BERKELEY – People living near the intersection of Bimini Drive and Jamaica Boulevard came out to a recent Township Council meeting to urge officials to make the crossroads less dangerous.
Bimini leads off Route 37 into hundreds of homes. Jamaica snakes its way through several senior communities and serves as a way to travel between them. They meet in a highly active intersection that neighbors said causes lots of accidents.
John Capaldi lives nearby and said there were three recent accidents, and one of them was fatal. He told the story of someone making a U-turn in the middle of the road. There’s a pedestrian crossing sign…but people have run it over.
Police Chief Kevin Santucci said he spoke to some of the residents in the area about this issue. Prior to the meeting, he spoke to the Traffic Safety Department in the police. He said they looked into six crashes at the intersection. In one of them, the driver didn’t see a motorcycle. In one of them, glare from the sun was to blame. In the other four, the driver didn’t see the stop sign at Jamaica.
One audience member shouted out that there have been many near-misses. In other words, it’s not just the number of crashes.
The chief learned that there used to be a blinking stop sign at that corner but it was damaged in a crash.
The police also ran a speed study for a month during the summer. The average speed was 25.47 mph; it is a 25 mph zone. The lowest speed was 15 and the highest was 67. There were almost 4,000 vehicles passing through a day.
Santucci said that tackling this problem needs to be multi-faceted. There needs to be signage. Drivers need to be educated, and there needs to be more enforcement.
He warned that “Once we start enforcement, people in this room are going to get tickets.”
It’s a truism among police officers that whenever residents complain about speeders and ask for police to pull them over, the ones complaining wind up being the among the speeders.
The residents asked for speed bumps, but police generally don’t want those installed because they cause more problems.
Bimini resident Larry Benardella said that Bimini does not have a shoulder. People have to park around the corner when they visit him. “You’re playing Russian roulette walking your dog.”
The town has been bringing robocans into some neighborhoods for garbage collection. With one can in the road on his side and one across the street, “Bimini just got 8 feet skinnier.” That’s going to cause more crashes.
Mayor John Bacchione said that robocans can be put on the sidewalk, and in the area of grass between the sidewalk and the street.
“We would prefer them on the street but we can make changes to put them on the edge of the curb,” he said. He also encouraged the use of signs and police enforcement.
Another Bimini resident, Anthony Palmieri, said that as soon as people pass the railroad tracks they speed up.
The chief said that officers will be directed to patrol the area. Residents might see them parked for a bit before leaving. If that’s the case, they are leaving to go to an emergency call.
Susan Palmieri said that the intersection should have a traffic light. It’s the only major entrance to that senior development that doesn’t have a light. People know this and so they use it more often.
“The word is out that Bimini is the westernmost connection to get to Davenport” Road, so heavy trucks and car carriers use it.
If there was a traffic light there, it would prevent crashes, she said. Also, it could be timed in such a way that if you get through the light on Route 37 you can’t build up enough speed to make it to the light on Jamaica.
However, another Bimini resident, Ken Metcalfe said that he doesn’t want a light because he’d never be able to get out of his driveway when cars back up from the light.
He suggested staggered slow bumps. First responders can go around them, but then again, some people won’t mind breaking the law to do it.
Another resident’s suggestion was to alternate stop signs on the streets leading up to the intersection.
Township Planner James Oris said there are laws about where to put stop signs and traffic signals.
If there’s a crash at an intersection where the town put a stop sign or traffic signal up arbitrarily, then the township would be liable, the chief said.
