PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The curves of Kelly Drive hug the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia, and the cherry blossom trees frame the scenic route inviting motorcyclists and drivers to whip around the bends.
It has become one of the deadliest roads in the city.
Three Philadelphia teenagers were killed this week along Kelly Drive, as investigators say they lost control of their car and crashed into another.
The curve where the crash happened has now claimed seven lives in just over two years.
The state set Kelly Drive's speed limit at 35 miles per hour, but drivers often whip around the curves at much faster speeds.
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The latest crash, near the intersection of Hunting Park Avenue, killed Joyce Robert, 18, Juwan Johnson, 19 and Julian Durant, 17.
They lost control of their Mazda, which slammed into a Honda. Two people from the other car are still recovering at the hospital.
In January 2019, a driver died when he lost control of his speeding car and slammed into a wall.
In December of 2020, two people were killed when they lost control and slammed into a tree.
Just a few months ago, a passenger in a car was hit by another car which lost control.
The crash this week is the fourth fatal crash on Kelly Drive in about two and a half years. Philadelphia's Office of Transportation, Infrastructure and Sustainability (OTIS) is studying the crash.
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"The entire length is on our high injury network which identifies the 12% of city streets where 80% of the killed and serious injury crashes happen," said OTIS Director of Complete Streets Kelley Yemen. Other city streets on that list include Broad Street, Lincoln Drive, Cobbs Creek Parkway and Roosevelt Boulevard.
"The types of crashes, whether they may be head on where people are running into each other, what we call angle crashes, what we know as t-bone crashes, red-light running. There are crashes related to aggressive driving, drunk driving," she explains.
"We want to get those patterns to understand what is happening on that corridor and then work to design interventions."
OTIS analyzes data about those crashes over five years. Once they go through it all, they help PennDOT and the city figure out how to make it safer.
"Whether it’s road design, automated enforcement, whether it’s a behavioral issue, we want to be able to identify what are the different tools we need to bring to bare to reduce fatal and serious injury crashes," said Yemen.
For now, officials urge people to adhere to the speed limit, as they say every five miles above the limit can exponentially increase the chances of serious injury, or death.