At around 4:30 p.m. on Monday, a white tent covered a victim’s body to the side of the Chevron gas station at Mission Street and South Van Ness Avenue. Witnesses said a man was hit and killed by a truck at the busy intersection.
Richard Conway Jr. was on walk with his pit bull about a block from the scene when he heard a loud bang and the sound of sirens.
Conway Jr. rushed to the corner and saw the body of a deceased man, possibly unhoused, between 25 and 40, wearing Velcro shoes with no socks.
“I just prayed for him,” said Conway Jr.
The death is, by preliminary counts from the city, San Francisco’s ninth traffic fatality of the year. The city in 2014 adopted a “Vision Zero” goal to eliminate traffic deaths, but it has failed for more than 12 years running. Last year 25 people were killed by vehicles on city streets.
Conway Jr. and other employees said the vehicle that hit the man was a truck, possibly an F-250 or F-350. The street is a northbound one-way road where cars move speedily going from the Mission District down town.
Police officers had closed the block between Mission and Market streets on Monday evening. The owner of Picacho food truck, which parks at the intersection of Mission Street and South Van Ness Avenue, waited behind the police line to identify the body.
Based on the descriptions, the food truck owner said, he suspected the victim may be one of two men who usually buys horchata from him, and hangs out in the area.
This is a developing story and will be updated as we receive more information.
This will just be used as an excuse to further impede city traffic, frustrating drivers even more. If the city really wanted to elimiate traffic deaths it would strongly embrace autonomous vehicles – they have an 8-fold reduction in accidents per million miles driven verses humans.