Video: Main Street Safety Addressed by Community at Town Board Meeting

The , has resurrected community safety concerns on the state roadway.

These concerns were .

Lavena Sipes, the mother of , addressed the situation with her daughter as well as and other past fatal and injury-laden accidents on the roadway.

"While circumstances varies in each situation, they all have something in common and we feel like the road is simply unsafe," Sipes said to the town board.

Barbara Gallagher, mother-in-law of the late Byrne, said the roadway made her nervous while handing out flyers for the

“It was so horribly scary just to get out of the car in front of Napper Tandy’s bar, I was giving flyers out on the street there. I wouldn’t even cross the street because I felt that it was so unsafe and as an adult I don’t think that I should be afraid to cross the street,” Gallagher said.

Mark Mancini, owner of Mancini Architecture, brought visual aides of plans on how Main Street could be constructed to make it safer for pedestrians. Many of the ideas for the proposed roadway changes, Mancini said, were taken from a

“What we’ve done in my office is create an idea and a concept and take these ideas that were generated on the Facebook [group] that was created by Lavena and put them into one comprehensive package … What I want is your support to go to the state with these types of drawings and say, ‘OK it’s time, it’s time to change the road because one death per year is not acceptable anywhere,’” he said.

Town councilman Robert Creighton said many of Mancini’s proposed changes, which include reducing the four-lane road to three lanes, were similar to those proposed by the town and rejected by , and added the town plans to bring these suggestions back to the DOT.

“I’m not being critical of them … but we have suggested narrowing of the road and we were backed up on that suggestion by the precinct commander of the fourth precinct and at our last meeting with the DOT, I don’t want to say they out-and-out rejected it, but they were not in support of it. We’re going to go back to them and try it again,” he said.

Town Supervisor Patrick Vecchio said James Rhoads, commander of the Suffolk County Police Department Fourth Precinct, is seeking permission to put police cars on Main Street.