Family's parked cars a wreck magnet

Terry Hopkins figured it was just bad luck when a drunken driver careened into two of his family's parked cars outside his East Orangeburg Avenue home in 2006. It totaled one of them.

But then a driver slammed into his daughter's parked car in April.

It happened again in January, wrecking his sedan.

His rental car wasn't safe, either. A drunken driver smashed into it early this month. That one also claimed a van specially fitted for Hopkins' 10-year-old son, who has cerebral palsy.

"It seems like my house has become a magnet," said Hopkins, 44.

He took his plight to City Hall last week, asking for a permanent fix to keep cars and pedestrians safe near his home.

"My neighbors out walking their pets, if they get hit, there's no chance," he said.

Apparently Hopkins' home is the Bermuda Triangle of Orangeburg Avenue. No one else on his block endures the same concentration of accidents, city officials say.

They can't explain why so many wrecks wind up at his curb.

"You wouldn't expect it," Modesto traffic engineer Jeff Barnes said. Orangeburg is "fairly straight through there."

Hopkins has a few theories.

One starts with a cluster of bars on the other side of Oakdale Road. He thinks the two accidents that involved drunken drivers could have started from those establishments.

Orangeburg also shifts slightly to the south near his home. Drivers who get on the road from Oakdale would line up to strike parked cars if they don't follow the tilt in the center of the street, he said.

Barnes said the city is looking at ways to address those tendencies.

Police plan to focus more enforcement on Orangeburg soon to deter drunken drivers, while Barnes' office wants to add another stripe to the road to keep cars in their lanes.

"It's a little glitch in the roadway," said Lt. Bill Ryan, who leads the Modesto Police Department's traffic unit. "It is what it is. We'll try to increase enforcement in that specific area."

Barnes said speed bumps aren't an option. More than 12,000 cars drive on Orangeburg each day. City policies permit speed bumps only on streets that draw fewer than 2,500 drivers.

Those numbers tell Hopkins that the city should do more to slow traffic near his home.

"If they're going to use a residential area for a thoroughfare, they have to take some precautions," he said.

Keeping his sense of humor

Hopkins said he didn't think traffic would become such an issue when he moved to Modesto from the Bay Area in January 2006. He came to the valley for its affordability and its slower pace, both of which he still enjoys.

He manages to laugh at the wrecks despite the losses.

They become spectacles on his block, with his neighbors heading outdoors in the dead of night to check out the scene.

"It's become a familiar sound," Hopkins said, with some accidents waking him and one booming over the sound of a televised basketball game he was watching with his family.

"We're watching a Warriors game, and we hear it," Hopkins said. "We just look at each other and say, 'Not again. It couldn't be.' "

Accidents take a toll on his home in other ways, too.

Tire marks sink deep into his front yard, where he parks the family's cars to keep them safe.

"It's destroying my lawn," he said.

Hopkins said he won't recover the full cost of replacing his van. But he said he's fortunate his insurance rates haven't risen.

Aside from asking the city to improve his street, Hopkins has one other request for Modesto drivers: "I would really like for the community to be a little more conscientious. We understand it's a thoroughfare. It's not the autobahn."

Bee staff writer Adam Ashton can be reached at aashton@modbee.com or 578-2366.

This story was originally published February 22, 2008 at 4:27 AM with the headline "Family's parked cars a wreck magnet."