A young woman with a pink backpack walked north along Morrison Drive until the sidewalk on her side of the street morphed into the pedestrian and cyclist entrance to Cooper River bridge.
Without hesitation, she stepped down onto the bustling four-lane road. It was 5:30 p.m. on a Monday. Drivers flew past her in the next lane between Cooper and Huger streets, but she seemed unfazed. She passed a white cross nestled inside a bushel of multicolored flowers, a stuffed teddy bear placed in front to keep watch over the whizzing cars.
Final touches on the memorial had been erected minutes earlier in honor of two 20-year-old women, Lizzy Zito and Arianna Gamber, who died a day earlier, April 28, in that same area.
After taking about 100 steps on the stretch of road with no visible speed signs, the heavy vegetation butting up to the asphalt thinned, and she hopped up onto a grassy curb to continue walking on a well-worn dirt path to the Morrison Yard apartments.
Minutes later, another woman exited the luxury apartments nestled between the road and the on-ramp to the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge that connects the peninsula to Mount Pleasant.
She waited as 10, 20, 30 cars sped past, waiting for a rare opening in the rush-hour traffic. When an opening finally came, she leapfrogged across the road — first scurrying into the grassy median, then again to the other side of the road.
Construction closed the sidewalk along the east side of Morrison Drive from Johnson to Huger streets on May 1. This left pedestrians going to or from nearby apartment complex Morrison Yard with no choice but to walk alongside or dart through the four-lane road.
This is what nearby residents and pedestrian passersby do everyday. A crosswalk stands south of the pedestrian entrance to the bridge. Its crossing signal still works, despite one button that fell out of its socket and dangles by a few multicolored wires. There isn’t another safe opportunity to cross the four-lane road for another half-mile north.
There is a long way around to reach the large Morrison Yard apartment complex instead of darting out into the street. But construction on the apartment side now blocks all of the sidewalk between Johnson and Huger streets. Pedestrians have no way to reach the apartments without jaywalking.
A poster in Morrison Yard's leasing office shows plans to improve Morrison Drive that the South Carolina Department of Transportation said are not in the works.
Inside the Morrison Yard's leasing office, a poster set on a golden easel boasts of plans to add a new traffic signal and crosswalk at Johnson Street, a sidewalk along Morrison Drive and a stair tower to connect the apartments to the pedestrian bridge over the Cooper River.
But the S.C. Department of Transportation, which owns Morrison Drive, told The Post and Courier it has no immediate plans to add anything to that stretch of road.
A DOT spokesperson declined an interview request seeking more information. Anyone with a concern about Morrison Drive can call the department directly at 855-467-2368, according to its spokesperson.
Neither the Morrison Yard apartment complex, nor its developer, Woodfield Development, provided a comment prior to publication.
“It makes it seem like they don’t care about safety,” one resident, Julie Jones, told The Post and Courier. She’s frustrated both at the developer and public agencies for not working together to get this done.
The corridor is designed to move cars quickly. The land plan approved dense population growth. That's not unique in Charleston County, according to Katie Zimmerman, the executive director of Charleston Moves, a nonprofit that is working to make more local roads pedestrian friendly.
Charleston County is the most dangerous county for pedestrians in South Carolina, and the Palmetto State is the third-most dangerous state for pedestrians in the nation, according to studies.
The Holy City has been ranked the fifth-most dangerous city for pedestrians in the country.
“Unfortunately, we have a bit of an epidemic on our hands,” Zimmerman said. “The county is one big hot spot at this point.”
Zimmerman’s group studies, audits and documents the dangers of intersections, corridors and bridges to lobby councils, agencies and state lawmakers to make changes in order to better protect pedestrians.
Morrison Drive has always been a point of concern for citizens, with Sanders-Clyde Elementary School on the west side of the road and bus stops on both sides, Zimmerman said.
When the “strikingly bridge-adjacent” apartment complex, as its website touts, was proposed in 2021, plans to make the area more pedestrian-friendly were publicized.
But they haven’t come to fruition.
There are “a lot of cooks in the kitchen” during the process of developing a pedestrian-friendly plan to get it finalized, approved and added, Zimmerman said.
And Morrison Drive is just one stretch that “desperately needs improvement.”
That much has been made clear this week when Zito and Gamber were hit and killed by a car near the entrance to the Ravenel bridge on April 28.
“It’s really just a matter of the push and pull of so many priorities. There are so many areas that desperately need improvements. Can we get Morrison on the list?” Zimmerman asked.
She thinks it can happen.
“Especially given this horrific incident, it’s the opportunity for the mayor to throw support behind the plans,” Zimmerman said.
The mayor’s office declined interview requests, instead providing this statement on behalf of Charleston Mayor William Cogswell:
A memorial is adorned with flowers and other personal items on the side of East Bay Street just past the on-ramp for the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge on April 29, 2024, in Charleston. The memorial was erected for two 20-year-old women who were killed in a hit-and-run near the location on April 28, identified as Lizzy Zito and Arianna Gamber.
“I extend heartfelt condolences to the families of the two young women tragically lost this past weekend,” the statement said. “Their lives were cut short due to a senseless and reckless crime. As the investigation continues, the city will continue to support our police department to ensure that those responsible are held accountable.”
For now, people are continuing to cross the road wherever they can.
“I don’t believe most pedestrians are putting themselves in harm’s way on purpose,” Zimmerman said. “They’re trying to do what they need to do, and the infrastructure is just not working for them.”
One man finished his run on the bridge just before noon on May 1. He waited for a clearing in the traffic, stepped over a short barrier dividing the pedestrian sidewalk from the on-ramp and hurried across the ramp, into the right lane of traffic on Morrison Drive.
As he walked alongside the road, he placed his hand on the white memorial cross — a sign of respect to the two young women who had lost their lives just days earlier.
