AUSTIN, Texas — Some who live and work near the intersection where a Capital Metro bus crashed into a home are calling it dangerous.
The bus crash happened at 53rd and Duval in central Austin on Monday. CapMetro released new video from the bus camera on Tuesday. It shows the moment the bus collided with a pickup then crashed into a house.
The intersection is a four-way stop. During rush hour it's a busy area: people crossing the street, walking their dogs and cyclists coming through. With all that going on, some people said the stop signs just aren’t enough and said Monday’s crash was just one of many.
“This is not the first time,” said Mario de Leon. “You can be on the back patio and see someone blow straight through the stop sign and it kind of gets everybody’s attention.”
Mario de Leon works right across the street at Home Slice Pizza. He said they’ve seen several crashes at that intersection.
Their surveillance video from last March shows a car blowing through the stop sign and hitting another car before it ends up on their parking lot.
“We’ve had several close calls where a car will just not even see you, every time someone crosses the street I look over and I’m making sure they’re okay,” said de Leon.
“It’s not necessarily highly visible -- the stop signs and then it’s kind of a tight corner,” said Cindy Turner, who lives in the area.
Turner said she has seen people go through stop signs too. In Monday’s crash, Austin Travis County EMS said the driver of the pickup had a medical emergency and Capital Metro said their driver doesn’t appear to be at fault.
But regardless of how it happened, “After yesterday’s accident and some of the documented accidents over the past year, I think it’s time to make some change,” said Jeff Mettler, who works at Home Slice Pizza.
“It’s like what’s it going to take for them to put a light up,” said de Leon.
We called the city, and the transportation department said they hadn’t received any 311 complaints. But de Leon said there's a petition going around. People are hoping the city will add a stop light, others are asking for speed bumps or even just flashing lights for the stop signs to make them more visible.