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Saturday, August 15, 2009

How safe is Forbidden Drive?
Countless joggers trot along the picturesque paths of Forbidden Drive in Fairmount Park every day.

But many are likely unaware that their favorite jogging spot is the one of last places they would want to become a crime victim, a fact that was underscored when a 34-year-old woman was raped at Bells Mills Road near Forbidden Drive on Tuesday night.
The area, part of the Wissahickon Creek Valley section of Fairmount Park, is a dead zone for cell phones and police radios, police officials said yesterday.
It is also an area of the park that sees little in the way of patrols from police officers or Fairmount Park rangers, the Daily News has learned.

When the first seeds of the city’s budget crisis began sprouting in December, Mayor Nutter nixed a plan to add 200 extra cops to the Police Department.
Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey was forced to fill the void from within, so he shuttered the 92nd District, formerly headquartered at Lincoln Drive and Gypsy Lane, which oversaw Fairmount Park.

The task of policing the 9,200-acre park was divided between the 14th, 16th and 19th districts, said police spokesman Lt. Frank Vanore.

But police apparently don’t regularly patrol the area where the woman was raped on Tuesday. Her attacker -- who she has not described in detail to police -- is still on the loose.
“We can’t get our vehicles back there,” said Capt. Winton Singletary, commander of the 14th District, on Haines Street near Germantown Avenue.

After the rape was reported, Singletary said, the city loaned several dirt bikes to his district for cops to use in the park.

Vanore said the police department has about 25 dirt bikes, three of which are used by cops in the 16th District to patrol sections of Fairmount Park that include the Please Touch Museum and the School of the Future.
Seven or eight Fairmount Park rangers are assigned to patrol the 1,800 acres of the Wissahickon Creek Valley section of the park, said Barry Bessler, the Fairmount Park Commission’s chief of staff.

“Certainly, that’s not as many park rangers as we would like, especially when you factor in sick time and vacation,” he said.
“Unfortunately, we can’t be in as many places as we’d like to be at anygiven time.”

The lack of a constant uniformed presence near the stretch of Forbidden Drive where the woman was assaulted on Tuesday is exacerbated by the fact that cell phones and police radios don’t work in the area.

“Even if you saw somebody being attacked out there, you can’t call for help,” said a police source who’s familiar with the area.
Police Chief Inspector Michael Feeney said radio reception might improve if digitial repeaters are added to the area as part of a $34 million upgrade of the city’s Motorola police and fire radio system.
Posted by David Gambacorta @ 12:51 AM  Permalink | 3 comments
Comments   
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 10:48 AM, 08/17/2009
    Hey, a new thought... why don't people stop jogging there?
    — nobodycares
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 10:48 AM, 08/17/2009
    Hey, a new thought... why don't people stop jogging there?
    — nobodycares
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 11:18 AM, 08/17/2009
    Nobodycares- Are you suggesting that we just accept that there are areas where we shouldn't feel safe and treat these as dead zones? No need to improve policing or attempt to make places safe... Yes, let's go with that. NOT!!!
    — xgear


3 comments
About The PhillyConfidential team

Dana DiFilippo has covered murder, mayhem and miscellany at the Daily News since 2000. She grew up in Delaware County and studied journalism and photography at Penn State University. E-mail tips to difilid@phillynews.com.

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Stephanie Farr has been reporting for the Daily News since 2007, covering everything from gay porn stars who entered the burglary business to moon trees, skinheads, murders and naked bike rides. She covers crime, both in the city and suburbs, and keeps clippings of bizarre Associated Press articles. Her favorite this year was the story about the drunk in Punxsutawney who gave mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to a dead opossum. E-mail tips to farrs@phillynews.com.

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Phillip Lucas joined the Daily News crime team in 2011. He grew up on the mean streets of Seattle and studied journalism and psychology at Howard University in Washington, D.C. Before landing in the City of Brotherly Love, Phillip was a reporter for The News Journal in Wilmington, Del. Email tips to lucasp@phillynews.com.

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Morgan Zalot is the newest crime reporter at the Daily News, starting in 2011 after interning at the paper twice as a Temple University journalism student. In her past stints at the DN, she covered just about everything, from drunken Phillies fans to a barber shop in a high school to a grisly murder-suicide. She’s a born-and-raised Philly girl who grew up in the Northeast. E-mail tips to zalotm@philly.com.

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