Sunday, June 10, 2007

* Sheridan Road Open Again



After this mornings horrific crash, which possibly claimed the life of a female who was trying to make a U-turn at 6807 North Sheridan Road - all that's left are broken glass, unknown car parts, about twenty-five feet of skidmarks from the 'Royal Triple C' cab #4870 tires and the woman's wig.

40 comments:

Unknown said...

There is also a somewhat deceptive curve on that part of Sheridan when traveling north. It used to be commonplace (maybe still is) for late-night (tipsy?) drivers to miss the curve and plow into a line of parked cars near the Oasis tavern there.

I live here too said...

This was followed by a hit and run to a pedestrian on Clark at the entrance to the Dominick's. Approximately at 9:45AM. 2 Male blacks (Oh, is that PC? Who cares, it's the truth) 20 ish about 6' 0", thin, driving a small older black Chevy SUV. The registered address to the vehicle was in the 1500 block of Juneway, or Jonquil. Dumped vehicle in a dead end alley and fled on foot, very, very fast. The vehicle had damage to its front end from striking the pedestrian. Offenders fled North on Winchester.

The North Coast said...

I've noticed how fast the traffic travels on Sheridan by Pratt. They seem to consider it a highway of sorts.

Don't EVER walk against the light on Sheridan and stand well back from the curb when waiting to cross.

I didn't hear this accident this morning. Usually an accident at this intersection wakes me up, but I was out cold.

DorothyParker007 said...

what the hell is the driver doing au turn? its against the law

I live here too said...

I actually met with and spoke with the tow driver that cleaned this mess up. One of the things he mentioned was that there was "a half gallon of wine in the back seat". Upon further conversation he was refering to one of those big jug bottles, and it was half full.... Draw your own conclusions.

Jocelyn said...

That wig was still there at 5pm today.

Dr O said...

It seems that to have one of the photo enforcers would put a stop to the various red light runners. I've seen a lot of people slam on their brakes so they won't go through red lights at Western/Peterson, Cicero/Lawerence, and now Belmont/Austin since they put them in place.
To whom do we need to speak to have Sheridan/Pratt included in the next round of installations?

sweetpea said...

That wig won't last long. Someone with an eye for a fine hair piece like that will make a grab for it.

sweetpea said...

Kinda looks like Jocelyn could use a new wig anyway.

anonymous said...

Sweetpea....decent people like Jocelyn don't pick up wigs from the street to actually get any use out of them, they put them in the trash where they belong.

The North Coast said...

Wow, are we being CATTY in here.

Jocelyn is an attractive young person. Somebody sounds envious of her.

Jarvis_smells_like_piss said...

can you say continuation of lakeshore drive? this is exactly why i want an extention!

anonymous said...

Hey, good thinking North coast, I say we get a little liquor in her, but not that wig, I think blonde would go much better with her big blue eyes.... a red striped sailor top and some hoop earrings and she'd be pretty cute alright.

The North Coast said...

I just KNEW that someone out there would use an accident like this, and the prevalence of speeding on Sheridan, as an excuse to advocate cramming ANOTHER stretch of limited-access asphalt down our throats, murdering our beaches in the process.

We don't need another damned expressway. We need fewer cars on the road, and for those to drive in a manner safer for pedestrians.

Until the denizens of the suburbs immediately to our north decide to get sensible and start taking the train, I suggest that we employ measures designed to slow people down. Speed bumps as a last resort. I always thought the speed limit out there on Sheridan was 30 or 35 miles an hour, but people usually travel in excess of that speed.

I don't want to see ONE MORE DIME spent on freeways and limited access roads to accomodate suburban drivers. They don't have a God-given entitlement to expressways. My taxes pay for the hyper expensive limited-access roads even though I never use them and couldn't honestly afford to.

I wonder how expensive gasoline will have to get to pry these idiots out of their speeding cars and get them on the trains.

DorothyParker007 said...

wait, wait, don't throw out the wig I"ll take it, Jos if you have it, please let me wear it to my prom this Friday.

Jarvis_smells_like_piss said...

you are so damn wrong, north coast. i want less traffic on sheridan road. it's too much at this point, not to mention, our beaches kind of blow. big time. i was just there yesterday, so I would know. i woudl like to see all the private beaches along sheridan road (in edgewater) gone from the high rises. i would like there to be a better running/biking path in rogers park, and i certainly want to stop seeing people from the burbs drive through oour neighborhood. the ONLY way all those things will happen is if we extend LSD.

been there said...

ya know, i think they have had good luck in edgewater with traffic calming measures that include replacing some lights with stop signs. lights cause a lot of frustration and "hurry and beat the light" and other behaviors. traffic would flow a lot more smoothly, and calmly, if only the major arteries had lights.

The North Coast said...

If we extend LSD we will lose our beaches.

One of the reasons I voted for Gordon was because of his passionate opposition to any extension of LSD, as it will cost us our beaches. Figure it out- where will the extension go where it will not cost us either beaches or buildings?

