Lindenhurst, NY — Crash Data, Roads, History & Law

History

Before European settlement, the area that became Lindenhurst lay within the territory of the Secatogue and Massapequa people; the Village's own history page records that the area was then called Neguntatogue, which it translates as "forsaken land."^[8] In 1657 the Huntington farmer Jonas Wood and his neighbors signed a treaty with the Secatogue for several necks of land in the area, including Santapogue Neck.^[9] English-descended farmers from Huntington did not establish a permanent settlement in the district, then known as Huntington South, until well after that; among the earliest documented settlers was Jesse Ketcham, who in the 1780s built a home on what is now Montauk Highway just east of Washington Avenue.^[4] Huntington-descended farmers built a one-room schoolhouse on what is now West Montauk Highway, establishing the area's public school system in 1841.^[5]

The area's character changed after the South Side Rail Road laid a single track to Babylon in 1867, opening it to easier travel to New York City.^[7] Thomas Wellwood, an Irish immigrant who had begun buying acreage in the area in 1861, purchased large tracts once the railroad arrived, and by 1870 his holdings were extensive enough that the railroad's timetable listed a "Wellwood Station."^[6] Around that time Wellwood met Charles S. Schleier, a Brooklyn resident born in Breslau, Germany, who wanted to build a place for German immigrants to live and work; the two formed the Breslau Cooperative Building Association and marketed the new settlement to prospective buyers with excursion trains from New York City.^[1] Their planned community, the "City of Breslau," was formally dedicated on Pentecost Monday, June 6, 1870.^[1]

The settlement's name was changed to Lindenhurst in 1891, and in 1923 it became the Incorporated Village of Lindenhurst.^[2] The Village organized its own police department the following year; it patrolled Lindenhurst until 1960, when it was dissolved into the Suffolk County Police Department.^[3]

How the roads got here

Sunrise Highway, New York State Route 27, runs through Lindenhurst; the New York State Department of Transportation's official list of highway dedications names the stretch of Sunrise Highway and NY 27 running through Lindenhurst, along with the Shore and Belt Parkways, as part of the ceremonial POW-MIA Memorial Highway.^[20]

Montauk Highway, signed as New York State Route 27A east of Sunrise Highway, is described in the state's own touring-route documentation as continuing from Sunrise Highway and Carman Mill Road onto Carman Mill Road, Merrick Road and Montauk Highway toward Babylon, Bay Shore and Islip.^[21] The road called Montauk Highway already existed in the eighteenth century: the Village's history page places an early settler's 1780s home on what is now Montauk Highway, within the district that became Lindenhurst.^[4]

Wellwood Avenue, the Village's principal north-south street and the address of both Village Hall and the Lindenhurst Village Fire Department, carries the Suffolk County designation County Road 3 (paired with Pinelawn Road further north) in the county's official roadway inventory.^[22][10]

Law and legal history

Since 1968 the Incorporated Village of Lindenhurst has had its own version of New York's prior-written-notice rule for street and sidewalk defects. Local legislation adopted by the Board of Trustees on August 28, 1968 (Ordinance No. 1-1968) amended § 6-628 of the Village Law as it applies to Lindenhurst; the provision, now Chapter 116 ("Notification of Defects") of the Village Code, bars any civil action against the Village for injuries caused by a defective, unsafe or snow-and-ice-obstructed street, highway, bridge, culvert, sidewalk or crosswalk unless the Board of Trustees had actually received prior written notice of the condition and failed to correct it within a reasonable time.^[15][16] The Board amended the provision on June 16, 1992 by Local Law No. 2-1992.^[16]

The Appellate Division, Second Department, has applied that rule against a plaintiff suing Lindenhurst. In Koehler v. Incorporated Village of Lindenhurst, 42 A.D.3d 438 (2d Dept. 2007), decided July 10, 2007, the court reversed the denial of the Village's motion for summary judgment in a sidewalk-defect case: once a municipality shows it received no prior written notice of a defect, the burden shifts to the plaintiff to come forward with evidence that the municipality itself affirmatively created the condition, and the plaintiff there had not done so.^[25][27]

The Second Department has also reviewed the Village's land-use decisions. In Anzisi v. Incorporated Village of Lindenhurst, 88 A.D.3d 995 (2d Dept. 2011), decided October 25, 2011, the court affirmed the denial of a challenge to the Village Planning Board's rejection of a subdivision application, holding that a local planning board has broad discretion over subdivision applications and that judicial review is limited to whether its determination was illegal, arbitrary, or an abuse of discretion; the court found the Planning Board's denial had a rational basis and was neither arbitrary, capricious, nor illegal.^[26]

Government, courts and policing

Lindenhurst has been patrolled by the Suffolk County Police Department since the Village's own police department, organized in 1924, was dissolved into the county force in 1960.^[3] The Department's First Precinct, whose contact address is 555 NY-109, West Babylon, NY 11704, "proudly covers the Town of Babylon," which includes Lindenhurst.^[17][18] The County's Third Precinct, based in Bay Shore, covers Islip Town communities (Bay Shore, Baywood, Brentwood, Brightwaters, Islip, Central Islip, East Islip, West Islip and Islip Terrace) and does not list Lindenhurst among the areas it serves.^[19]

Traffic and village-ordinance matters arising in Lindenhurst are heard at the Lindenhurst Village Justice Court, at Village Hall, 430 South Wellwood Avenue; the court holds a Vehicle and Traffic Court session generally on the first and third Wednesday of each month at 2:00 p.m., and a Village Ordinance Court session generally on the second and fourth Wednesday at 1:00 p.m.^[11]

The Village's own Department of Public Works, at 121 Albany Avenue, maintains local streets, while Sunrise Highway (NY 27) and Montauk Highway (NY 27A) are New York State highways and Wellwood Avenue is Suffolk County Road 3.^{[10][20][21][22]} Fire protection is provided by the Lindenhurst Village Fire Department, headquartered at 225 South Wellwood Avenue, and public education by the Lindenhurst Union Free School District.^[12][13]

Railroad and transit

Rail service reached the district in 1867, when the South Side Rail Road extended a single track to Babylon.^[7] Landowner Thomas Wellwood's large holdings gave the railroad's timetable a stop called Wellwood Station by 1870, shortly before the adjoining settlement of Breslau (later Lindenhurst) was formally dedicated.^[6] The 1901 railroad depot and freight house that once served the area is preserved today at Irmisch Park as one of the Lindenhurst Historical Society's two house museums, alongside the Old Village Hall Museum, which was moved to the park from its earlier location on South Wellwood Avenue.^[14]