And here’s the weird thing - I’ve been in NYC during rush hour three separate times in the last two weeks (long story) and the cars there all wait for the pedestrians. Not because they want to, mind, or think it’s right - because every time the light changes about 10000 pedestrians stride out into the road whether it’s safe or not. It’s like the cars think, well, I could hit one, but all of those might damage my car. Still, they pull up to within 4 centimeters of the pedestrians, waiting, anxiously.
Around here I work off of a large commercial roadway. There are pedestrian walkways at the lights. People still amble across the 40 MPH road!
AFAIK, the “stop for pedestrians in crosswalk” only became law in Chicago a couple years ago. They have been putting up signs lately, like these, which do seem to help. To be honest, I don’t ever remember being taught in driver’s ed or anywhere else to stop merely because a pedestrian stepped into the crosswalk and is waiting to cross. I mean, if there’s a stop sign, yes. You’re supposed to stop and let the pedestrian cross. But at an uncontrolled intersection? Honestly, we weren’t taught it. I remember my confusion in Aspen, when I visited there as a teenager, and how barely stepping a toe into the crosswalk would cause all the traffic to halt. The first few times I actually tried to wave the traffic by, not quite understanding.
In the 70s I moved from Montreal to Los Angeles. We used to get visitors from Montreal occasionally. I would amaze them with a simple trick: I’d walk across a street, and cars would stop for me. They would be agape.
Here in Boulder they’ve put up multiple, mid-block, pedestrian crossings on 35MPH roads. Instead of traffic lights to control the traffic, they just have yellow strobe lights on the PED-XING signs which are activated by a button. Traffic is only required to stop when pedestrians are crossing. This has caused several auto-pedestrian accidents when I’m sure the pedestrian had the right of way, but drivers are just not used to stopping in the middle of the road. Because I’m familiar with the area, I pay special attention at these places, and I’m sure other conscientious drivers do too, but drivers who don’t know that they might have to suddenly stop mid-block, or are just not paying attention, are exceptionally dangerous at these points, because the pedestrians are led to believe this is a safe crossing point. If it’s important that people be able to cross at these places, and at many of them I believe people will cross there regardless of the cross walk, then the city needs to put in a proper traffic light to be activated by pedestrians.
The suburb I live in had several of these setups on a 40MPH street near my house, and after several years they decided they were too dangerous, and have removed them and are installing a traffic light. Boulder just passed some more laws to regulate drivers’ behavior at the crossing.
Traveling this summer I was with several people who are used to the generally pedestrian friendly drivers in Boulder*. Edinburgh had enough construction downtown that lazy crossing generally wasn’t an issue. In London however, I was constantly yelling at them, “hurry up, those cars aren’t going to stop” at anything except a traffic light controlled zebra crossing. My companions did that willful denial thing of refusing to look at the cars (because if you can’t see them, they can’t hurt you?), while the drivers had that determined glare of for queen and country they’re not lifting, let alone touching the brake.
- Either pedestrian friendly, or too slow to cause a problem for pedestrians. It’s hard to tell.
Route 50 is an extremely busy highway in Northern Virginia but the threat of being squished by a car wasn’t enough of a deterrent to stop crazy women with kids and strollers from running across six lanes of high speed traffic. The county had to install a 12-foot chainlink fence on both sides of the road, and built an overhead walk way. It has saved lives, too. Apparently in some South American countries it is perfectly normal to cross the street where ever one feels like crossing.
There’s a road near my house that has two grocery stores on either side of a busy road, and all kinds of bus stops. There’s a light at one end of this bunch of stuff, and a pedestrian crosswalk in the middle of the road a block down, but people still cross the road all over the place. I am fairly sure that they will put a fence in the median after someone gets killed there (which will happen someday, I’d say, given how busy the street is). I can look at this street and see the hazard, but apparently the City can’t.
I once knew a Brit over here who swore that if you were crossing the street in a crosswalk and a car failed to stop for you, and you took down the license-plate number and reported it to the police, the police would hunt down the perp and there would be consequences. He insisted he was talking about Thailand and not Jolly Old England. We laughed and laughed and urged him to try it, but he never would.
Oh? I thought it was the law in Canada that cars had to stop if a pedestrian crossed the road?
AFAIK this is true, if you step onto a zebra crossing and the cars don’t stop, the drivers are in big trouble. I’m not 100% sure (since I never drove in the UK) but as I understood things if a driver hits a pedestrian who is on the road, it’s the pedestrian who is held responsible, but if a driver hits a pedestrian who was on a zebra crossing, then the driver is held responsible.
