SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. – A 70-year-old bicyclist died Monday after being struck by a SunRail train in Longwood, officials with the Florida Highway Patrol said.
The crash happened at 3:19 p.m. near Lake Mary Road and Ronald Reagan Boulevard, a Highway Patrol spokesperson said. The cyclist, later identified as Stewart Lashley, of Orlando, was pronounced dead at the scene, the FHP spokeswoman Kim Montes said.
The Christian Sharing Center said on Facebook that Lashley was a volunteer bike mechanic for the Longwood organization.
“Stew was a bike enthusiast who spent many hours working on bikes that we gave to our clients and sold in our thrift store,” the post read. “He will be sorely missed here at The Sharing Center.”
Montes said Lashley was trying to cross the tracks after the railroad crossing gate was already down when the southbound train struck him.
The FHP and the Seminole County Sheriff's Office are still investigating the incident.
There were 25 people onboard the SunRail train when the crash happened, Montes said. SunRail services were suspended between Lake Mary and Sand Laker roads. Buses were brought in to transport displaced passengers.
The involved train was released shortly after 6 p.m. and the passengers were taken to Longwood, where they could then transfer to another train. Other trains were able to use an adjacent track to get by the area.
A man walking on the tracks in Orlando near Orange Avenue was hit and killed by a SunRail train last week. A 13-year-old boy was struck and killed in May while taking a shortcut on his way home from school in Sanford.
Officials from the Florida Department of Transportation, who manage the commuter rail, told News 6 on Friday that $400,000 has been budgeted to add chain link fencing along the rail corridor of 12 sites in Orange and Seminole counties in an attempt to eliminate cut-through foot traffic over the mainline railroad tracks.
See a map of all the SunRail-related crashes since 2014 below: