SHEEPSHEAD BAY'S ONLY INDEPENDENT NEWS BLOG

The scene of an April 2011 accident on Bedford Avenue and Emmons Avenue.

Community Board 15 sent a request to the Department of Transportation yesterday, seeking a left turn signal and daylighting at the accident-prone intersection of Emmons Avenue and Bedford Avenue.

The corner, as we reported yesterday, is the site of frequent collisions, according to residents. Cars making a left from eastbound Emmons Avenue onto Bedford Avenue are forced to make a blind turn, as parked cars along the median block the view. We’ve reported on several accidents at the intersection.

The request went in after yet another accident this weekend, spurring members of the Sheepshead Bay / Plumb Beach Civic Association to renew their calls for the turn signal and daylighting, a safety measure that sets parking back several feet in order to increase visibility for oncoming traffic.

But Community Board 15 Chairperson Theresa Scavo said that residents shouldn’t hold their breaths for DOT action.

“How many times have we requested this? This is not the first time we’ve requested this,” Scavo said. “Every now and then we get a call, ‘We need a left turn signal there.’ Fine. But we put in this request several times and it’s always been rejected.”

Scavo added that it can take up to four months for the agency to make their determination. DOT inspectors visit the site and count the number of vehicles making the left turn, as well as look at the intersection’s accident history, and take action dependent on internal criteria.

That leaves residents with little recourse for action, except repeating their request every few months.

“There’s nothing that [neighbors] can do. DOT goes there and does the study. If there is not a certain percentage of cars making that left, they wont do it,” Scavo said. “It doesn’t matter how many people they get letters from, it’s a DOT study and they have criteria and if it’s not there it’s not there.”

Following another car accident at the intersection of Emmons Avenue and Bedford Avenue, neighbors are renewing their calls for improved traffic safety measures before someone loses their life.

On Sunday, September 2, two cars collided as an eastbound vehicle traveling on Emmons Avenue sought to turn up Bedford Avenue, and a westbound car slammed into it. No one was seriously injured, but at least one group is saying it’s an ongoing problem.

“Vehicles driving east on Emmons that need to turn north onto Bedford will find it impossible to see cars traveling west on Emmons. Then, ‘WHAM….CRASH,’” said Sheepshead Bay / Plumb Beach Civic Association member Tom Paolillo, who told Sheepshead Bites about the accident and sent in the accompanying photo. “It is a regular occurrence.”

Paolillo said the corner needs a turn signal and a “No Parking Anytime” setback to prevent cars from parking at the end of the median so that oncoming cars can be seen during a turn.

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Meeting announcement from the Sheepshead Bay-Plumb Beach Civic Association:

Click to enlarge

THE COMMUTE: Ned heard my name for the first time when I emailed him in March 2010 with my testimony opposing the Brooklyn bus service cuts at the public hearing held in the Brooklyn Museum of Art. That was shortly after I discovered Sheepshead Bites. He quoted a significant portion of my testimony for a story and ultimately asked me to become a regular contributor. At that hearing, I was the only person who spoke out against the B4’s proposed elimination, at all times, east of Coney Island Hospital.

Find out what we can learn from our fight for the B4.

It's (going to be) back! Victory! (Photo by Allan Rosen)

YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: After petitions, public workshops and letters from local officials, the MTA will announce today that the B4 bus line will be fully restored by January 2013.

The fate of the line, which had weekend and off-peak service axed in 2010 east of Ocean Parkway, was unclear earlier this week, when Sheepshead Bites reported that the agency was considering major improvements across the borough. But local leaders told Sheepshead Bites that MTA officials informed them this morning that the agencies plan to announce that the B4, as well as other diminished lines across Southern Brooklyn, will see full or partial restorations.

The B4′s restoration already has locals elated, including members of the Sheepshead Bay – Plumb Beach Civic Association, which collected more than 2,000 signatures to a petition demanding the agency bring back the line to Emmons Avenue, Shore Parkway and Knapp Street.

