TAYLORSVILLE, Utah — The Taylorsville community continues to mourn the death of a 14-year-old girl hit and killed while crossing the street on Halloween.
Victoria Hillman was walking in the crosswalk on 2700 West 5930 South around 7 p.m. Saturday when the accident occurred.
Parents who live in the area say they have been warning their children for years about this particular part of the road.
“I feel strongly that if we don’t do something quickly it will happen again,” said Valerie Cleveland. “We watched this girl grow up and to have her gone this quick and it could have been prevented is very heart breaking.”
Cleveland said if Victoria’s death doesn’t bring this issue to the city’s attention she doesn’t know what will.
“At least 10 people I talked to the night of the accident that were here called and they haven’t gotten a response,” Cleveland said.
With Bennion Junior High just a few hundred feet up the road, this is a heavily traveled crosswalk when it comes to children and teens. Parents say after dark is the worst, due to inadequate lighting.
“It is pitch black right here, it’s just flat dangerous, we were crossing last night after the vigil and we almost got hit I couldn’t believe it we had to break out our cell phones and hold them up so people could see us crossing,” said Burk Cleveland.
Residents say the street lights that are in place are unreliable.
“The light here that they have comes on for a couple minutes at a time and then shuts off and it’s off for maybe a period of 10 to 15 minutes,” said Ben Deollos.
These folks say finding a logical solution shouldn’t be hard.
“Just kind of like you do at a busy intersection, you hit the little button, it takes 10 to 15 seconds, a series of lights starts flashing it signifies to the drivers, ‘hey somebody wants to cross for pedestrians,’” Deollos said. “It would be sad to see another tragic accident like what happened to Victoria.”
FOX 13 News reached out to the Taylorsville Mayor’s office. They released this statement:
“Public Safety is the City of Taylorsville’s number one priority. The City will continue to evaluate and review crosswalks citywide to address any immediate safety concerns.”
