Remembering Jodie Lane, who died on this date in 2004

[Photo by Todd McCraw via Facebook]

Reposted from Jan. 16, 2014

Jodie Lane was a 30-year-old doctoral candidate at the Teacher’s College at Columbia University. During the late afternoon of Jan. 16, 2004, Lane, who lived on East 12th Street with her boyfriend, was walking her dogs. She was electrocuted on a snow-covered Con Edison junction box on the southwest corner of 11th Street at First Avenue.

The street was named in her honor in the spring of 2005. Former Councilmember Margarita Lopez joined Lane's family and friends for the street co-naming ceremony.

"The name of Jodie Lane is going to be there forever," Lopez said, "for Con Ed to remember what they did — that they didn’t care about the residents of New York City — and for it not to happen again."

As The Villager reported:

The young therapist’s death horrified the city, and brought heightened awareness to the problem of stray voltage leaking from street fixtures. With pressure from Lopez, Con Ed agreed to do annual stray-voltage inspections for all street lampposts and other electrified street fixtures.

In November 2004, ConEd agreed to pay Lane's family more than $6.2 million and to set up a $1 million scholarship fund in her name at Columbia.

Read more about the Jodie S. Lane Public Safety Foundation here.

Previously on EV Grieve:
In Memoriam: Roger M. Lane