14-year-old bicyclist hit in crosswalk on busy Richland street. The driver didn’t stick around
Richland police are still searching for a driver involved in a hit-and-run with a 14-year-old at a busy intersection over 10 days ago.
The teen was riding his bike across a George Washington Way crosswalk at McMurray Street when the driver failed to yield, colliding with the rear wheel of his bicycle.
“The police department is actively pursuing leads in this case. Currently, we do not have a suspect identified,” wrote investigating Officer Anthony Santana.
The collision near the Safeway store happened at 4:16 p.m. on Oct. 26, said Richland police. The 14-year-old cyclist was on his way home from Chief Joseph Middle School, heading east, when he stopped at the George Washington crosswalk.
A silver-gray SUV, possibly a Mitsubishi Outlander Sport, police say, was heading west on McMurray Street and had also stopped at the intersection to turn left onto George Washington.
As the crosswalk signaled the teen to enter the intersection, the driver of the vehicle swiped the rear tire of the teen’s bike. The bike was too damaged to ride but he was not hurt.
The driver is described as a dark-haired woman who was using her cellphone as she went through the intersection and “never looked up from her lap,” the teen’s mother told the Herald.
After the collision, the driver turned into the Safeway parking lot, police say, though it’s unclear what happened after that. Police are currently seeking more security video footage from the store.
Investigators are also looking for any information that could help identify the driver or the car.
Screenshots posted this week on the department’s Facebook show the car, though the license plate number is not clear.
Anyone with information is encouraged to call police at 509-628-0333 and refer to case No. 22-047202.
Community concerns
Parents and community members are concerned Richland streets may not be safe enough for the city’s youth to be walking along.
At the Nov. 1 Richland City Council meeting, several people voiced concerns about recent incidents.
Francesca Maier said the “leading pedestrian interval” system — a safety improvement at crosswalks that gives pedestrians a 4-second head start, and which recently was implemented at the George Washington-McMurray intersection — wasn’t enough to prevent the incident.
Maier is a Richland resident and the secretary of Wheelhouse Community Bike Shop, an organization that also donated a bike to the young teenager after his was damaged in the collision.
Her own son was almost hit by a vehicle while walking at the intersection of McMurray and Jadwin Avenue, Maier told the council.
“Unfortunately, we like to think of every crash as an isolated incident, but they’re really not,” she said. “And if you look at the full picture, if you look at the pattern, so far this year in Richland there have been five fatal crashes taking eight lives — that’s more than any other year going back as far as WSDOT’s records go, going back to 2007.”
She asked for the city to design safer roads and install hardened center lines on major roadways used near schools.
