In 2001, when a CVS pharmacy opened on North Middletown Road in Pearl River, N.Y., Rockland County administrators approved a curb cut on the nearby sidewalk to facilitate wheelchair access from the road to the sidewalk. Three years later Stacey Gersten, 48, who had a “mild developmental disability”, tried to cross the road on foot at that point and was struck and killed by a hit-run driver, Duane Boos. In December a jury agreed to assign 65 percent of the blame for Gersten’s death to the county; it assigned 35 percent of the blame to Boos and none to Gersten. James Lynch, a Paramus, N.J. lawyer who represented the Gersten family, “said the jury agreed that the curb cut at the sidewalk outside the CVS was an ‘invitation’ for pedestrians to cross at a ‘dangerous spot’,” one with no crosswalk and no curb cut at the opposite side.
In short, it would seem that the county is liable because in its effort to help wheelchair users, it provided an inordinate temptation to jaywalkers. And as disabled advocates regularly point out, wheelchair users are not the only group that benefits from curb cuts. Bicyclists and scooter users, parents with strollers, the elderly with walkers, people using a dolly or cart to manage a load of goods — all may legitimately desire midblock access to a road without intending to cross to its other side.
Without visiting the actual site of the accident it’s hard to draw definitive conclusions. It would be a shame, however, if liability-averse road authorities drew the lesson that from now on it is going to be legally risky for them to install curb cuts anywhere other than at crosswalks. (Khurram Saeed, “Rockland hit-and-run victim’s family wins $1 million lawsuit”, White Plains (N.Y.) Journal-News, Dec. 22).
16 Comments
I can inagine it now……A new slew of anti-ADA lawsuits that claim the measures created to help the disabled are now a hinerance to the able-bodied Oh boy!!!!
I kind of have to agree with the jury on this one. Why put a “curb cut” in a location where you are not supposed to cross? There is no logical reason for it.
Jim, I assume there’s on-street parking, so the curb cut is for the disabled to get from their car parked on the street in front of the pharmacy up to the sidewalk.
The logical reason is to get to your car without having to go all the way to the crosswalk and walking back.
I looked up both of the CVS Pharmacies on North Middletown Road in Pearl River on Yahoo Maps. The satellite map shows that both of them have their own parking lots. I stand by my previous statement.
Please note the time frame here. The curb cut was made in 2001. The accident happened in 2004 and you are looking at images from, possibly 2007.
For three years there were no problems caused by the curb cut. This suggests to me that it was not that dangerous.
And in the three years since the accident, is it that surprising that the CVS would have decided it needed a parking lot? Or relocated to a site that had one?
There is just too much unknown.
OBQuiet,
I don’t think that they totally rebuilt both stores so that they could add a parking lot. That being said, it wouldn’t suprise me if there wasn’t an ADA requirement for that curb cut. The idea behind the ADA regulations are sound, it is the implimentation that is flawed. If there wouldn’t have been a curb cut added, we could just as easily be discussing a lawsuit brought on by non-compliance with ADA regulations due to it’s ommission.
I wasn’t saying that they rebuilt the store. These are typically leased anyway. Often the term is for 5 years.
But I do not have the address of where the accident happened. If the original site did not have a parking lot. I think it would be likely that CVS would have been looking for one that did.
There are only two CVS stores on North Middletown Road in Pearl River N.Y. Both have the same features that I am talking about.
The curb cut was put there so wheelchair users like myself can have access to the store like everyone else. If there is no curb cut there’s no way to access the building. If the curb cut was added next to a street it’s so when we park we can get out of the car and NOT have to move down the street to the nearest intersection. This can be really dangerous because 1 we are on the street and 2 we are so short that most vehicles windows are a lot taller than us and people might not see us. Also if we are driving we would have to put our wheelchair together in the street, or if we were a passenger we might not even be able to get out of the car because of the curb. With the curb cut the store becomes accessible and we get a better chance of not getting hit by a car.
We are also not told of what this girl’s exact level of disability was. Would she have stopped at a curb cut at a regular intersection? Would she have watched for traffic? If it was a regular crosswalk and someone went to make a right turn would she have known to stop and not keep on walking? There are so many unanswered questions here. I’m not trying to say she was incapable of things and deserved anything because she totally didn’t but I am saying no one here could possibly know every detail and have proved they don’t.
The curb cut was put there so wheelchair users like myself can have access to the store like everyone else. If there is no curb cut there’s no way to access the building. If the curb cut was added next to a street it’s so when we park we can get out of the car and NOT have to move down the street to the nearest intersection. This can be really dangerous because 1 we are on the street and 2 we are so short that most vehicles windows are a lot taller than us and people might not see us. Also if we are driving we would have to put our wheelchair together in the street, or if we were a passenger we might not even be able to get out of the car because of the curb. With the curb cut the store becomes accessible and we get a better chance of not getting hit by a car.
