Cyclist dies after being hit by truck in Cambridge
Authorities are investigating a deadly crash involving a bicyclist and truck on Friday morning.
Cambridge Police say they responded to the area of Hampshire and Portland Street around 8:20 a.m. for a report of a serious pedestrian accident.
Arriving officers found a 24-year-old Cambridge woman on a bicycle who had sustained severe injuries.
She was transported to Massachusetts General Hospital where they later succumbed to their injuries. The identity of the deceased party is not being released at this time.
The truck involved in the crash remained at the scene.
Investigators say both the woman and the truck were traveling in the same direction on Hampshire Street when the truck turned right onto Portland Street at the time of the collision.
The incident remains under investigation by Cambridge Police and the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office.
The deadly crash comes just two weeks after a female cyclist was hit and killed by a box truck in a separate part of the city.
In that incident, Cambridge police say the cyclist and a box truck were traveling in the same direction on Mount Auburn Street before the truck turned onto DeWolf Street and the two collided.
Cambridge City Councilor Jivan Sobrinho-Wheeler, who introduced a policy order asking the city manager for bicycle safety audits and intersection improvements, including traffic signals and street markings, told Boston 25 News Friday the most recent fatal crash is yet another tragic reminder Cambridge streets need to be safer for bikes.
“It’s devastating, we have two crashes in less than a month of people killed while biking, both killed by trucks in Cambridge,” Sobrinho-Wheeler said. “It’s really a tragedy and something we got to work more and try to prevent.”
Sobrinho-Wheeler also said the city needs to look at truck sideguards between wheels, which prevent bicyclists and pedestrians who are struck from sliding under trucks.
He introduced a safety ordinance in the past that required city trucks and trucks from companies contracted with the city to have sideguards. But any other truck traveling through the city is not required to have the safety mechanisms.
“Both of these crashes involved large trucks that did not have sideguards and other safety features,” Sobrinho-Wheeler said. “We need action from the state and federal level [so that they] all have these safety features.”
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