Woman’s Kin Blame the City for Her Death : Traffic: They say residents have long complained to Tustin officials about the dangers of the street where she was hit by a tow truck Sunday.

The group of family and friends of Paquita Said slowly made their way down the two blocks from their Heights Drive home Monday afternoon to the spot where the 64-year-old mother of three was struck and killed by a tow truck the evening before.

In the lead was her husband of 41 years, John Said, who carried a stepladder. Behind him were their adult children and and several friends who helped carry a memorial wreath. When they reached the crosswalk at Yorba Street and Amaganset Way, where Paquita Said was struck as she was taking her nightly walk with the family beagle, they stopped and tied the flowers to a tree.

Around them, the spent flares and chalk markings on the street were there to remind them of the previous night’s tragedy.

As they expressed their grief, the Saids and their neighbors also had angry words Monday for the city of Tustin, which they said has failed to heed years of warnings from residents about what they described as the dangerous conditions along Yorba Street.

The accident could possibly have been avoided, they said, had the city installed street lights and a traffic signal at the crosswalk where Paquita Said was hit.

She was thrown for more than a block when the truck hit her. The dog was not hurt.

The Said family and their neighbors said Yorba Street has become a virtual speedway for motorists who are attempting to bypass the continuing construction on the nearby Costa Mesa Freeway.

Bickering between the city and the neighborhood over the Yorba Street traffic problems has gone on for years, neighbors said.

About a year ago, the city painted the crosswalk at Yorba and Amaganset and installed a blinking yellow light that operates weekday mornings and afternoons to protect schoolchildren. But the Saids and others said more could have been done.

“The yellow lights are only on when the children are here, but what about the rest of the time?” John Said said. “I’m going to talk to the city about this to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

“Since they began working on the freeway, traffic on Yorba has just gotten out of hand,” said Monica Said, the couple’s 23-year-old daughter. “They need a traffic light to slow things down.”

Officials from the city’s Traffic Department, who decide the placement of street lights and traffic signals, did not return several telephone calls seeking comment Monday.

Tustin Police Capt. Steve Foster agreed that speeding is a problem along Yorba, but he said that it has not been determined whether the driver of the tow truck that struck Paquita Said was exceeding the 35 m.p.h. limit. He said detectives will complete their investigation today and will present their findings to the district attorney’s office.

Foster said his department patrols that area of Yorba heavily and that 18 speeding tickets have been issued there this month. He said that number is “a little higher than normal” in comparison to the numbers for similar streets.

“There is about a mile straight there between traffic lights and it is four lanes, so that gives drivers a lot of room to roam,” he said.

Crossing guard Joanne Ritter, who helps schoolchildren at the crosswalk, said that police often do issue citations to speeders but that the cars still whiz past.

“The police do the best they can, but they can’t be everywhere all the time,” Ritter said.

Neighbor Amos Bernstein said that without action by the city, traffic along Yorba will continue to become thicker and faster.

The neighbors’ anger seemed to become even more intense as each one described the loss of “a wonderful woman.”

“When a child of mine was killed a few years ago, she was the most thoughtful person,” Suzanne Eckenrod said of Paquita Said. “She would stop in to talk and encourage me to get out of the house. She was loved by everyone.”

Paquita Said was an assistant school librarian and a saleswoman for Avon cosmetics.