Car Strikes High School Student on Blackheath Rd.

A Long Beach High School student was hit by a car while riding his bicycle on Blackheath Road Monday morning, and some residents are pointing to the incident as a sign of continuing dangers on that street.   

A public information officer at Nassau County Police Department told Patch that a student was hit by a car at about 9 a.m. on May 7, but the officer was unable to provide details on the accident, such as the identify of the motorist, the age of the student, and the injury that he sustained. “There’s no criminality to the accident,” the officer said. “It was a non-life-threatening injury.”

Blackheath Road residents Darlene Haut and Greg Naham, president and vice president of the Lido Homes Civic Association, believe the accident highlights the danger from the volume of cars driving down a narrow residential block that leads to the high school used by many students on foot and bikes, and that the situation will only be exacerbated after the district builds a new athletics complex at the school. The two residents raised the issue at Tuesday’s Board of Education meeting at Lido Elementary School.

“Unfortunately, this is not surprising,” Haut told the school board about the accident, adding that residents in her neighborhood witness “near misses” daily on their streets.

Naham, who said that the student was “run over” by the car, noted that some residents, such as Brian Hasset of Fairway Road, have warned about the dangers of heavy traffic on narrow streets. “The next [accident], God forbid the child is killed,” Naham told the board.

While none of the board members comment on the traffic issues on Blackheath and surrounding streets, Superintendent David Weiss told Naham that the student “was hit by the car, not run over by a car. The student will be back in school.”

At past meetings, board members have said that traffic issues have been ongoing and that residents must work with the Town of Hempstead to finally correct them. At a meeting in January, Board Trustee Pat Gallagher said the high school complex plan includes moving the neighboring Blackheath Pre-Kindergarten School to the Lido Complex, and taking with it parents who drive at least 250 students to and from the school down Blackhead Road each weekday.

On Tuesday, Haut called the district’s traffic study of the area “incomplete and inconclusive,” contending that it omitted factors such as the number of cyclists and pedestrians, as well as the speed of buses and cars.