Sidewalk Terror: Brooklyn Drivers Caught On Camera Dodging Pedestrians, Kids To Beat The Traffic
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) – Brooklyn drivers are using the sidewalks as their own personal streets – and it's all being caught on camera.
It's a frightening sight as cars cruise down the sidewalk with adults and even children in their crosshairs in Williamsburg.
These impatient drivers are making the dangerous maneuvers all in an effort to avoid traffic.
On Monday morning, outside a school on Harrison Avenue, a driver in a pickup is caught going on the sidewalk to get around a school bus. The driver nearly hit two children.
Last week, security footage from a school on 53rd Street in Borough Park spotted a driver in a sedan dodging small children on the sidewalk, just to get out of gridlock.
"This is insane. What kind of person would go on a sidewalk?" Dov Hikind said.
The former state assemblyman is furious and says he's working with the authorities to find and arrest the reckless drivers.
"What's the freaking rush?! Where are you? What's so important that you're willing to take a chance with someone else's life? Inexcusable!" Hikind added.
This recent bad behavior on the roads - and sidewalks - is nothing new.
In April, a yellow school bus in Borough Park jumped the curb to avoid double parked cars.
"They really need to arrest these people," Brooklyn resident Shayla McKinnon said.
McKinnon has lived in the neighborhood for nearly two decades.
"That's dangerous. What's so important that you can't wait for the light to change?" she told CBS2's Matt Kozar.
"The people who did this, they should be arrested. They committed a very serious crime. We need to send a very clear message. You can't behave this way," Hikind declared.
The NYPD is investigating both incidents of driving on the sidewalk right outside of schools. Hikind says he's been in touch with the Brooklyn district attorney in the hopes of cracking down on these driver's personal highways.
