BALTIMORE COUNTY, Md. — Two trees along Holly Neck Road now bear the scars of a deadly car crash that happened in the early hours of Sunday.
A small memorial for 18-year-old Austin Lautenschlager and 19-year-old David Santos III sits in the grass across the street for the two teenagers, who did not survive the impact.
Some neighbors, who have been vocal about the speeding issues along the road, wonder if more could have been done.
Neighbors torn on traffic measures in Essex
“Unfortunately, they lost their lives and that's a shame but if the speed humps were there, maybe they'd be here today,” neighbor Stanley Groncki said
Groncki has been advocating for the traffic calming measures along the road for the past two years, and despite the marks on the road outside of his house, they’ve never been built.
“What will it take for the county to follow through with what the residents on Holly Neck Rd requested?” he wrote in an email to traffic engineer Keith Link on April 22. “Will it take a serious accident? Or worse, someone losing their life? I certainly hope not.”
Gronscki’s mother, Shirley Gregory, was helping him through the process.
Link, who informed her earlier that month that he had received the “go ahead”, has since retired after 32 years.
Baltimore County did conduct a study after the request was first received in 2024, but ultimately the project did not receive enough signatures to move forward, which is 75% of affected homeowners.
Groncki says he did have that number, actually more, with the help of his mother. However, nine homeowners later rescinded their signatures after they were contacted by the Holly Neck Conservation Association.
“A significant number of them indicated they were unaware of what they were signing at the time when they signed it, that it had not been clearly represented to them,” Scarlett Corso, who has since been elected Vice President, said.
She says, based on where the humps were proposed, they would not have prevented the early morning Sunday crash. A map provided to WMAR-2 News shows that the crash happened right before a hump would have been built, in the 2200 block of Holly Neck Rd.
“This community is torn a little because there are some issues with traffic and vehicles moving quickly,” Corso said. “Because Holly Neck Road is the only road in and out of the peninsula, a number of the residents had concerns about accessibility for EMS, firetrucks, police.”
There’s also concern about boat and trailer traffic that come through. She says there’s been talk about speed cameras.
A neighbor who witnessed the crash near her home expressed interest in more police enforcement along the road.
An In Focus look at crash data from Holly Neck Road
“I don’t think that there’s a perfect solution to this. Every solution or alleviating measure presents counter problems,” she said.
Groncki and Lohrig agree that speed humps may not be a cure-all but believe that they’d still make a big difference.
“I just hope God's with those kids in heaven and just wish some of those people would wake up,” Lohrig said.
