Five people were injured and a popular hair salon was totaled Tuesday morning in a chaotic Park Slope crash.
Cops say two vehicles — an SUV and a Pontiac — collided at the intersection of Third Street and Fourth Avenue shortly before 8 am, sending the Pontiac barreling into the storefront of Elements Hair Salon.
The driver of the Pontiac, who police say fled the scene, struck a 47-year-old female cyclist and a 30-year-old man on a scooter, according to authorities. Three occupants of the SUV were also injured. All five were transported to Methodist Hospital for treatment, according to a Police Department spokesperson.
According to HowsMyDrivingNy, an online database of traffic violations in New York, the Florida plates assigned to both cars have racked up parking and moving violations, including one red light ticket for each vehicle.
Fourth Avenue has long been treated like a speedway by drivers, with two lanes of traffic in each direction separated by a median. The Department of Transportation has worked in recent years to calm traffic through the implementation of a protected bike lane and other measures, yet speeding remains an issue along the corridor.
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A fundraiser has been launched to help pay for repairs to the hair salon’s storefront, netting over $7,000 towards a goal of $50,000 as of Wednesday evening.
Occupants of the building on the corner of Third Street and Fourth Avenue have since had to temporarily relocate from the building — not because of damage caused by the crash, but because a Department of Building’s inspector conducting an inspection of the building found shoring in the cellar that had been installed without proper permits, and damage to the building’s roof bulkhead that made it unsafe for occupation, according to department spokesman Andrew Rudansky.
Update (April 7, 5:45 pm): This story has been updated to include additional information about fundraising efforts, and intel from the city’s Department of Buildings.