“I am just so glad. Everybody is going to be so thrilled,” said Kathy Flynn, president of the SBPB Civic, upon hearing the news. “This is going to help everyone who has to go to the hospital, the clinic, the businesses, anyone who has to visit, as well as the disabled in the area. People who commute to Manhattan every day, they only have to take one bus to the station. It’s going to save a lot of people a lot of time and a lot of stress.”

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Barbara McCord Way is the new name for Gunnison Court between Brown Street and Batchelder Street, the same block the longtime Plumb Beach advocate Barbara McCord lived on, and on which members of her family still live.

The McCord clan gathers under the sign. (Click to enlarge)

Family, friends and local leaders unveiled the new street sign honoring the former chairwoman of the Sheepshead Bay – Plumb Beach Civic Association Barbara McCord on Sunday, June 3.

A low-sitting quiet block, with one-story homes and no condos, there are few streets like Gunnison Court left in the neighborhood, and the location makes a fitting tribute to a woman who spent much of her life protecting and preserving Plumb Beach’s bungalow colonies and beach-town culture, family, friends and elected leaders agreed.

“She always wanted to keep the community the way it was and to know the neighbors and keep it a great little place that it used to be,” said Lorin McCord-Satzger, McCord’s daughter. “When she set her mind to something to get it done, she got it done and she’d fight with whoever she needed to do it. She got things done.”

McCord passed away on January 22, 2011, at the age of 75, following a 10-year battle with congestive heart failure. But even as she battled the condition, McCord had a continuous presence at the Plumb Beach Civic Association, a group founded by her mother Margaret McCord, and with which she served for more than 40 years.

Read more about McCord, and view more photos from the unveiling.

A message from the Sheepshead Bay-Plumb Beach Civic Association:

Photo by Erica Sherman

Approximately 200 people turned out to honor those veterans who’ve given the ultimate sacrifice in serving and protecting our nation, as the community celebrated the annual Armed Forces Day and Memorial Day Parade and Observance.

Organized by the Sheepshead Bay – Plumb Beach Civic Association, the event brought together veterans from almost every conflict going back to World War II. Gerritsen Beach’s Nicole Hidalgo sang the National Anthem; she, too, is a veteran of sorts, having sung at 9/11 tributes and professional sports games.

The event, as always, included a motorcade of classic cars, which line up near the memorial site on Emmons Avenue, near Brown Street and the Miramar Yacht Club.

Helping the marchers keep pace was the Bishop Kearney High School marching band, and students from other local schools were honored with awards for winning Memorial Day-related contests.

Assemblymembers Alan Maisel and Helene Weinstein, as well as State Senator Marty Golden, were in attendance.

Check out the photo gallery!

The following is from the Sheepshead Bay-Plumb Beach Civic Association:

Local elected officials pledged support to bringing back full B4 bus service and other public transportation improvements to the area at last night’s Sheepshead Bay Transit Town Hall, organized by Sheepshead Bites, Transportation Alternatives, Assemblyman Steven Cymbrowitz and the Sheepshead Bay – Plumb Beach Civic Association.

More than 50 people turned out for the event to share their experiences with mass transportation in the area, emphatically expressing the community’s desire to restore the B4 to a 24/7 bus line after service cuts in 2010 eliminated the line east of Ocean Parkway on weekends and off-peak hours on weekdays. The Sheepshead Bay – Plumb Beach Civic Association presented elected officials with a petition signed by more than 1,000 people, and when a representative from Transportation Alternatives asked the crowd how many of them were affected by the B4 cuts, every hand in the room went up.

“Over 90 percent of our residents in this community rely on mass transit regularly,” Cymbrowitz said in his opening statements. “Ideas that appear brilliant on paper often fail to deliver in practice. One example? The decision to provide B4 bus service to Knapp Street and Voorhies Avenue during peak periods Monday to Friday, leaving thousands of potential riders without viable mass transit services.”

Keep reading to find out what other concerns and proposals came out of the meeting, and what the next steps will be.