[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
I was just talking about this with friends the other day. It is nice that Jodie is remembered.
ReplyDeleteI remember this and thinking was a reckless reason it was for someone's life to be taken. At the very least, at least it brought awareness to the problem. I'm glad her street sign was replaced when the new signs went in recently.
ReplyDeleteIt hurts to think that Jodie's life was taken in such a reckless manner, and also how much better our city could be if Jodie were still among us. I'm so grateful to her family for fighting ConEd to improve safety of New Yorkers, even though (if I remember correctly), they themselves do not live here. A heart-wrenching tragedy, and yet the family ensured a wonderful legacy for Jodie.
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