Dear Editor,
Late this afternoon, Saturday, Nov. 4, a couple crossing the road from the east end of Red Hook Plaza to American Yacht Harbor was hit by a car. The husband was extremely critically wounded, the wife slightly less seriously, but she is undoubtably going through hell as well.
There is no question in my mind that a pedestrian cross walk would have prevented this accident.
Red Hook is a small town or village. Anywhere else in the 'civilized' world, speed limit signs would be posted at either end of the village and pedestrian cross walks would be installed in places of high pedestrian traffic.
Red Hook has an uncommonly high level of pedestrians from early morning to late evening and yet people drive through it as if the main road was a race track.
The most recently formed Red Hook civic group – Citizens Alliance for the Improvement of Red Hook – several months ago requested assistance from Public Works to dramatically increase road safety in Red Hook. I sincerely hope that the necessary people in authority take notice of this latest tragic accident and make road safety in Red Hook a top level priority.
Corinne Van Rensselaer
St. Thomas
