California's Broken Jaywalking Law • Hacker News Board

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#51

Post by MichaelGG » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 3:42 AM UTC

cauterized wrote: post #46

MichaelGG wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet the countdowns are also at intersections that have no middle place. In such cases, it's a binary decision, made for people of all ability ranges. The countdown provides no useful information to act upon and should thus be removed. Though I agree - there should be some way to indicate "do not attempt crossing, even if you think you're so fast." Perhaps adjust the countdown and keep the hand for several seconds mor…

What does a median have to do with it? The countdown allows me to choose to cross if there are 20 sec left (enough time for me to get across anything less than an 8-lane highway) or not to cross till the next light if there are only 3 sec left when I reach the curb. With old-school flashing lights all I know is that the light will change soon, but gives me no idea HOW soon. In pedestrian friendly cities generally peo…

But the countdown occurs while the hand for no crossing is showing and that's jaywalking. Unless the point is to say "don't cross, unless you're fast". After the hand goes up, it should be just don't cross. Otherwise people will mostly try to outrun the light, especially in the US as there is little fear of a stopped driver hitting you (vs, say, Latin American countries).

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#52

Post by hijiri » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 4:49 AM UTC

flurp wrote: post #41

Maybe the problem is the length of countdown timers? I don't know how they are determined and set but anecdotally I often see 10 seconds or sometimes others in excess of 15s or even 20s on a road that takes ~5s to cross. It seems to me like this is a reasonable law IF the timers were set to only give the pedestrians minimal amount of time to cross the street. Given it takes 5s to cross, timer starts with 5 remaining.…

It might just be that the car traffic signals are patterned to last that long, so the pedestrian crossing signals are the same length to match. But that would depend on the crosswalk.

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#53

Post by runamok » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 6:58 AM UTC

Swizec wrote: post #42

dmitrygr wrote: post #20

Refuse to talk to cops (always, not just about jaywalking). Do not provide ID ever (unless driving, since it also happens to be your DL) and do not answer questions as to whether you have ID. The amount of paperwork they'll need to fill out in order to arrest you (and thus allow them to search you [the claim will be that the search is for weapons for their safety, but anything they find is free for them to use/look a…

> Do not provide ID ever (unless driving, since it also happens to be your DL) and do not answer questions as to whether you have ID. Isn't it technically illegal for an adult not to have ID on them?

There is no form of ID required to walk around in the US. If I am not driving I don't have to carry my DL.

If a police officer asks you to stop and what your name is, you ARE required to ID yourself in most states but not to prove it via ID.

> "Stop and identify" statutes are statute laws in the United States that authorize police[1] to legally obtain the identification of someone whom they reasonably suspect has committed a crime. If the person is not reasonably suspected of committing a crime, they are not required to provide identification, even in states with stop and identify statutes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_and_identify_statutes

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#54

Post by vegedor » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 9:49 AM UTC

MBlume wrote: post #40

killerdhmo wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't really an endorsement though is it. IANAL and I'm not often in court with cops and I say cooperate they're people too. shrugs

They're...people who want to point guns at you and steal your money? Why would anyone want to cooperate with people like that?

because if you cooperate, they have one reason less to feel aggravated or get agitated. It's not black and white, good or bad, don't tempt a cop with a short fuse.

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#55

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 10:02 AM UTC

cozzyd wrote: post #18

JoshTriplett wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, if the speed limit was set at 75mph, would that remain the common speed of traffic, or would the common speed increase with the limit?

On the Autobahn people drive at infinity km/h

[deleted]

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#56

Post by ZeroGravitas » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 10:03 AM UTC

meddlepal wrote: post #26

tommoor wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an Englishman I find the idea of jaywalking quaint

As a Bostonian I find the idea of heriditary rule quaint.

Technically they don't rule, they're just a prominent part of a network of very rich and well-connected families that move in the same social circles, go to the same schools, give each other jobs and sometimes intermarry. Luckily Boston has nothing like that.

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#57

Post by iwwr » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 12:03 PM UTC

The fact that there is such a thing as 'jaywalking' is a broken aspect of modern society.

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#58

Post by upofadown » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 12:31 PM UTC

I'm actually OK with the enforcement. The politicians should do their damn jobs and update the laws. The police shouldn't have to maintain a list of exceptions in their heads.

... and yes, this is a car culture thing. Most of the broken laws relate to bikes and pedestrians in the places where I have bothered to look.

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#59

Post by cousin_it » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 12:38 PM UTC

rtpg wrote: post #16

escherize wrote: post #2

This is a bit like keeping speed limits down at 65 mph (a standard set when car technology was 50 years less mature). It's another way that the state can selectively punish most any citizen at will, within the bounds of law.

car technology was 50 years less mature, but are our brains any better? There's a lot of studies showing the strong correlation between speed limits and car accident fatalities, even recently

I became much more skeptical about correlations after I read somewhere that cholesterol might be not a cause of heart disease, but rather a part of the body's reaction to heart disease. For some reason, that example just hit me really hard. People think that they can make causal conclusions from observed correlations, but they are wrong.

As a rule of thumb, any correlation observed in the wild has at least three equally plausible explanations, two of which are tailored to the narratives of the two main political parties.

Re: California's Broken Jaywalking Law

#60

Post by lsaferite » Thu, Apr 16, 2015, 12:42 PM UTC

iopq wrote: post #48

jballanc wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I definitely don't think it's just you. Once, when I lived in the valley, I was at a restaurant on one side of the street and wanted to go to a shop across the street, but it was the middle of the block and I didn't feel like walking to the cross-walk. The road was 3 lanes in either direction, but there was a wide grassy median, so I did what I've always done growing up in NYC: I crossed the near 3 lanes and waited o…

Even worse, you get to street that has no sidewalk at all, you cross and the other side has no sidewalk either. Literally no sidewalk on either side of the street!

Welcome to 90%+ of the US.

I live in a fairly rural city and drive a stretch of road every morning with no sidewalk and lots of walkers in the grass. And the speed limit is 65. I'm constantly worried some idiot will wander onto the road.