Stop Hitting My House
One of the cars that crashed into John Gall’s property and the city-installed boulders. The impact took out the pedestrian signal and pole, as well as one of two reflective signs. Photo by John Gall.
John Gall has lived in the same Cleveland Heights home since the 1990s. It sits at the base of a T-intersection where South Taylor Road meets Fairmount Boulevard—a spot where, in theory, drivers are supposed to turn either left or right.
But that’s not what keeps happening.
Over the past few years, Gall’s home has been repeatedly hit by cars. Nearly two years ago, after a sedan fleeing police crashed directly into his home, John Gall took the splintered remains of his kitchen cabinets and turned them into a makeshift protest sign that read: Where’s My Guardrail? He had a point. The crash wasn’t a fluke—it was the first in what would become a disturbing pattern.
Just as the final repairs to his brick house were being completed last summer, another vehicle barreled into his property. This time, it was an SUV believed to be traveling over 80 miles per hour. The impact flattened Gall’s parked Subaru Forester and destroyed his brick garage. Somehow, the driver walked away unscathed. Gall, once again, was left to pick up the pieces.
Most recently, two different vehicles struck the granite boulders the city had installed to protect his property—on back-to-back nights.
Those boulders did their job. Mostly. But Gall is not reassured. “It’s an inadequate defense for me, and I still think you need to change the intersection,” Gall told the news. “I don’t think the barrier is adequate, and the reflective signs are superfluous… But if the city still wants to have rocks, I need more of them than the current two,” Gall added.
Cleveland Heights has taken some action. A speed bump was installed a few hundred feet away and a “T” warning sign went up over the summer. But according to Gall, those measures don’t get at the heart of the problem. Drivers are still blowing through a light at speeds upwards of 80 mph. They still treat this straight shot like a runway. And the intersection still behaves like a funnel aimed squarely at his living room.
The boulders and signs in front of Gall’s residence. Image from Facebook.
A guardrail, which existed when Gall bought the house, was removed in a road project nearly 20 years ago. Installing a new one, the city has said, wouldn’t be effective—or safe—because of the perpendicular angle. Gall, not convinced, has requested a meeting with the Public Works Department.
In the meantime, he’s asking for more boulders. And fewer reflective signs, which he says only get in the way of mowing the lawn.
But while the specifics here may sound unusual, the pattern is anything but. Crashes that repeat in the same location—and especially in the same way—are signals, not accidents. They point to a design problem.
That’s where the Crash Analysis Studio model comes in. What line of sight might be confusing here? What turn is harder to make than it looks? Are people speeding because the road design invites them to The Crash Analysis Studio model invites residents and city staff to ask better questions—ones that can lead to meaningful, place-specific solutions. It’s a process rooted in humility and observation: if this keeps happening, what are we missing?
Gall’s house doesn’t need more bad luck to prove the point. It needs a system that treats repeated crashes not as unfortunate coincidences, but as a solvable design problem. Until that happens, he’ll keep living with the fear that the next car might make it past the boulders.
