Pedestrian Struck on Knollwood Road

Sure, there’s a snowstorm happening as we post this and we expect accidents to happen. As we sit in our offices looking over the Town, our police scanner is busy with all the usual calls plus those created by the weather. Numerous police and fire departments along with ambulances have been scrambling about the County as well as the Town to accidents of various degrees of severity.

The Broadway Civic Association has long complained that the Town is shirking its responsibility by not insisting to install sidewalks in numerous places, but specifically leading to the newly built and just-opened Greenburgh Health Center on Knollwood Road. In fact, the Town Planning Board approved a sidewalk at 275 Knollwood Rd, the location of The Knolls at Pinewood, a 15-unit luxury condominium, of which 13 are complete. But ‘The Knolls’ doesn’t want sidewalks built – neither does The Paul! And, of course, since The Paul doesn’t want it, his Town Board doesn’t want them either.

Interestingly, when The Paul, his Town Board, County Executive Rob Astorino, his aide Ned McCormack and County Legislator Michael Smith were all pushing to destroy WestHelp for Valhalla votes, Kevin “Henchman” Morgan suggested the need to build sidewalks on Knollwood Road from WestHelp’s property toward Rt 119 because it would be unsafe for Ferncliff residents to walk on Knollwood Road without them. The irony is that the Ferncliff residents and day students would never be walking anywhere. They would have a van transporting them wherever they might be going. The Henchman must have misspoke.

The point? At about 2PM today, Friday, a pedestrian was struck by a car walking on Knollwood Road at the entrance to the Westchester Community College. There is no sidewalk. At the other end of Knollwood Road, the new Greenburgh Health Center has opened. It’s only a matter of time that a pedestrian gets hit by a car at this new address. The old Community Health Center on Rt 119 across from the former A&P in the Crossroads Shopping Center, found many of it’s clients crossing Rt 119 with kids, strollers and shopping bags, etc., in all kinds of weather and traffic. The dangerous situation that existed at one area has been shifted to another. Even though it is a different area, the same risk still exists for the health center’s clientele, just at their new home. There is no sidewalk.

The Paul had championed the illegal sale of the old Cooke’s Florist property to the Mount Vernon Medical Group that runs the medical center doing business as the Greenburgh Health Center. He spot-zoned the property and has trumpeted not installing sidewalks for this location. While we hope no one ever gets hurt coming or going to this new location, the amount of traffic that frequents the area almost guarantees it. Many will recall how The Paul continually bragged about the Town’s AAA Bond Rating some months ago. Perhaps if we utilized some of it by borrowing the necessary funds and building sidewalks throughout the busy streets in our Town, we can save people from being involved in an unnecessary accidents and injuries. We can only hope.