I agree with you on the rest- we definately need to work on reclaiming our riparian rights to the continuous beach. I have read elsewhere that these bldgs do NOT own the beachfront they have cordoned off and have NO RIGHT to claim sections of the beach for their exclusive use.

As for the traffic, $5 a gallon or more ought to start to make a dent. That's one of the many reasons I adamantly oppose any government action to control the price of gasoline. Let the free market get these wasteful suburbanoids out of their cars and onto the trains.

In the meantime, we can resort to more traffic control and more measures to slow traffic to slow these idiots down.

Levois said...

That wig in that street makes it look worse. Almost as if she got scalped.

The North Coast said...

You're right, the wig DOES make it look worse. A personal belonging like a wig, or a shoe, at the scene of violence, is very evocative.

anonymous said...

I think Craig was all dressed up on his way to visit Thomas Westgard again when he came upon the scene, got in close for a photo, it fell off and he left it there for the evocative effect.

SouthEvanstonian said...

"Until the denizens of the suburbs immediately to our north decide to get sensible and start taking the train ..."

This is a very ironic statement, seeing that the CTA is threatening to cut the purple line express. How much more can they do to discourage people from taking the el?! When I want to go to downtown Chicago, I must weigh my options: spend 45-60 minutes on a slow, dirty train populated with sketchy individuals, or drive 20 minutes in my nice car and pay a bit more for gas and parking? For people with options (read: well-heeled surburbanites) the answer is usually pretty easy.

If you want less traffic on Sheridan road, lobby the CTA to make its services attractive to middle-class consumers. They want safe, clean, and fast -- and right now, Sheridan road covers those bases better than the el does.

Fargo said...

Make public transit and bike riding into more attractive options, and fewer will drive. How about adding a downtown congestion fee (like London) and using the revenue to improve public transit and bike facilities?

The North Coast said...

You better know I'm lobbying for better transit, from every angle. It's not only the lifeblood of the north lakefront, but it's my personal lifeline.

Evanston and Wilmette have both done a superlative job of creating walkable, centralized communities that are well-oriented to transit, even if it happened by accident. Evanston has even increased housing density close to the transit core.

It would be a tragedy to destroy transit to these two towns, especially now that we KNOW we have to scale back our auto use drastically.

Yet WHAT does our gov choose to shower $1.2 billion dollars in subsidies on? Ethanol and biomass, that's what, the better to drive food prices northward while subsidizing a form of energy that would not be economically feasible without them, while enabling people in their car addiction. Ethanol and biomass have a negative ERoEI, and half the population will be driven to starvation by the diversion of land from food production to fuel production. Yet Blago and Obama and all the others continue to tout these "alternatives".

Let's face it, we subsidize absolutely EVERYTHING. I don't like it but I have given up hope that either the Republicans or Democrats will ever grasp how free markets truly operate. So, it's not a matter of whether we will subsidize autos via "free" interstates and limited access roads that cost $20MM a running mile, "alternative" fuels, and tax breaks for oil depletion; or whether we will subsidize public transit and trains, or whether we will subsidize air travel so I can fly to St. Louis with 80% of the cost of my flight on the taxpayers dime.

It's a choice of WHAT we will subsidize, and I am lobbying frantically for improved transit, because in a few more years, many tens of thousands more people will be driven from their cars by the costs.

My hope is that,if they don't subsidize it, they demonopolize it and let private operators compete. But it will take a long time and billions of dollars for someone else to put the rail infrastructure in place we already have.

So we have to work with what we have.

I live here too said...

North Coast.
So, are you saying the rest of the Lakefront adjacent to LSD doesn't have any beaches? Seems to me that nearly the entire North and South Lakefront, where LSD runs, has parks and beaches.

I say add about 100 yards of fill, adding parkland, extend LSD into Evanston-dumping all that traffic on their doorstep, and add an unbroken swath of new beaches just like in Lincoln Park, Or, do something like the Lincoln Park rowing basin, current beaches, some open water, LSD, and more Park/beaches on the new Lake side.

The noble idea of fewer cars is nice, but a pipe dream. Until the cost of ownership of a car becomes more painful than using public trans, cars are the reality. Change is always upsetting, but I could see that extending LSD to the Cavalry cemetery area being pretty cool.

Kheris said...

@ i live here too

CTA has a long way to go before it really achieves world class status as public transportation, but it's a heckuva lot better than some places I have been. Extending LSD sounds wonderful now, but it won't be so wonderful if it turns into an extension of the existing speedway out of the Loop. Of course if oil hits $80/barrel next year, perhaps we'll all decide the money is better spent on improving existing parks, buses and trains.

DorothyParker007 said...

The wig = Tony Soprano heads a rolling.

But to be serious it is sad that someone slot their life over stupid driving. You can walk out of your home one day and its over, just like that.

The North Coast said...

I believe a true Free Market approach would put car ownership beyond the reach of half the citizenry, and make the transit a profitable proposition.

I repeat: De-subsidize ALL transportation, and let the user pay for it all.

