Police this week arrested a Bridgeport man on four vehicular charges stemming from a serious motor vehicle accident last August on South Main Street (Route 25), near Cold Spring Road, which shut down a section of South Main Street for 14 hours, resulting in extensive detours and much traffic congestion.

After learning that police held a warrant for his arrest, James Patrick, 50, went to the police station about 5:30 pm on January 2, and was arrested on charges of speeding, reckless driving, improper passing, and failure to wear a seat belt.

The multiple-impact two-vehicle accident occurred about 12:15 pm on Friday, August 25.

Patrick was driving a 2001 Lexus sedan southward on South Main Street and traveling at approximately 77 miles per hour as he attempted to pass a 2006 Kenworth heavy dump truck on the right, according to police.

After striking some curbing, the Lexus traveled 311 feet off the road. It struck a utility pole. The fallen utility pole brought down utility lines onto the truck, causing a fire atop the truck's hood, police said. The Lexus and the truck did not make contact with each other during the incident, according to police.

The multiple-impact crash created extensive wreckage on the street and the need to make extensive repairs to the damaged utility lines. The incident caused a localized power outage. Patrick was injured in the accident, but the truck driver was not hurt, according to police.

Motorists followed lengthy detours that routed them around the accident. Those travel delays happened during a Friday afternoon rush period in late summer, a time when many drivers were traveling.

Because Botsford Hill Road has a low-clearance railroad bridge that prevents tall vehicles, such as tractor-trailer trucks, from passing beneath it, the southern end of the through-traffic detour was positioned much farther south - at the intersection of Route 25 and Route 111 in Trumbull. The northern end of the through-traffic detour was located at the intersection of South Main Street and Mile Hill Road in Newtown. That two-way detour also included Wasserman Way, Route 34, and Route 111 in both Monroe and Trumbull.

Police created an isolation zone near the accident. That zone was bounded on the north by the intersection of South Main Street and Button Shop Road, and was bounded on the south by the intersection of South Main Street and Botsford Hill Road/Meadowbrook Road. While limited local traffic could travel in the areas lying north and south of the crash scene, through-traffic, especially large trucks, needed to take the lengthy detour.

The traffic congestion on local roads was compounded by traveling motorists who had encountered unrelated accidents on Interstate 84 and then got off that highway in seeking alternate local routes for their travels.

The section of South Main Street where the accident occurred was reopened to traffic about 2 am on Saturday, August 26.

After arrest processing on January 2, police released Patrick on a written promise to appear on January 17 in Connecticut Superior Court in Danbury.

Police Officer Robert Haas investigated the accident for police.