(erielack) Train wreck in Nanuet/ Spring Valley late 1800's

[NJNYRR_@_aol.com]

Following is an editorial from the Journal-News (Rockland County, NY).  
Anyone have any information on the wreck mentioned here?

This is also no ordinary crossing because the sharp bend, poor line of sight 
and high embankment make it a particularly dangerous length of track. In 
fact, it was the sharp bend that caused a passenger train to go flying off 
the curve just pass the Pascack Road tunnel in the late 1800s

The full text follows.

Be responsible, NJTransit (Original publication: Aug. 05, 2001) If NJTransit 
had spent the more than $100,000 given the families of train accident victims 
on improved safety, perhaps the 10 people would be alive today. Yes, we agree 
that public awareness and individual responsibility are needed at the deadly, 
improper, pedestrian-made crossing on the Pascack Valley Line tracks between 
Lawrence Street and Route 59. But this is no ordinary track. Ten deaths in 15 
years is too high a statistic and should have prompted improvements years 
ago. This is also no ordinary crossing because the sharp bend, poor line of 
sight and high embankment make it a particularly dangerous length of track. 
In fact, it was the sharp bend that caused a passenger train to go flying off 
the curve just pass the Pascack Road tunnel in the late 1800s, a scene so 
terrible that it was featured on the front page of a New York City newspaper. 
It was that crash that resulted in making the banking even more severe, and 
it is that increased angle that worsens the safety factor and makes it 
difficult to avoid a train. NJTransit has agreed over the last decade and a 
half to give more than $100,000 in damages to the families of those struck 
and killed crossing train tracks on the edge of Spring Valley, but the 
railroad has yet to take any action to make this area safer. "People should 
not be crossing there," says Michael Klufas, a spokesman for the railroad. 
The path, he adds, is "not an authorized crossing." But people have crossed 
there for many years, at least since Route 59 was rerouted about 1930, 
walking across the tracks from residential streets to nearby Route 59. It is 
far easier to do that than walk a mile up to Dutch Lane and then back down 
Route 59, or more than a mile down to Pascack Road, through a nonpedestrian 
tunnel and back up Route 59. At least five families have filed wrongful-death 
lawsuits against the government-owned transit agency, most of which were 
settled before trial. The most recent death was July 18, when Geovany 
Roca-Duarte, 28, of Spring Valley was killed as he used the path to cut 
across the tracks to meet his employer's van at a gas station on Route 59. A 
dozen years ago, a Spring Valley woman, Josette Medorzil, died in the same 
manner. Like Roca-Duarte, she was hit by a train between 7 and 8 a.m. as she 
took the path from Route 59 to meet her employer's van to go to work. She was 
a garment worker at a factory in Nyack. "The path is there. It invites you to 
cross over," says Joel Lutwin, a lawyer who represented the family of another 
victim of the path, 15-year-old Elie Germain, struck at the same spot in 
1989. Lutwin said recently that he vividly recalled visiting the site with 
his investigator about 10 years ago when he was working on the case. The path 
was so worn down "it was white," he said. The worn path is still there. 
People use the path and are killed, and the railroad pays their families 
damages. A jury awarded $64,165 in 1993 to the survivors of 15-year-old 
Leslie DeRose, who cut across the tracks in 1985 on his way to apply for a 
restaurant job. And after a year and a half of litigation, the railroad paid 
a $50,000 settlement to the family of Alibadra Sano, 18, who was struck and 
killed at that area of the tracks in 1997. If the railroad is amenable to 
settling these cases or spending money to go to trial, it should be willing 
to put its thinking cap on and come up with a solution. We have suggested an 
over-the-tracks crossing, with federal monies tapped. Whistles could also be 
sounded constantly from the Nanuet Mall to downtown Spring Valley. Fencing 
might help, but probably for not for long, since the fencing that is there 
has been tampered with. Besides, fencing is not the real answer. The people 
who cross these tracks are poor. They have no cars and little money for buses 
and cabs. They go off to McDonald's for a cheap hamburger for their supper or 
to Route 59 to look for work that may never come. If this were another area 
of Rockland and commuters were involved, something would probably have been 
done years ago to improve safety. The railroad cannot hide behind the fact 
that the people in Spring Valley/Clarkstown should be more responsible. Yes, 
they should be, but so should NJTransit. This is an unique situation. People 
need a safe way way to get to Route 59. Roads have been built to get people 
where they want to go. Why can't a safe crossing be provided for poor people 
who apparently have no voice?   


Michael Sheehy  
NJNYRR/Erie Milepost 34 "Summit Park Station"
New Hempstead, NY
Homepage: hometown.aol.com/njnyrr

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