Traffic Light Approved at Site of Deaths

The San Diego City Council on Tuesday voted unanimously in favor of installing a traffic signal at a busy Southeast intersection near where a woman was killed in December while trying to cross the street.

The vote, which came without discussion, means that there will be a signal at 42nd and Market streets by September.

“I’m very happy. . . . I’m glad we don’t have to have dialogue about the light anymore,” said broadcaster Willie Morrow, whose appeal over radio station XHRM-FM more than a month ago resulted in more than 3,000 letters to Councilman William Jones’ office demanding that a traffic signal be installed at the intersection.

Jones put the installation cost at $90,000 to $100,000. The council decision followed Monday’s action by its Transportation and Land Use Committee approving the installation of the light.

The intersection has worried neighborhood residents for years, Morrow said. Their concern turned to anger when a 39-year-old mother of nine children was killed by a car near the intersection on Dec. 26. In 1984, a child was killed crossing a street near the intersection.

In the last five years, seven people have been killed on a stretch of Market Street between Interstate 805 and Interstate 15, Jones said. The area has also been the site of 17 other accidents involving injuries, he said. There are no traffic signals, stop signs or crosswalks along that stretch of Market Street.

Although the light ranked 28th on the list of intersections needing signals, Jones pushed hard to get it installed as soon as possible. “Two weeks ago it wasn’t even on the list,” he said.