The Newtown Police Commission has received an update on accidents around the flagpole.  The 100-foot steel pole has stood in the middle of Main Street for 145 years and the intersection with Church Hill Road and West Street is one of the top three spots for accidents. 

Captain Christopher Vanghele says the best option for safety, after a five year study of the crashes, may be to do nothing.  Potential solutions considered ranged from installing a traffic light to building a traffic circle.  Vanghele estimated that accidents at the flagpole may be reduced as much as 55 percent with a traffic light, but traffic backups would increase. He noted that the new light may also cause accidents when it's first operational.

He noted that speed is not a major factor, there have been no serious accidents and no pedestrians hit.  Most are due to driver error and not road design. 

Only 10 accidents in the last 4.5 years involved the actual flagpole.  27-percent of crashes involved cars coming off Church Hill Road and being struck by northbound Main Street traffic.  22-percent of the accidents were people following too closely. 

Even though 86 crashes happened at the flagpole intersection since 2017, the average works out to 1.6 accidents per month in a place with average monthly volume of 450,000 vehicles.