A collision between a driver and a pedestrian in Chapel Hill Thursday night ended with a trip to the hospital and minor charges being issued.
The Chapel Hill Police Department confirmed to Chapelboro that police officers and members of the Chapel Hill Fire Department responded to a call about a pedestrian being injured along East Franklin Street around 7:35 p.m. The collision, which happened between Couch Road and South Estes Drive, also drew Orange County EMS and UNC Police responders according to photos from the scene.
Chapel Hill Police said the pedestrian was clipped while using a crosswalk across East Franklin Street. The victim was transported to UNC Hospitals for treatment of their injuries before being released on Thursday. The driver, 22-year-old Durham resident Kiana Lashawn Jones, is charged with speeding and failure to yield from the incident.
The incident marks the second pedestrian-involved collision along East Franklin Street in 2022. The Town of Chapel Hill’s Vision Zero dashboard, which tracks reported collisions by drivers with pedestrians or bicyclists, indicates there was a collision on January 19 that resulted in minor injuries for a pedestrian. Earlier in September, a person standing in the road was struck and died along Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard near Perkins Drive.
From 2017-2021, the Town of Chapel Hill has reported 192 crashes between vehicles and bicycles or vehicles and pedestrians. In that time, five of the bicyclists or pedestrians died, while another 11 experienced serious injury. Additional statistics can be found at the town’s Vision Zero page, which is part of Chapel Hill’s resolution to “eliminate traffic deaths and serious injuries by 2031.”
Photo via Aidan Hunt.
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