A driver behind the wheel of an SUV killed a cyclist in Sheepshead Bay on Monday afternoon, marking the latest death in a particularly deadly year for traffic fatalities.
Cops responded to a report of a crash at Nostrand Avenue and Shore Parkway in Sheepshead Bay at around 5:50 pm, where they found 55-year-old Bensonhurst resident Fidel Trinidad lying in the roadway with severe bodily trauma.
Police say Trinidad had been riding a bike southbound on Nostrand Avenue when he was struck by a driver in a green Audi SUV, which was traveling northbound on the roadway. The driver remained on the scene, and the NYPD is investigating the crash.
Paramedics rushed Trinidad to Coney Island Hospital, where doctors pronounced him dead on Monday night.
A search of the driver’s license plate on How’s My Driving NY shows the SUV has racked up 14 school speed camera violations since May, along with two red light camera violations.
While this is the first fatal incident at that intersection in the past five years, three other people, all pedestrians, have been killed in traffic collisions within a two-block radius since 2016, per NYC Crash Mapper. Those deceased include Marie Beavers, 64, at Nostrand and Emmons avenues in 2015; Iosif Morgenshteyn, 65, at East 28th St and Shore Parkway in 2018; and Misa Gorlitskaya, 80, at Haring St and Voorhies Ave in 2019.
Vision Zero data showed that drivers have killed 13 cyclists have in 2021, as of Sept. 30. Several more cyclists were killed in October, including Jose Ramos, 56, who was killed by a hit-and-run driver on Oct. 15 on Atlantic Avenue and Essex Street in East New York.
Safe streets advocates Transportation Alternatives released a report earlier this month identifying this summer as the deadliest in terms of traffic violence since Mayor Bill de Blasio took office in 2014. 217 people have died in traffic collisions on city streets so far this year, per NYPD data, a 17 percent increase over this point in 2020.
