Dump truck critically injures 62-year-old e-bike rider in Brooklyn
GOWANUS, Brooklyn (WABC) -- There are growing safety concerns at an intersection in Brooklyn after a private garbage truck struck and critically injured an e-bike rider.
It happened on Third Avenue in Gowanus around 9:30 p.m. Sunday, not far from an area where the city has been working to install more protected bike lanes.
Police say the driver of the truck, a 32-year-old off-duty firefighter working an authorized second job, hit the 62-year-old cyclist while making a left turn onto 12th Street.
The victim, from the Bronx, had been riding on the sidewalk. He was taken to Methodist Hospital in critical condition.
The truck driver stopped at the scene, and the owner of the private sanitation company described his as "distraught."
"Perhaps the last thing he was looking out for was a cyclist coming off the sidewalk," said Paul Basile, president of the Gowanus Alliance.
He appears to have been making a legal turn with the green light at the time of the collision.
No charges were immediately filed against the truck driver, registered to Pride Recycling and Demo, and the investigation is ongoing.
The crash happened in an area where the Department of Transportation has been working to install more protected bike lanes, just one block over on 4th Avenue. Two bicyclists have been killed along the corridor this year.
After a slew of delays, in the past several weeks, the DOT announced they were expediting the installation of bike lanes as part of the Green New Wave announced by Mayor Bill de Blasio following a major uptick in cyclist deaths on New York City streets this year.
The owner Pride Recycling and Demo Inc. said the driver in Sunday night's collision had only been with his company two weeks but had years of experience.
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