Four years later, Delmar sidewalk still crumbling

By Mike Owens

KSDK -- It's been four years since Elizabeth Bansen died when her wheelchair was struck by a car as she wheeled down Delmar Boulevard in November 2005. She was in the street because the sidewalks on both sides were in such poor shape, her wheels wouldn't go.

A year after she died, her friends and supporters gathered at the spot she died, the 2700 block of Delmar just west of Jefferson, to remember her and urge the sidewalks be repaired.

Two years later, the Bansen family sued the city and the driver of the vehicle that hit her. The judgment removed the driver, but found the city negligent in maintaining the sidewalks. The family was awarded $200,000. At the time, city officials thought the sidewalks had been repaired.

Eventually, some of the sidewalks, fronting property owned by the Missouri Department of Natural Resource, which operates the Scott Joplin Museum nearby, were repaired.

Fast forward to this week, the fourth anniversary of Bansen's death, and there's still a 200 foot strip of sidewalk that needs to be fixed. Instead of being a sidewalk, the strip looks like a trail.

Steve Patterson, an urban planner, who also runs a website called Urban Review STL, noted the lack of usable sidewalk this week. He says the condition that the sidewalk is in makes it impossible for a wheel chair to navigate the stretch of street. Just west of the bad sidewalk, there's a public housing complex, with a number of wheel chair users living there.

City officials were aware that the sidewalk hasn't been repaired, and the city streets director blames the owner of property where the sidewalk is located.

The streets department has cited the property owner three times in the past, in hopes of getting the sidewalk repaired, but the property owner, St. Louis Auto Collision Center, has not done the work. A man answering the phone at the company said he would check on the status of the walk, but he never called back.

However, a lawyer who represented the Bansen family in the lawsuit says the city is entirely responsible for replacing and repairing sidewalks.

The streets director, Todd Waelterman, says he hopes to get the sidewalk fixed in thirty days. In addition, Waelterman says he toured the area today, and found there were two curb cuts missing from corners in the area, and he plans to get them fixed too.

Waelterman says work will start Monday, with a deadline of 30 days.