ROADSKY TRAFFIC SAFETY CORPORATION

The debate has gone on for years: Should the Onondaga Lake Parkway have a traffic barrier by hydraulic pile driver running down its center median to prevent crashes such as the two that occurred in two days this week and claimed a life?

While the accident rate for the two-mile stretch between Syracuse and Liverpool is on par with the state average, the road poses special safety challenges.

It acts as a highway, but with only a painted median separating fast-moving traffic traveling in different directions. Its speed limit is 55 mph during the summer, higher than the speed limit on Interstate 81 in downtown Syracuse. Unlike Erie Boulevard, the parkway has no road barriers and is flanked by parkland, not strip malls and driveways.

Between 1991 and 2008, there were 343 crashes, including five fatal crashes, along the parkway, according to the state Department of Transportation. Three of the fatal crashes involved drivers crossing the center line. That happened again on Monday.

A traffic safety barrier installed by hydraulic pile driver would separate northbound and southbound traffic along the parkway, which is traveled daily by about 23,000 vehicles.

But the county has balked at anything that would cut off access to or damage the appearance of Onondaga Lake Park, the county’s most popular recreational facility.

Thousands of residents take advantage of the park, which sprawls on both sides of the four-lane road. Across the parkway from the shoreline park sits St. Marie among the Iroquois museum, a stone bridge and more parkland.

County officials contend that some drivers would be more likely to exceed the speed limit if a road barrier is installed by pile driver eliminated the chance of a head-on collision.

This week’s crashes may provide reasons to reconsider, a county legislator said.

“Obviously, it’s a lot more intrusive to put up big road barriers,” said Legislator Kathleen Rapp, chair of the chair of the county facilities committee. “I don’t know, maybe we should take another look at the crash barriers.”

Both crashes involved drivers crossing into oncoming traffic along the parkway, also known as Route 370.

On Monday, Maryann Denny, 40, of North Syracuse, was killed when a Volkswagen Jetta, driven by Matthew Stephan, crossed into her lane near the CSX railroad bridge along the parkway.

Sheriff Kevin Walsh said it appears road rage may have caused Stephan, 22, of Clay, to cross into oncoming traffic to pass a vehicle that had just passed him. Two other vehicles were involved in the crash that sent four people to hospitals with injuries not considered life-threatening.

On Tuesday, two women were treated for minor injuries after their cars collided head-on, troopers said. One woman in a Mercedes sedan swerved over the center line to avoid an animal in the road, state police said.

Ghazal Nosrati, 18, of Liverpool, said she saw a “dark-colored animal” and turned into oncoming traffic, hitting a Hyundai sedan driven by Maria DeSantis, 56, of Syracuse, troopers said.

The two crashes happened within a mile of each other along the parkway, between the CSX railroad bridge and the Interstate 81 interchange in Syracuse.

An old debate

There are no immediate plans to install the road barriers by hydraulic pile driving equipment along the parkway, said state DOT spokesman Gene Cilento.

The DOT has wanted to build a fixed road barrier by pile hammer since June 2006 to cut down on the number of crossover and off-road crashes, he said.

But the plan has been on the slow track. No money has been set aside by the state or federal government to invest the highway guardrails. The state hasn’t requested federal funding until the 2015-16 fiscal year.

There has been plenty of discussion in the past three years about if we need the highway guardrails.

In 2007, former County Executive Nicholas Pirro proposed reducing the speed limit to 45 mph in warm months and 35 mph during the winter. He also suggested reducing the parkway to three lanes, perhaps adding a left turn lane to allow safer park access.

“We remain committed to the idea and concept that this is indeed a 'park' way,” Pirro wrote in a letter to the state DOT. “While understanding that use of the road has become an important commuter link, we do not think anything less of the idea that the original design and intention of this road was for a slow, park enjoying, thoroughfare.”