We are also not told of what this girl’s exact level of disability was. Would she have stopped at a curb cut at a regular intersection? Would she have watched for traffic? If it was a regular crosswalk and someone went to make a right turn would she have known to stop and not keep on walking? There are so many unanswered questions here. I’m not trying to say she was incapable of things and deserved anything because she totally didn’t but I am saying no one here could possibly know every detail and have proved they don’t.
The curb cut was put there so wheelchair users like myself can have access to the store like everyone else. If there is no curb cut there’s no way to access the building. If the curb cut was added next to a street it’s so when we park we can get out of the car and NOT have to move down the street to the nearest intersection. This can be really dangerous because 1 we are on the street and 2 we are so short that most vehicles windows are a lot taller than us and people might not see us. Also if we are driving we would have to put our wheelchair together in the street, or if we were a passenger we might not even be able to get out of the car because of the curb. With the curb cut the store becomes accessible and we get a better chance of not getting hit by a car.
We are also not told of what this girl’s exact level of disability was. Would she have stopped at a curb cut at a regular intersection? Would she have watched for traffic? If it was a regular crosswalk and someone went to make a right turn would she have known to stop and not keep on walking? There are so many unanswered questions here. I’m not trying to say she was incapable of things and deserved anything because she totally didn’t but I am saying no one here could possibly know every detail and have proved they don’t.
The curb cut was put there so wheelchair users like myself can have access to the store like everyone else. If there is no curb cut there’s no way to access the building. If the curb cut was added next to a street it’s so when we park we can get out of the car and NOT have to move down the street to the nearest intersection. This can be really dangerous because 1 we are on the street and 2 we are so short that most vehicles windows are a lot taller than us and people might not see us. Also if we are driving we would have to put our wheelchair together in the street, or if we were a passenger we might not even be able to get out of the car because of the curb. With the curb cut the store becomes accessible and we get a better chance of not getting hit by a car.
We are also not told of what this girl’s exact level of disability was. Would she have stopped at a curb cut at a regular intersection? Would she have watched for traffic? If it was a regular crosswalk and someone went to make a right turn would she have known to stop and not keep on walking? There are so many unanswered questions here. I’m not trying to say she was incapable of things and deserved anything because she totally didn’t but I am saying no one here could possibly know every detail and have proved they don’t.
The curb cut was put there so wheelchair users like myself can have access to the store like everyone else. If there is no curb cut there’s no way to access the building. If the curb cut was added next to a street it’s so when we park we can get out of the car and NOT have to move down the street to the nearest intersection. This can be really dangerous because 1 we are on the street and 2 we are so short that most vehicles windows are a lot taller than us and people might not see us. Also if we are driving we would have to put our wheelchair together in the street, or if we were a passenger we might not even be able to get out of the car because of the curb. With the curb cut the store becomes accessible and we get a better chance of not getting hit by a car.
We are also not told of what this girl’s exact level of disability was. Would she have stopped at a curb cut at a regular intersection? Would she have watched for traffic? If it was a regular crosswalk and someone went to make a right turn would she have known to stop and not keep on walking? There are so many unanswered questions here. I’m not trying to say she was incapable of things and deserved anything because she totally didn’t but I am saying no one here could possibly know every detail and have proved they don’t.
The curb cut was put there so wheelchair users like myself can have access to the store like everyone else. If there is no curb cut there’s no way to access the building. If the curb cut was added next to a street it’s so when we park we can get out of the car and NOT have to move down the street to the nearest intersection. This can be really dangerous because 1 we are on the street and 2 we are so short that most vehicles windows are a lot taller than us and people might not see us. Also if we are driving we would have to put our wheelchair together in the street, or if we were a passenger we might not even be able to get out of the car because of the curb. With the curb cut the store becomes accessible and we get a better chance of not getting hit by a car.
We are also not told of what this girl’s exact level of disability was. Would she have stopped at a curb cut at a regular intersection? Would she have watched for traffic? If it was a regular crosswalk and someone went to make a right turn would she have known to stop and not keep on walking? There are so many unanswered questions here. I’m not trying to say she was incapable of things and deserved anything because she totally didn’t but I am saying no one here could possibly know every detail and have proved they don’t.
Why have we decided as a society that if something goes wrong then somebody is going to pay through the nose for it. Tragic accidents happen and it is a dangerous fiction to assume that things can be made so safe that nobody will ever get hurt again.