AUBURN, Wash. — A donut shop in Auburn is cleaning up after a car crashed into the store late Tuesday night.
Donut Star is on a curve on the road on Auburn Way South that employees say is dangerous.
Data from the Washington State Department of Transportation shows six crashes have happened on this curve in 2022, two of them ending with cars crashing into Donut Star. Just six weeks ago, on October 22 a different car crashed into the store.
“It's frustrating for the owner,” said Kelly Poi, an employee at Donut Star. “Also, for us, because if it's affecting the business, you know, I don't have a job to work here, right?”
Donut Star purchased its own concrete barriers to help protect their building, but what they want to see is for the City of Auburn to put a barrier alongside the road.
“Not just to protect the building, but for everybody, you know, in here and the customers and stuff like that or even the people that walk on the sidewalks,” said Poi.
Auburn police say despite signs being put up by the city to alert people of the turn, this curve by the donut shop is a problem area.
“What happens is they get comfortable on that stretch and then the turn comes up out of nowhere. If you're speeding or distracted, it comes even quicker,” said Kolby Crossley, the Public Information Officer with the Auburn Police Department.
Employees at Donut Star say this has been a problem for years. In 2018, a pick-up truck crashed into the business. Surveillance video showed customers having to run out of the way.
Police say when they have responded to crashes at the donut shop, the damage to the concrete barriers shows just how fast people are driving.
“We've showed up and those things have been completely cracked in half,” said Crossley. “They've been flipped over, they've been pushed, and it takes a lot of force to do that kind of damage to those things.”
Kelly at Donut Star says they need the city’s help to keep the business running and to protect people from getting hurt.
“Drive carefully please, I really appreciate it, I don’t want to lose my job,” said Kelly.
We did reach out to the City of Auburn to see what it had to say about these concerns and if it plans to make any improvements, but we were told it could not get in touch with the right people to answer our questions before this story aired.