Pedestrian Safety Survey Results

From October 15 through December 15, 2023, Livable Tarrytowns and Bike Tarrytown conducted a pedestrian safety survey. Advertised by way of flyers posted around Sleepy Hollow and Tarrytown, email, and various social media channels, the survey attracted close to 600 responses.

Respondents, many of whom wrote about more than one particular site, raised a total of 785 concerns about unsafe walking locations in the two villages. Not surprisingly, many wrote about the same crossing point, intersection, or street. Still, as shown on the map we generated, survey respondents highlighted over 100 problem areas. In this way, they made clear that problems with pedestrian safety in Sleepy Hollow-Tarrytown are not limited to a small number of intersections or thoroughfares, but are widespread. 

“My friends and I came to Tarrytown as tourists for the first time, and the first thing we noticed was how cars don’t yield to pedestrians.”

Pedestrian Safety Survey participant

Numerous people expressed fear about traversing the two villages. As one individual wrote in regard to Central Avenue and Broadway in Tarrytown, “Crossing the street with little kids is terrifying and I see it on the faces of other parents too. Like they don’t really know if they’ll be seen and then have to sprint.” Not surprisingly, the Broadway/Route 9 corridor received the highest number of responses by far. And, as shown in the map generated from the results, a small number of areas along that corridor received the lion’s share of attention. (Many thanks to Neil Curri, a cartographer and GIS Lab Manager at Vassar College, for donating his time and skilled labor and producing the map.)

“Crossing the street with little kids is terrifying and I see it on the faces of other parents too. Like they don’t really know if they’ll be seen and then have to sprint.”

Survey respondent re: Central Avenue and Broadway in Tarrytown

There are two areas of greatest concern along Broadway.

The first is the five-way intersection (of sorts) where Bedford Road, Beekman Avenue, Hudson Terrace, and New Broadway all converge with Broadway/Route 9 in Sleepy Hollow, a highly dangerous area of longstanding concern among local residents. Respondents suggested various traffic-calming “fixes” to this highly dangerous area, ones ranging from raised crosswalks to pedestrian-activated strobe lights. Over the years, Bike Tarrytown has also made many recommendations, including curb extensions, for the area.

The second is where McKeel Avenue and Broadway converge. As reported in our previous blog post, Bike Tarrytown and Livable Tarrytowns have come up with concrete proposals–short-term and long-term–to transform the intersection, one that has proven deadly for pedestrians on two occasions since August 2022.

While there are many other areas in need of attention, we briefly mention four more that survey respondents highlighted.

1. Neperan Avenue and the Old Croton Aqueduct Trail (Tarrytown): Vehicles parked immediately adjacent to where the trail crosses Neperan on the north side of the street block the line of sight. There are also no markings indicating that where the OCA and Neperan intersect is a crossing location for pedestrians and cyclists. A curb extension or “pinchpoint” on the north side of Neperan, a raised crosswalk and signage–among other changes–are desperately needed.
2. Bedford Road, Webber Avenue, and the Old Croton Aqueduct  (Sleepy Hollow): This is a key school route for students and their families. It is also where the aqueduct trail enters the TUFSD campus. Due to the lack of a crosswalk, the speed of cars coming down the hill, and the low visibility due to curves, this is a hazardous crossing location for pedestrians.
3. Depot Plaza and West Main Street at Railroad Avenue (Tarrytown): Due to many people walking to and from the train station, this is a heavily pedestrianized area. Of high concern are the two crosswalks that connect the Metro North station and Tarrytown Village Hall. Drivers frequently speed and ignore pedestrians within the crosswalks or block the crosswalks (particularly on the station side of the street) with their vehicles. Some simple engineering–curb extensions and raised crosswalks, for example–could greatly enhance pedestrian safety in the area. Also unsafe is the west (river) side of the station, at the bottom of the H-bridge, where West Main and Railroad Avenue meet. An area of frequent speeding, there is a need for wider sidewalks, additional crosswalks, and traffic calming interventions in the general area.
4. Franklin Street and Broadway (Tarrytown): Students and their families walking to and from the Washington Irving Intermediate School have to cross two busy streets that are heavily trafficked. According to reports received by Livable Tarrytowns, there have been a lot of “close calls” at this intersection and it is in need of urgent attention and remediation.

“[The villages] are not safe for anyone: sidewalks are terrible, a hazard, especially to [those who are] impaired, disabled, kids, and seniors.”

“It’s truly shameful how poor pedestrian infrastructure is on the main route for train commuters.”

Respondents to the Pedestrian Safety Survey

How to view the map

The map is a compilation of all the responses to the survey that we received. If you click on the image below, it will bring you to the interactive map.

It is a “heat map.” A heat map shows the relative number of responses received by locations. In this case, yellow indicates the highest number of responses in an area, followed by red, and then purple (light purple being a relatively low number).

Viewers can control the size of the map via the “zoom” features (the “+” and “-” signs in the upper right corner.

A yellow dot indicates a location that at least one survey respondent raised concerns about. If you click on one of them, a box such as that to the right will emerge. In the bottom right corner, it indicates how many respondents wrote about the location (four in the case of Beekman and Pocantico). Viewers can scroll through the various responses using the arrows in the bottom left corner, and thus how survey takers described the problem, their suggestions for improvements, and any other comments.

This is a local road with 30 mph speed limits, not a highway. Why is it designed like a highway?

Survey respondent re: White Plains Road in Tarrytown

Next steps

On Saturday, February 24, 2024, Livable Tarrytowns had a meeting at the Warner Library to present and discuss the results of the survey. Twenty-five residents of Sleepy Hollow and Tarrytown were in attendance.

In the second half of the gathering, attendees organized themselves into three groups to focus on specific problem areas. Group members brainstormed about the changes they would like to see and how to bring them about–by working with local and state officials as well as with residents and non-governmental entities in the area. These groups are now standing bodies under the umbrella of Livable Tarrytowns, each of which has a particular focus.

The three groups are:

The School Safety Zone Working Group: Its focus is the slowing down of traffic in the vicinity of all schools in the Tarrytowns and the development of safe walking and cycling routes to and from those schools–both of which require changes in the streetscape and the associated infrastructure.

The Broadway for All Working Group: While the entire Broadway corridor in Sleepy Hollow and Tarrytown is the group’s concern, its initial focus is on Broadway and McKeel. Its broader goal is to transform Broadway so that it a safe and enjoyable thoroughfare for pedestrians and bicyclists alike.

The Old Croton Aqueduct Working Group: This group concentrates on where the aqueduct trail intersects streets to ensure that crossing locations are safe for pedestrians. Its initial focus is on where the trail crosses Neperan Road in Tarrytown and Bedford Road in Sleepy Hollow.

If you would like to join a working group (or start one of your own), please send an email to livabletarrytowns@gmail.com.

In the coming weeks and months, Livable Tarrytowns will share the survey findings with officials in the two villages and the public school district. The survey is one tool among many that we need to deploy to win support for far-reaching changes needed to make the villages’ thoroughfares–and public space more broadly–safe and welcoming to all, particularly for the most vulnerable among those who live and work here.