LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A woman died after being hit while crossing the road on Fern Valley Road early Friday morning. Police said she was not crossing at a crosswalk when she was hit.
"It's sad that a family has to lose a loved one," said Tony Cook.
He's a volunteer for Bikes or Bust, a drive that collects bikes to give out to children. The drive set up their location at the United Auto Workers building, and has been there for six years.
It's just down the road from where the woman was hit earlier in the day.
Cook said the road gets busy with UPS and Ford's Louisville Assembly Plant, even early in the morning.
"So you have everybody either going into work, coming out of work," said Cook. "Both directions is busy with people."
Plus, the road has limited lighting.
"Mainly the light you get is from the different businesses on both sides, that may reflect out a little bit," said Cook.
But the lights are at their respective businesses, and pointed toward them.
"It's unfortunate," Gautm Asujn, the sales manager at Build My Place, said. "It's saddening, of course. No one should be hit."
Asujn has worked at Build My Place for two years. He said he's seen some bad crashes, but nothing like what happened Friday morning.
Along with the road's vehicle traffic, he's noticed foot traffic.
"People do walk across the road for food and various things," said Asujn.
Chain restaurants are across the five lane road from his store.
There is limited sidewalk and crosswalk access on the busy road as well.
"I think there is a lot of street design that is very 'car-centric', 'auto-centric', and [Fern Valley Road] is a road that's designed to move cars very quickly," Streets for People President Chris Glasser said.
Streets for People advocates for safer roads for pedestrians.
He said the lack of safe pedestrian access makes the road "dangerous by design."
"Fern Valley Road is a dangerous road," said Glasser. "I think it's known to be a dangerous road."
Glasser cited a study conducted by the city, which shows Fern Valley Road as the 26th most dangerous. This is out of over 3,000 miles of roads in Jefferson County. He said the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC) designed and maintains the road, leaving little room for Metro Government to make changes.
"[KYTC] continue[s] to invest in building out these roads that are, in two decades from now, are going to be identified as the dangerous roads that need to be fixed," said Glasser. "Instead of building these dangerous roads, they should be built with more safety in mind."
Asujn and Cook agree.
"That's something of a concern that government or whoever's over it should take care of," said Asujn. "A sidewalk and something to walk carefully would help a lot."
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