Parents in the area of an acknowledged major intersection for commercial trucks are requesting a crosswalk to give their kids a safe route to town.
A request has come into the town to install a crosswalk here, at Parade Hill Lane and Oenoke Ridge Road. The crosswalk, which requires ConnDOT approval since Oenoke/Route 124 is a state road, ideally would run across from the south side of Parade Hill Lane the south side of Parade Hill Road, allowing kids in the neighborhood to walk safely to town by way of a sidewalk along the eastern side of Oenoke. Credit: Terry Dinan
A number of new families have moved into Parade Hill Lane and the houses fronting Oenoke Ridge Road near it, so that up to 20 children are now in the area, including many that are now at an age where they want to walk to town, according to John Sheffield of 24 Parade Hill Lane.
“We wanted to see what the possibility would be to put in a crosswalk across Oenoke, from Parade Hill Lane to Parade Hill Road on the other side,” Sheffield said at the Sept. 17 meeting of the Police Commission.
The idea would be to hook up with the sidewalk that runs down toward God’s Acre along the eastern side of Oenoke Ridge Road.
Trucks traveling between Westchester and the Merritt Parkway or Interstate 95 often cut through from Route 124 (Oenoke) down to Route 123 via Parade Hill Road. That, and the speed of many passenger cars on Parade Hill Road, has raised serious concerns from residents of the street and its offshoots, including those with small kids. In that case, town officials have pushed back on proposals from residents that include a stop sign, speed bumps, new sidewalks or lower speed limits as impractical or infeasible.
Sheffield made the point that not only children but also a handful of commuters would make use of a crosswalk helping them safely access town by foot.
Police Chief Leon Krolikowski said the request, which includes at least one letter from a family seeking the crosswalk, would be forwarded first to the Traffic Calming Work Group—a team of police, public works, fire and emergency management representatives—and from there back to the Police Commission, the group that ultimately would ask the state (Oenoke Ridge Road is a state road) for permission to create the crosswalk.
In the past, the whole process has taken the state 3.5 years to give final approval, such as the for the new crosswalk across South Avenue that runs directly to the police department.
Police Commission Chairman Stuart Sawabini asked Sheffield to clarify just where the proposed crosswalk would go.
It would run across Oenoke Ridge on the south side of Parade Hill Lane to Parade Hill Road, Sheffield said, since most all commercial traffic that coming up Parade Hill Road turns north along 124.
“I’m not aware of any trucks that come up Parade Hill Road and then turn let and drive south,” Sheffield said.