Philadelphia homeowner frustrated with series of car crashes in his front yard

A series of car crashes in front yard of one Philadelphia home has left owner frustrated

A Philadelphia homeowner along Lincoln Drive is frustrated with repair bills after three cars have crashed in his front yard.

WEST MOUNT AIRY - Lincoln Drive is said to be one of the most dangerous roads in Philadelphia and a man who lives along it says three crashes have happened on his property in the last year alone.

"You don’t hear it, consciously, but the sound is horrendous. As soon as you hear it, you wake up instantly and jump out of bed. I look for taillights and see where they’re at," homeowner Paden Amsden stated.

Amsden is done with the rude awakenings, but cars keep barreling into the property he bought a year ago. The first was February 17, a week after he moved in, when a wayward driver blasted two concrete and steel posts in front that he thought belonged to the city.

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"But, come to find out, I own them. So, the previous homeowner told me in the future, get the police report. Make sure you get insurance information, that way you can recoup some of the damage to the property," Amsden explained.

He got compensation for the first one, but the hits just keep coming. July 2, a car headed down Lincoln lost control and smashed into a parked car belonging to a guest of Paden’s, only in town for a few days.

"Knocked the stop sign out. We had a house guest that the driver hit that car. Totaled the driver’s car, totaled the house guest’s car, into the telephone pole, damaged the fence. Never saw a penny from that. There was no insurance information on the police report," lamented Amsden.

No insurance for the crash that happened Friday morning at 1 a.m. The driver wadded his car into the posts and the tree out front. And, when the accident report arrived? No insurance information, something police typically take at the scene. Paden wants compensation, but he’s more afraid that a housemate or a pet will get hurt if something doesn’t change. He suggests speed cameras.

"I know they work. I don’t speed on the boulevard anymore and all the research I’ve done on it seems as though they are effective. So, maybe we look at getting some speed cameras out here and giving people some hefty fines and slowing them down," Amsden added.

Speed cameras have been discussed as an option for a couple of years. Philly Streets emailed saying that while it’s a PennDOT section of Lincoln Drive, the Streets Department would work with Philadelphia Police toward an engineering solution. Speed cameras would also have to be legalized outside of Roosevelt Boulevard and construction zones before they could be installed. Amsden is looking at having boulders brought in as a more permanent barrier.