No more "free" interstates or limited-access road. No more tax support for such roads. You want a good, high-speed road, pay the tolls that it takes to maintain it- not a drop of support from any federal, state, or municipal agency. And no more FIGHTING WARS FOR OIL. That means we get the hell out of the middle east. Also, raise the cost of the city sticker to about $500 to reflect the true cost of street parking spaces-much more than the $75 a year a sticker now costs.

No more subsidies for air travel, which means no more publicly funded airports or civil air control or bailouts for airlines or tax supports for otherwise unprofitable flight routes.

No more support for Amtrack.

No more support for public transit.

It would be a rocky transition as transit agencies scrambled madly to buy equipment and hire personnel to meet the drastic upswing in demand as people are priced out of their cars by skyrocketing gasoline prices and tolls on every limited-access road.

But cities would redensify, local businesses might have a chance against national chains, and traffic would be much lighter and life might be possible for people who can't afford cars at all, or are stretched way too thin keeping some beater running. No more teens aimlessly cruising around for hours on end and getting into car wrecks- it will suddenly make a lot of sense to raise the driving age to 18 (at least).

Transit fares would drop as traffic increased and more service would be instituted, and once more people could live without spending $5000 a year on something they spend maybe an hour a day in.

Businesses would relocate in dense areas (cities) in order to have a cheap workforce.


The airlines will totally collapse without public subsidies, except for the one or two that cater strictly to the luxury market. Most travelers will have to take to the rails, and many business people will video conference instead of jumping on planes, and the railroads will once again find passenger service rewarding.

We should start the process now, and the best place to start is with Blago's idiotic and destructive ethanol subsidies.

Craig Gernhardt said...

Amazing, Laura just solved all the world's problems, in 10 paragraphs.

Anonymous said...

I live here too,
If LSD were to extend to Calvery cemetary or there abouts, were would it let out on the Evanston side? Just wondering...

Discussion of that should make for a very lively public meeting up in Evanston. Don't you think, southevanstonian?

The North Coast said...

Hey, Craig, I can't solve poverty or overpopulation or shrinking resources or government oppression or the fate of millions of starving, abused children.

But I will always put my oar in on wasteful, government-subsidized practices, such as subsidizing what is wasteful and unecomomical vs. what is economical and wouldn't need subsidy if the govn't weren't throwing money at its competition.

I'd just like to see a country where people making $9 an hour weren't forced to get an auto just to make a damn living.

Anonymous said...

wig was gone at 7:45pm - i went a show a friend and no wig, im very disappointed i didn't pick it up (why didn't the police??? was it not evidence of some kind?)

Toto said...

Hey Dot, I snagged it for you and have sent it to my hairdresser in Edgewater. Should be ready by Friday. Jos missed a dandy.

Compasion said...

You people don't realize that the woman hit has a family. She died and you never know if somthing like this could happen to you or someone you love. Her family didn't know she died until a day later. Although she may have taken a u-turn, is no excuse for a cab to be going so fast to kill anyone. The cab driver is fine and blames the woman, who can't defend herself nor had any life insurance. You never know if somthing like this could happen to you or someone you love. Because we all know that we've all made a bad judgement call sometime or another. This woman is being attacked and the family has no idea when they can bury her. She was someone that maybe one of you probably knew.

Craig Gernhardt said...

Dear reader named Compasion.

I've had many conversations about my commenters with various people lately. Most coward commenters who make these snide comments really hate me because what I do on this blog.

Thus, they start hating everyone who agrees with my point of view on any given subject. They throw stones behind a computer because they don't have the courage to come forward and show us their real identity.

I've got over 1200 readers a day, so they're just the very small percentage of people who read the site.

For the record, I never attacked either driver.

In this case I'll go out on a limb and say both drivers are at fault. Two wrongs, no one is right.

In any case, I apologize for all they idiots who choose to mock this death because they truly hate me so much.

That isn't fair to the family of this lady who died in this terrible crash.

Fargo said...

It sounds like both drivers were wrong and that the woman paid the ultimate price for that mistake.

SouthEvanstonian said...

Rebecca, if there's one thing Evanston likes to do, it is debate! LSD extended to Calvary would certainly have everyone's tongues wagging and fingers typing up here!

Jocelyn said...

I am pretty sure we all have done stupid things at some time in life and we can count ourselves as very fortunate that we have not had to pay such a high price for it.

Anonymous said...

Southevanstonian,

Not surprised by that at all. If and when that day comes, they could probably sell tickets to those public meetings...they'll be that entertaining.

Not trying to give the Evanston city council any bright ideas though...I hear they come up with enough of those by themselves!

Philip McGregor Rogers said...

THis is what happens when two bad drivers meet each other,

Cant you imagine the car accident the other way around?

Doing the Unexpected will always bring trouble,
Ofcourse both are at fault,
Two people doing two stupid things driving,
It was fate that brough them together,

Just the other day some idiot didnt understand what happens at touhy and ridge and rogers,
I was traveling east bound on touhy
and this crazy driver damn near merges into me, I was in the right lane which is where you are supposed to be when you dont want to be on rogers and if you want to continue onto touhy,

it definitly is an irregular intersection.

A reminder why the necessary evil of driving should be curbed, and someday eliminated, or atleast decreased.

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