Sunday, May 1, 2016
Elderly lady ticketed for non-hazardous sidewalk
From CBS 2:
An elderly homeowner in the Bronx has been ordered to fix her sidewalks due in part to a tripping hazard.
But as CBS2’s Raegan Medgie reported, the woman is confused – and wants to know why she is the one responsible.
Rosa DeBartolo has lived in her Throggs Neck home for 43 years. In March, she received a violation notice from the Department of Transportation reading, “The sidewalk has the following defects: broken, trip hazard, patchwork.”
DeBartolo called 311 for a second opinion, when another DOT inspector issued her even more violations.
According to the city DOT, property owners are responsible for fixing sidewalks next to their properties. Blue chalk marks were placed on DeBartolo’s sidewalk show where repairs are needed.
But the question DeBartolo had was, where’s the damage?
17 comments:
To the asswipe who keeps posting that stories from other borough "have no business" on Queens Crap: Do you think these things do not happen here? What happens in another borough today will happen in Queens tomorrow. Stop being dense.
It happen to me in North Flushing. Bullshit violation that was caused by the street being repaved so the Belgium block curb is too low causing a puddle to form in my driveway. The ticket states my driveway is improperly pitched causing water to puddle. If I call for a re-inspection I'm worried they will add more violations. A big shake down by our local government to raise money to feed the machine.
All city agencies, ALL, are staffed by revenue generating scumbags
If you looked very carefully, there were some cracked flags.
The corner of the property, where the two sidewalk runs come together are a crumbling patchwork.
Fix your sidewalk...
I'm all for the city forcing people to fix bad sidewalks, but this is just stupid. If the city inspectors really have nothing better to do then nitpick for a small crack, maybe they can go inspect in front of some city buildings which have horrible sidewalks or inspect some of the roadway medians and curbs which are mostly in horrendous shape.
"The corner of the property, where the two sidewalk runs come together are a crumbling patchwork. "
That a crosswalk. Which is the responsibility of the city, not the homeowner.
I once called 311 to report major, serious sidewalk violations on my block. I'm talking huge flags raised up, major cracks, and standing water due to bad pitching. DOT's solution, instead of going house by house, put violations on every single house. Thankfully a re-inspection cancelled the bogus violations and forced the home owners with real violations to fix their sidewalks.
Total shakedown. It's to induce people who don't consume or make enough money even for sustainability to move. Especially the elderly, who according to the officials in Looking Glass NYC, don't factor in this app and tourism based economy and are in the way for more excessive and dense development.
And it's going on everywhere, across the boroughs, the nation and even overseas.
Wanna see further daily proof, since I am violating jurisdiction since this site is queens based, look at the massacre that is the Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park development pestilence in Brooklyn.
I feel for this senior citizen. She calls from a re-inspection and gets more violations. I see nothing wrong with her sidewalk looks better than a lot of sidewalks in my neighborhood. Let's see if the inspectors will see all the broken and dangerous sidewalks over here on my Queens block I will be reporting them all.
You cant have cracked gravel mix flags and sloppy Home Depot white concert mix patchwork. It looks like shit.
Need to dig out the bad pour the proper mix & color and blend it or replace all the flags. Problem is most contractors and workers these days are clueless working with those old materials like gravel mix.
There are soooo many more sidewalks that are a real tripping hazard all over the city,the Mayor could start in Park Slope with all the raised blue stones.
Last year inspectors came to my sisters block in Maspeth and gave her and her neighbors fines.Her sidewalk was not a tripping hazard just cracks by the driveway.When the contractor was digging up the sidewalk he said he has never broken up concrete that was in such good shape.After spending 3,000 dollars the inspector came back and found one square that was only partially replaced because the rest was in good shape and the inspector gave another fine for it. She's fighting it even if the city puts a lien on her house.This is just a city agency squeezing homeowners.
What happened to Senator Avella's bill to make the city responsible for maintaining the sidewalk?
"What happened to Senator Avella's bill to make the city responsible for maintaining the sidewalk?"
The City used to be liable for most sidewalk conditions.
This was changed in the last ten years.
The reason was that since certain sleazy lawyers regarded NYC as an endless cash cow, they were sending minimum wage 'scouts" out to find any sort of damage on a sidewalk. They'd then send a notice to the City to put it on notice so that when an 'accident" happened they could 'represent" someone in a lawsuit.
Blame past abuses for this situation.
They will chase down homeowners, but they never do anything to the warehouses that run 18-wheelers over them all day long, or the chain stores, or the properties that are owned by the DOT/MTA/EDU/NYPD/FDNY.
No, they can have sidewalks that are basically rubble, but since they cant squeeze money out of them, they get ignored.
This is not a 'shakedown', there are no fines associated with sidewalk violations. If the inspectors are reporting trip hazards where there are none, it's just incompetence. In the case of a legitimate violation, a property owner can choose any licensed contractor to replace the sidewalk.
I know of entire blocks that were told to replace their sidewalks, which looked just like this woman's. Some homeowners had the work done themselves, others let the city do the work and bill them. In every case, the new sidewalks were of poorer quality than the old (in my opinion).
Queens Crapper:
I beg to differ with your opinion, I admit the city is creating handicap accessible crosswalk ramps, and installing where applicable.
HOWEVER it is still the property owners responsibility before and after.
Per New York City Administrative Code Sidewalk Rules:
§ 7-210 - Liability of real property owner for failure to maintain sidewalk in a reasonably safe condition.
a. It shall be the duty of the owner of real property abutting any sidewalk, including, but not limited to, the intersection quadrant for corner property, to maintain such sidewalk in a reasonably safe condition.
b. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the owner of real property abutting any sidewalk, including, but not limited to, the intersection quadrant for corner property, shall be liable for any injury to property or personal injury, including death, proximately caused by the failure of such owner to maintain such sidewalk in a reasonably safe condition. Failure to maintain such sidewalk in a reasonably safe condition shall include, but not be limited to, the negligent failure to install, construct, reconstruct, repave, repair or replace defective sidewalk flags and the negligent failure to remove snow, ice, dirt or other material from the sidewalk. This subdivision shall not apply to one-, two- or three-family residential real property that is (i) in whole or in part, owner occupied, and (ii) used exclusively for residential purposes.
c. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the city shall not be liable for any injury to property or personal injury, including death, proximately caused by the failure to maintain sidewalks (other than sidewalks abutting one-, two- or three-family residential real property that is (i) in whole or in part, owner occupied, and (ii) used exclusively for residential purposes) in a reasonably safe condition. This subdivision shall not be construed to apply to the liability of the city as a property owner pursuant to subdivision b of this section.
Please let me know your thoughts...
DOT is responsible for the condition of the curbs and the crosswalks. At 2:11 of the video, it's quite obvious that the major defect is in the crosswalk area. As for the snow info above, it's interesting because the city is shelling out millions of dollars to buy "small plows" to clean narrow streets, crosswalks/corners, and bus stops, the last of which is supposed to be cleaned by Cemusa under an existing contract.
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