Wantagh Pkwy, 8.3.2009

More details later. 3 lost lives, southbound Wantagh Pkwy, on curve before Merrick Rd.

Wantagh Parkway, 7.20.2009

About 8 p.m. on Monday, July 20, 2009, before sundown, a bicyclist alongside the Wantagh Parkway stopped to repair a flat tire.  The location was reported as just north of  the Goose Creek Bridge, one of three bridges on the parkway north of Jones Beach.  The bicycle path runs alongside the northbound three lanes of traffic, but most of the time four or more yards away from the lanes.  At the bridges, however, the path is closer to the traffic.

Unfortunately, a northbound motorcyclist lost control of his cycle, left the parkway, crashed into the bicyclist and killed him.  The newsday.com story is here.  Police charged the motorcyclist as driving while intoxicated and other charges.

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The location of the crash may be different from what was stated in the news reports.  I have been watching for a memorial, and today (July 24, 2009), I found it not at the Goose Creek bridge, but further north, just before reaching the bridge over Seaman’s Creek.  The guard rail and cyclone fence appear damaged from a crash, and hanging on the fence are a bicycle wheel and other mementos.   This is about 3.5 miles north of the Jones Beach water tower.

Wantagh Parkway, 1.31.2009

On a clear Saturday, midday, January 31, 2009, a driver unfortunately lost his life northbound on the Wantagh Parkway between Sunrise Highway and the Southern State Parkway.  Few details are available, but it seems to have involved loss of control, hitting a tree, a flip-over, and the ejection of the driver.  Newsday has five photos of the result.  The front of the 2003 red Corvette was demolished.  See newsday.com here.  The tree he hit is on the left, about a half-mile north of the Park Avenue bridge.  The crash made quite a mark on this tree , perhaps 18 inches in diameter.  The impact sent the car back into the center lane in pieces.

Wantagh Pkwy., 9.5.2008

A brief incomplete item was posted on newsday.com here stating that a person died in a crash on the Wantagh Parkway Saturday morning, September 6, 2008. (Corrected to late September 5, see below.)  Nothing appeared in print. Newsday has been cutting back on its reporting.  Two weeks later, this writer observed new memorial decorations on a tree about half a mile south of the Southern State Parkway, southbound, in the center median.  Maybe this was the location, but it is only a surmise.

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Oddly, a year later more detail has arrived.  A hard-to-find post at newsday.com (Try here) explains that a jury on October 22 or 23, 2009, convicted the driver Michael Bauer, 53,  of six counts, including second degree manslaughter and two of driving while intoxicated.  He was northbound about 11:30 p.m. on September 5, 2009, lost control at about 85 m.p.h., skidded almost 400 feet and crashed into the median somewhere near the footbridge crossing the Wantagh Parkway from Forest Lake School to Wantagh High School (Beltagh Avenue).  Sentencing is scheduled for December 4. 2009.  He caused the death of his girlfriend.