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Pedestrian In Parrish Struck By As Many As 5 Vehicles

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By BART PFANKUCH /of the Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Published: January 10, 2008

PARRISH - Residents of The Gardens, a retirement community, feared that someone would be killed crossing U.S. 301 to get to a new Publix.

More than 320 neighbors signed a petition asking Manatee County to install a signal to slow traffic, which often moves in excess of the 55 mph speed limit on U.S. 301 at Chin Road.

On Tuesday, hours after county commissioners agreed to ask the state to study the intersection, a man from the community died after being hit by as many as five vehicles, only one of which stopped and stayed after striking him, the Florida Highway Patrol said.

James Richard Corcoran, 77, of the 300 block of Bougainvillea Circle, was struck by cars traveling east on U.S. 301 near Chin Road just before 7 p.m. Tuesday, the highway patrol said.

Corcoran was crossing U.S. 301 just west of Chin Road, going to his nearby mobile home after shopping at Publix, when he walked into the path of an eastbound Chevy truck driven by Jose A. Torres, 21, of Bradenton, the highway patrol said.

As of Wednesday night, no charges had been filed against Torres.

After being knocked to the ground by Torres' vehicle, Corcoran was run over by several other vehicles. A woman driving the third car that struck Corcoran stopped but drove off before authorities arrived.

The accident left residents of The Gardens, a mobile home park, angry and upset.

"I've been writing to everyone and telling them this was going to happen," said Frank Look, the president of the homeowners association. "The whole park is really upset because they didn't want to put a light out there until someone got killed."

County officials recommended that a traffic signal be installed when North American Properties developed the shopping plaza on the south side of U.S. 301.

But Florida Department of Transportation officials, who control state roads, ruled against it, saying there was not enough traffic to justify a signal, said Harry Mendenhall, assistant director of transportation for the county. A second study after the store opened reached the same conclusion.

State transportation guidelines allow signals to be installed when traffic volume justifies the expenditure or if an intersection has five "correctable" accidents in a single year.

Correctable accidents typically are right-angle crashes or collisions that happen when vehicles turn out of or into intersections.

A new signal would cost about $110,000, Mendenhall said. The details of Tuesday's accident will be included in Manatee County's latest request for a signal.

Corcoran has no family locally. He has two sons who live in Maryland, highway patrol spokesman Kurt Arbogast said.

Arbogast said the first vehicle that struck Corcoran, Torres' truck, which was going 45 or 50 mph, probably killed him. Still, he said, the other vehicles that hit Corcoran had a duty to stop.

"Traffic was heavy, it was dark, and he was wearing dark clothing," Arbogast said. "But they had a requirement to stop and render aid or give information when they're involved in a crash."

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