Jodie Dionne, a resident of East Northport, is urging local officials to secure the junction of Elwood Road and Clay Pitts Road. since 2018, more than 20 vehicle collisions have occurred near her home, leading to property damage and injuries.
The 20-Crash Toll at Elwood and Clay Pitts Roads
The intersection of Elwood Road and Clay Pitts Road in East Northport has become a focal point of community concern due to a high frequency of accidents. According to the report, homeowner Jodie Dionne has witnessed or responded to over 20 crashes since 2018, many of which required 911 emergency calls.. These incidents include a variety of collision types, ranging from rear-end accidents to more severe T-bone crashes.
The human cost of these accidents is a primary driver for the demand for change. As reported,several incidents have resulted in injuries, including a specific instance where a bicyclist was struck. For residents like Dionne, the sound of a collision has become a recurring source of anxiety, fueling fears that a catastrophic event is inevitable if the road layout remains unchanged.
From Cracked Garage Walls to the June Fence Breach
The physical toll on private property at the corner of Elwood Road and Clay Pitts Road highlights the volatility of the intersection. Jodie Dionne's property has been struck multiple times, resulting in a cracked garage wall and the destruction of a tree. The report notes that her mailbox has been hit on three separate occasions, illustrating a pattern of vehicles losing control and veering off the roadway.
The most recent escalation occurred in June, when a vehicle breached the fence of the Dionne residence. These repeated incursions into private property suggest that current road boundaries are insufficient to contain speeding vehicles,turning a residential front yard into a recurring crash zone.
Legislator Stephanie Bontempi's Traffic Study Response
In response to the mounting evidence of danger, Jodie Dionne contacted Suffolk County Legislator Stephanie Bontempi to seek government intervention. The county has since initiated a formal traffic study of the Elwood Road and Clay Pitts Road intersection to determine the root causes of the frequent collisions. This move represents the first official step toward a structural solution for the East Northport neighborhood.
This situation echoes a broader trend seen across many expanding suburban corridors where residential intersections, originally designed for lower traffic volumes, fail to accommodate modern speed and vehicle counts. When local infrastructure lags behind traffic patterns, the burden of safety often falls on homeowners who must lobby officials to recognize a hazard that is already evident to those living on the street.
Guardrails and No-Turn-on-Red: The Proposed Safety Suite
To mitigate the risk of future accidents, Jodie Dionne has proposed several concrete engineering and regulatory changes. These suggestions include the installation of a guardrail to prevent cars from entering her property, the addition of a turn lane arrow to clarify traffic flow, and the implementation of a no-turn-on-red rule to reduce T-bone collisions. Additionally, Dionne has called for a reduction in the speed limit to slow vehicles approaching the junction.
The effectiveness of these measures often depends on the findings of the traffic study. For instance, if the study finds that visibility is the primary issue, a no-turn-on-red rule may be more effective than a guardrail, which only addresses the result of a crash rather than the cause.
The Discrepancy Between 911 Calls and Official Data
While the report highlights that Dionne's family has dialed 911 for over 20 crashes, it remains unclear if the Suffolk County official accident records match this number. Often, minor collisions that do not result in police reports go uncounted in official safety audits, meaning the actual danger may be higher than what is reflected in government data.
Furthermore, there is no information regarding why this specific intersection was not flagged for safety improvements by the county prior to Dionne's outreach to Legislator Stephanie Bontempi. Whether this was an oversight in regional planning or a lack of reported data remains an open question that the current traffic study must address.
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