March 21, 2007
Walk This Way! Or Else...
Pedestrians, cyclists, and drivers beware! As we mentioned this morning, the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments' annual Street Smart Pedestrian and Bicycle Safety Campaign kicked off yesterday. In addition to a flurry of ads on the radio, billboards, buses, and local papers, this campaign will also include a month of increased enforcement of traffic laws by local police.
We’re not sure which to be more worried about, the potential jaywalking tickets or the relentless march of Street Smart PSA’s, but color us cynical about this annual effort to get pedestrians, drivers, and cyclists to all play nice. We just don't have much faith that anyone is thinking twice about jaywalking because of ads on WTOP.
We've said it before: consistent enforcement of basic traffic laws, by cop or by camera, is the best and most cost effective way to change people's behavior. Yet, while a few ticketed pedestrians or a cyclist pulled over for speeding might make for a good local news item, it will hardly change the city's transportation culture. If you have any doubt, just look at the ban on cell phone use while driving. It's never enforced, and it's always ignored.
Likewise with other traffic laws, the fact that police can only find time to enforce them for one month a year is troubling. If there is a need for increased traffic enforcement, and we think there is, it should be a year-round policy. If it was, we might even have the distinct honor of appearing on Prevention Magazine's "Walkable Cities" list next year...
Photo courtesy MWCOG
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To drive home the lack of enforcement point - I was walking home last week and crossing Conn. Ave @ 18th St. I saw a cop in a van pull up next to a guy in convertible Sebring who was talking on his phone (no headset, mind you) and didn't have his seatbelt on, and the cop merely rolled down his window, asked him if he was going to put his seatbelt on, and when he did, just let him go. As the guy pulled away from the light he continued to talk on his phone. The cop then drove up 18th St, parked his van and got out to write parking tickets to two cars that already had them.
At first I thought that poster was a DCist mockup..
So, are we supposed to put more traffic cops on the street now to monitor agressive driving/walking? Who's going to pay for the added surveillance cameras? Instead of putting cops on every intersection, we need to explore a more cost-effective solution like putting traffic mimes in busy intersections. Not only would they help our burgeoning illiterate population understand that jaywalking is illegal through sign language, but they would draw the attention of agressive drivers away from other pedestrians. It's win-win, and all for the measly price of a few dead mimes.
Politburo, even with all the photoshop skills in the world, I would never be able to come up with something this ridiculous.
Politburo: My thoughts exactly! Guess I need to get myself a pair of boxing gloves for when I'm feeling adventurous while crossing the street.
So did I!
San Francisco began a similar campaign around 1999 or 2000. With much cooler posters, I might add. I don't have exact data in terms of how the campaign affected behavior, but anecdotally I've heard it made somewhat of a difference. Who really knows about stuff like this? The cell phone issue is just one example that comes to mind.
But I do have to say that if I get a jaywalking ticket in the District of Columbia, that sucker is getting blown up and framed on my wall. I have a better shot at getting cuffed and stuffed for eating fries on the metro.
Check out this bogus bill by Councilman Graham. Why do you Ward 1 people keep voting for this fool?
Of Course! What better way to save lives and improve driver/pedestrian relations than the DC Way---and by that I mean in the most half-assed way possible.
Honestly, if one more person walks across the middle of the street holding their hand up I'm going to scream. I'm not looking for pedestrians who aren't at intersections and about 3 years ago my wife picked up coffee right out of the shop when someone walks in front of us, no intersection, arm raised and I slammed on the break, spewing steaming hot coffee all over the interior of our car. Another time I was in an intersection in Mt Pleasant making a turn when a pedestrian walked straight off the sidewalk and put their hand on my hood as my car was moving. Whatever happened to "Don't touch a moving car." DC still isn't as bad as Langley Park, MD though. I talked to a Salvadoran friend about the immigration issue and he said that he knows farm folk who moved here who never lived near any kind of private cars, just buses and tractors.
I am from NYC and now live in DC and I have to say that the psychology behind pedestrians is totally different.
Pedestrians in DC feel they have the right of way and consequently walk out into the street expecting the traffic to stop.
In NYC, you don't walk out into the street if there is traffic coming unless you're SURE they are going to stop for you at the light and they actually do.
I've driven in both cities and the liberties that pedestrians take in DC is startling. Even stopping in the middle of the street in front of cars that are turning the corner in a sort of defiance of the oncoming drivers.
Now what makes more sense, expecting cars to stop for you and walking out into an intersection or waiting on the sidewalk in safety while they do or at least slow down? In Cars vs. People, cars will win.
This is not to say that traffic laws should not be obeyed or pedestrians should be made to fear oncoming traffic, but people in DC need to think a little more before straying into the street relying on the expectation that traffic laws will be obeyed by everyone. That kind of mentality leads to tragedy.
"I'm not looking for pedestrians who aren't at intersections"
Then you are not driving in a safe manner. The key to defensive driving is to expect the unexpected. Yes, the pedestrians are in the wrong, but will that really soothe your mind if you mow someone down?
