went over a sidewalk at Mt. Pleasant Street and Highland Avenue and crashed into Nature’s Way Market, breaking a window.
marko82
2016-03-07 22:41:54