Will a stop sign save lives? Mother of Fort Worth crash victim thinks so

If the quiet Greenway neighborhood had just one more stop sign, Isaiah Mobley’s mom believes her 19-year-old son would still be alive.

Mobley died May 19 when a day of riding motorcycles around the Fort Worth neighborhood ended tragically at the intersection of Leota Street and Carver Avenue. He was pronounced dead at the scene after his Suzuki motorcycle collided with a black Honda Civic.

Though traffic on Carver Avenue has to stop, Leota Street lacks a stop sign. It was once the other way around. Mandy Mobley, Isaiah’s mother, and others from the neighborhood plan to attend Tuesday’s City Council meeting to request the city make the intersection a four-way stop.

“I can’t help but think my son would still be alive,” she said. “Someone would have stopped or at least slowed down.”

Isaiah Mobley and another biker were northbound on Leota when the driver of a southbound car tried to turn left onto Carver Avenue in front of the motorcycles. Mobley’s motorcycle smashed into the passenger side of the car. The force was great enough to throw him over the car and onto the ground several feet away, according to a Fort Worth Police Department accident report.

The switch to the stop signs came in late 2014, said Tanya Brooks, assistant director of the city’s transportation and public works department.

At the time, the neighborhood requested the city look at traffic control in Greenway, including a four-way stop at the intersection. After the study, however, traffic engineers recommended switching the direction of the the stop signs.

To place an additional stop sign at an intersection, more than 300 cars need to pass per hour for at least eight hours a day. The Leota and Carver intersection “didn’t even come close,” Brooks said.

Over a three-day study in the summer of 2014, an average of 400 cars passed the intersection during a whole day, she said. At the time, the intersection had no history of crashes.

“We’ll definitely re-evaluate and see if anything needs to changed based on the crash,” she said.

The neighborhood north of downtown is one of the oldest black communities in the city.

World War II-era bungalows dot the neighborhood where less than 200 homes stand on fewer than a dozen blocks. Habitat for Humanity has taken interest in the neighborhood, building several homes, but development on the adjacent Samuels Avenue strip hasn’t come to Greenway quite yet.

Instead, the neighborhood has become an island walled off from the rest of the city — to the west Interstate 35W, to south heavy commercial businesses, to the east busy train tracks and to the north more railway and the Trinity River.

Tameisha Thompson, who saw the crash from her mother’s home a few doors down from the intersection, said traffic has increased over the past year, particularly after I-35W was widened.

Before that, traffic could access the freeway or its feeder road from multiple streets in Greenway. But those roads now dead end, forcing the bulk of traffic to the intersection of Carver and Leota.

The situation is compounded by dozens of commercial vehicles that use the residential streets as a short cut.

On a recent afternoon, Mandy Mobley stood on the corner near a memorial for Isaiah filled with dozens of candles, parts from the motorcycle and other personal items. She kept an eye out for passing cars. Nearly 30 passed the intersection in roughly 30 minutes — not enough to meet the traffic requirement, but more than what the neighborhood is used to.

“They’ve created a major intersection in the middle of this neighborhood,” she said. “It needs to be treated that way.”

Noble Reed, a longtime resident who is now president of the Greenway neighborhood association, agreed that the tiny pocket of the city has more traffic, particularly commercial vehicles. But he urged patience.

A community meeting June 10 at the Greenway Church will address several safety concerns in the neighborhood, he said, including the fatal crash and the need for more sidewalks. The neighborhood patrol officer and a public works representative will be on hand, and Noble said he’s reached out to Councilwoman Kelly Allen Gray, who represents the area.

“We want to explore some things that could really help the neighborhood,” he said. “I think before we make a quick decision we should analyze the whole situation and see what we need to do.”

Mandy Mobley hopes that will include more stops signs.

“I do not want my son to have died in vain,” she said.

This story was originally published May 31, 2019 at 1:06 PM with the headline "Will a stop sign save lives? Mother of Fort Worth crash victim thinks so."