Second Hit-and-Run in Less Than a Week in Butler County

Crash

On August 14 at about 11:30 PM, a woman was walking north along Fisher Road in Jefferson Township in Butler County, about a half mile north of the Saxonburg Borough boundary, when she was hit by a driver in a red Jeep SUV who then fled the scene. The woman was taken to a nearby hospital.

Context

Fisher Road is a local road owned and maintained by Jefferson Township. The land uses around this particular stretch are large-lot single family homes, with some small farms nearby. The road has one lane in each direction with no shoulders or sidewalks. The posted speed limit is 45 miles per hour. At that speed, there is over a 50% chance of a pedestrian being killed in a crash.

Countermeasures

According to the Institute for Road Safety Research, since Fisher Road has direct access to houses via driveways, it should be considered an access road. For rural access roads, they recommend a speed limit of 60 kilometers per hour, or 37 miles per hour. This speed is too high for drivers and pedestrians to interact safely in the same space, so pedestrians should be given a separate, parallel facility, such as a shared-use path.

Contact

Administrative functions of Jefferson Township are handled by Township Manager Leo Rosenbauer. He can be reached by phone at (724) 352-2324 or by email at Jefftwpmgr@zoominternet.net. Contact him to discuss reducing the speed limit and providing a parallel shared-use path on Fisher Road.