By Jenna Johnson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, December 4, 2007

An empty Metrobus that was headed to the Twinbrook Metro station struck and killed a man crossing the street during evening rush yesterday, Montgomery County police said.

The man, whom police did not identify immediately, had just stepped off a curb onto Parklawn Drive near Twinbrook Parkway when he was struck about 6:30 p.m., Metro spokeswoman Lisa Farbstein said. The man was not in a crosswalk, she added. He was the fifth pedestrian killed by a Metrobus this year.

The bus driver, whose name was not released last night, has worked for Metro since January, Farbstein said.

The bus, which was heading north on Parklawn, operates on the J5 route between Rockville and Silver Spring.

The driver was placed on paid administrative leave pending an investigation, including drug and alcohol testing, as is routine in such cases, Farbstein said.

After a series of Metrobus fatalities, Metro General Manager John B. Catoe Jr. this year ordered all 2,400 Metrobus drivers to have yearly safety training.

In January, a woman was killed by a bus at a major intersection in the Mount Pleasant neighborhood of Northwest Washington.

On Feb. 14, two women were fatally struck by a Metrobus as they crossed Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Archives-Navy Memorial-Penn Quarter Station.

Three days after the Penn Quarter incident, Angel Walters, 21, was hit and killed by a Metrobus near her home in the 1300 block of Congress Street SE.

Staff writer Lena H. Sun contributed to this report.