Cyclist struck, killed by MBTA bus

By Travis Andersen, Globe Staff

A 21-year-old man was fatally struck by a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority bus Monday as he rode a bicycle through a busy Allston intersection, officials said.

Boston police Officer Neva Coakley, a department spokeswoman, said the man was hit just before 6:30 p.m. near the corner of Harvard and Brighton avenues. She could not say whether he was wearing a helmet.

After the collision, a white bicycle could be seen lying next to the curb in front of Redneck’s Roast Beef.

Authorities withheld the man’s identity pending family notification. He was pronounced dead at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

Jake Wark, a spokesman for Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley, confirmed that an MBTA bus struck the man and said no charges had been filed against the driver as of Monday evening. “The investigation will likely continue through the night,” he said.

Gregory Boerman, 26, who works at the nearby Refuge Cafe restaurant, said that the intersection is dangerous and he sees accidents there frequently.

“This literally happens at least once a week, where someone gets hit or there’s a car accident in this intersection,” Boerman said.

Alex Sanchez, 37, a manager at nearby Patron’s Mexican Kitchen & Watering Hole, said he saw paramedics performing chest compressions on the man for about 10 to 15 minutes.

Joe Pesaturo, an MBTA spokesman, said in an e-mail that a Route 57 bus driver has been taken out of service while authorities investigate. Pesaturo did not identify the driver but said he is 58 years old and a six-year veteran of the T.

He said the bus is not equipped with a camera.

The driver was tested for drugs and alcohol according to standard procedure, Pesaturo said, but the results were not immediately available.

Asked whether the driver stopped the bus after the cyclist was struck, Pesaturo said only that police were investigating.

More than a dozen plainclothes and uniformed Boston police officers were investigating at the intersection Monday night, directing traffic and telling onlookers to move along.

Police cleared the scene shortly after 9 p.m.

Standing at the opposite corner of the intersection shortly after the accident, Jessica Oei of Brookline had come to Allston to pick up her bicycle at her boyfriend’s apartment.

“This is a really bad intersection,” said Oei, 31,

Her boyfriend, 26-year-old Joe Chan, who works at Boston University and often rides his bike there, said the “ghost bikes” placed at the sites of deadly accidents around the city are a frequent reminder of the dangers of city biking.

“This is always a risk with biking,” he said of the accident.

Oei said many drivers do not pay enough attention, but they are not the only ones at fault.

“I think it has a lot to do with how aware you are, whether you’re driving, biking, or walking,” she said. “You just have to protect yourself as much as you can.”

Other cyclists in the area Monday said they were not surprised to learn of the accident.

Harry Driscoll, 23, a Boston University graduate student who had his bicycle chained on Commonwealth Avenue, said the intersection where the man was struck is not safe for cyclists.

“That’s a very dangerous spot,” he said. “There’s no bike path down there.”

His friend, Sonya Iverson, 29, also a BU graduate student, said she rides her bike in from Cambridge, and that cyclists in the city have to exercise caution.

“It’s all on you to be careful,” she said. “The cars don’t pay that much attention.”