I do know trying to drive through the town here [Ireland] is a nightmare, there are cars parked on both sides, and pedestrians walking across the road at random, as well as drivers jumping out of their cars, or pulling out without looking/signalling. The other day I nearly ran over a child who ran across the road without looking, I didn’t see her until she was right in front of me due to A the parked cars that she ran out from, and B my attention was caught by some other pedestrian who looked as though they were going to step in front of me.
You people are getting this wrong. These women are SICK AND TIRED of motherhood and the responsibilities of parenting. They are putting their kids out in the street and praying for someone like you to come along and do the hard part for them – deliver the death blow.
Believe me, if you take a kid or two out, their moms will be crying tears of joy!
Maybe a large life insurance policy on the kid, with extra payout for accidental death?
Hey, stranger things.
Nope, not old fashioned. You just know the law.
On the way to work yesterday I heard about an 80-year-old man who was hit and killed by a car that morning. It was dark, and he was not using the crosswalk that was 50-75 feet away.
I doubt the idea that schools are training kids to think crosswalks are magic. I had a bicyclist today who decided to cross on his red light, almost right in front of me. He just didn’t want to slow down.
The amount of jaywalkers I see is amazing. And it’s not like we don’t have crosswalks - every corner and sometimes midblock. It’s a very pedestrian friendly area (which is one reason I avoid driving here during the day). But people apparently don’t want to walk five feet to a crosswalk.
Personally I always make eye contact with drivers before I step in front of their cars.
This should be common sense, but, judging by people who walk in front of my car, it’s about 50-50. When I’m driving and I see a pedestrian, I, as the driver, also make sure to make eye contact and give a little wave so they know I’m aware of their presence.
The ones I really hate are the bicyclists who use the sidewalk. I always have to make sure I look a little farther down the sidewalk to make sure I didn’t miss some idiot speeding on their bike, who invariably blows right through the intersection without checking for turning traffic. I’ve never come close to hitting one, but I have been surprised by them a couple of times. When a bike is on the road and you pass them, you are aware of their presence. When they’re on the sidewalk, and you have trucks and other cars between you and them, they can be easy to miss, and they come up on you in a hurry when you’re making that turn. If they slow down to pedestrian speed on approaching the intersection, then I don’t have so much a problem with them.
How about some related idiots to gripe about?
Those folks that walk as close to the road lane as possible WITH the direction of the traffic. And bonus points for the super stupid ones that could easily walk much further from the lane on the shoulder or gawd forbid the actual sidewalk that is on the other side of the ditch :smack:
I wonder what percentage of pedestrian deaths are due to pedestrians not being proactive in watching out for their own ass?
My town has an adult guy who is kinda slow, mentally. He hangs out on the sidewalk, talking to himself. Problem is, mostly he stands right by a crosswalk.
Locals know the guy, and drive right by. Others slow down, looking at him, giving him a wave, etc. while he just stands there.
I’m no fan of loitering laws, but loitering at a crosswalk should be addressed.
I see this occasionally, too - pedestrians hanging out at the crosswalk for some reason or another without wanting to cross at the moment. I don’t think they understand that the fines for interfering with a pedestrian in a crosswalk here are HUGE - like, $500. To channel Yoda, cross or do not cross - there is no hanging out by a crosswalk.
I was driving along in an active school zone one morning and came to a stop for a kid who was standing at a crosswalk, looking like he wanted to cross. There was a cop car waiting at the intersection to my left. I waited and waited for the kid to cross, and he just stood there. Fines are doubled in active school zones, so I was looking at a $1000 fine if the cop decided that I was interfering with a pedestrian if I decided to go just as the kid finally started walking. So, yeah, people need to not just hang out by crosswalks.
That’s an easy one. You just have to go up over the curb to get him. Then, no fine!
It’s not 100% clear, but generally, the driver is held to be at fault in the UK if they hit a pedestrian, regardless of whether they were on a crossing or not. Certainly the law states that you must drive at a low enough speed that you should be able to not run over a child that darted out into the road.
It probably is possible to be held at fault as a pedestrian if you deliberately dive in front of a car, or you’re on a motorway or other place where pedestrians are banned, but otherwise the car driver has all the responsibility.
There is a general ‘don’t cross like a tit’ guideline of course, but I don’t think it’s actually legally enforceable.
That’s “Canada”. “Montreal” is a different world, at least in terms of driver’s “courtesy”.