Funny to see this post considering I was almost hit by a police car while crossing the street this morning (at a green light, in the crosswalk). The police car casually drove right through the red light. No sirens or warning. I'm thinking the police officer driving either just didn't care, or didn't see the red light in question. I probably would have flicked off the car if it hadn't been ... you know ... a cop.
How many pedestrians have died this year?
How many people have been robbed / assaulted / murdered?
I want my tax dollars spent locking these thugs up ...
Richard,
I don't get it. What's your point? You don't want there to be any safety-related initiatives that don't have to do with robbery, assault & murder?
The ad campaign, I agree, is lame-o. However ...
What's interesting to me is the tremendous amount of disregard motorized vehicles in my neighborhood have for people trying to cross at crosswalks. I'm thinking if they have such disregard, why is it any suprise that pedestrians jaywalk? Seriously, the safety of the pedestrian is no greater by crossing at places where cars are supposed to stop.
Then you are not driving in a safe manner. The key to defensive driving is to expect the unexpected. Yes, the pedestrians are in the wrong, but will that really soothe your mind if you mow someone down?
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Yes that was EXACTLY what I wrote!
DC Adult illiteracy rate higher than national average
www.wjla.com/news/stories/0307/406743.html
"I'm not looking for pedestrians who aren't at intersections"
Then you are not driving in a safe manner. The key to defensive driving is to expect the unexpected. Yes, the pedestrians are in the wrong, but will that really soothe your mind if you mow someone down?
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Wow, where's that article about functional illiteracy in DC... you mis-twisted my words so fast I should sue you for whiplash.
Sorry Don, I just don't see what I wrote in your #9. You're right, maybe I'm functionally illiterate. Feel free to clarify your original post.
Yeah, I must be functionally illiterate too, because I don't understand Don's point. What if that ped had been a 4-year-old or a dog? As the larger thing, it's your responsibility to look for smaller things in your way, even if they "aren't in intersections."
As for consistent enforcement of traffic laws, as DCist promotes, I totally disagree that traffic cameras are at all useful. Sure, everyone slows down for those 100 meters where the camera is looking, which is great for the 8 houses or whatever nearby, but then people speed right back up again. It makes money for the District when people don't know where the cameras are, but they offer no overall gain in safety outside of those zones. They're just stupidity tax, but unlike the lottery, it's not voluntary.
This programs is absurd. I can't believe that anybody would accuse pedestrians of being wrong. It's the car people who cause ALL of the problems by their excessive driving in bedroom sized vehicles. Here's a better idea, wall off parts of the city to cars so that the rest of us can enjoy the freedom to simply walk without having to worry about being killed by the car people. It is crazy that we ever were persuaded to think that having motor vehicles mixing it up with walkers could ever be acceptable. Driving is for losers and always has been.
I've done this before, but it looks like it's time yet again to appeal for even-handedness on both sides of the car-vs-ped debate.
The fact of the matter is, pedestrians DO jaywalk from time to time. Those of you in cars know this, so you should always be aware and watching for it,. Those of you who are pedestrians should be aware of the fact that doing so creates a safety hazard, and so if you're going to jaywalk, you'd better be damn sure that conditions are safe to do so.
On the flip side, drivers DO take extra liberties, and very often become aggresive drivers (especially when conditions are right for extra frustration). I'm sure every pedestrian has stories of drivers cutting them off when they had the right of way or almost running them over by going way too fast down a residential street. Pedestrians need to recognize that being behind the wheel sometimes makes otherwise fine people become asses. And drivers need to recognize when they are being a asses and adjust their behavior accordingly.
The only thing any of us can do is check our own behavior because it's the only thing we can control in any situation. I'd have a better opinion of DC program if that were the message they were delivering.
Yeah, I must be functionally illiterate too, because I don't understand Don's point. What if that ped had been a 4-year-old or a dog? As the larger thing, it's your responsibility to look for smaller things in your way, even if they "aren't in intersections."
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If you think that's what I meant then you would HAVE to assume I was insane, correct? A sane person would not write that, so either I'm insane or you misread my post, one has to be true, correct?
If that's how you view these discussions, as constantly looking for lunatics, then that's what you're imagining you're finding. Why you'd want to live in that kind of world is beyond me, but you wrote what you wrote. Either way it's in your head, not in my post.
The 4 year olds you discuss are less pedantically literal than you.
Yeah, I must be functionally illiterate too, because I don't understand Don's point. What if that ped had been a 4-year-old or a dog? As the larger thing, it's your responsibility to look for smaller things in your way, even if they "aren't in intersections."
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If you think that's what I meant then you would HAVE to assume I was insane, correct? A sane person would not write that, so either I'm insane or you misread my post, one has to be true, correct?
If that's how you view these discussions, as constantly looking for lunatics, then that's what you're imagining you're finding. Why you'd want to live in that kind of world is beyond me, but you wrote what you wrote. Either way it's in your head, not in my post.
The 4 year olds you discuss are less pedantically literal than you.
I'm convinced. Don either is insane, or is intentionally f*cking with me.