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Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

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Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#51

Post by cfstras »

seanr88 wrote: post #37
tim333 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UK has no jaywalking laws (apart from full motorways) and about 1/3 the pedestrian deaths of the US ( https://usa.streetsblog.org/2020/10/10/exactly-how-far-u-s-s... ). There are other ways to do things.

No other country has anything to teach the USA. The USA is unique and special for a large number of reasons and so foreign methods won't work here. If I recall they even drive on the other side of the road in the UK, that will never catch on here.

is this satire? I honestly can’t tell.

Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#52

Post by alexanderchr »

wredue wrote: post #39
_aavaa_ wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they did not make the cars inherently safer. A red light does not stop a driver from driving through a pedestrian crossing when people are there. Speeding laws do little for the bikers in unsegregated bike lanes, mere inches away from an inattentive driver.

Maybe I’m just thinking outside of the box here, but how exactly do 3,000 lbs pieces of metal and glass become safer for people crossing the street in an addressable way by auto makers, when it’s the buyers demanding larger and larger vehicles? On segregated bike lanes, I’m afraid to tell you, cyclists don’t use them anyway, so why on earth should anyone focus on putting them in?

Oh cyclists do use segregated lanes, they just have to be done properly. Primarily they need to be safer than sharing the road with heavy vehicles, something that most bike lines spectacularly fail at.

Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#53

Post by talideon »

alexfoo wrote: post #50
seanr88 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No other country has anything to teach the USA. The USA is unique and special for a large number of reasons and so foreign methods won't work here. If I recall they even drive on the other side of the road in the UK, that will never catch on here.

You could phase it in slowly like Ireland did. Cars on a Monday. Lorries and HGVs switch on Wednesday. All remaining traffic on the Friday. Done!

Citation, please?

Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#54

Post by talideon »

cfstras wrote: post #51
seanr88 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No other country has anything to teach the USA. The USA is unique and special for a large number of reasons and so foreign methods won't work here. If I recall they even drive on the other side of the road in the UK, that will never catch on here.

is this satire? I honestly can’t tell.

It is, and blatently so.

Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#55

Post by hef19898 »

tim333 wrote: post #46
TacticalCoder wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany always is doing super well in these rankings. Yet 2/3rd of the highways have no speed limit at all. It's of course unsurprising: all cars are driving in the same direction on the highway so head-on collisions on the highways are extremely rare. Also pedestrian deaths on the highway: the number is so minuscule it doesn't even register.

Germany does have jaywalking laws though. I'm not sure about Holland which has very low pedestrian deaths.

Only for red traffic lights and marked pedesteian crossings. Everything else is fair game, as it should be. One has to love the fact that in the land of the free one cannot cross a street where one wants.

Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#56

Post by scubbo »

retrac wrote: post #23

Worth pointing out that "jaywalking" is not a universal crime. There are jurisdictions in the USA where it's legal. And it's legal here in Canada. Even the term stands out -- I'm familiar with "jaywalking" but you only use a term for it if it's illegal. We just call it "crossing the street", or "impeding the flow of traffic", depending how you do it. (It's not exactly a free for all: in Ontario there is still a requi…

> Worth pointing out that "jaywalking" is not a universal crime.

When I first moved from the UK to the USA, I assumed that "jaywalking" was a made-up thing that you warned tourists about, like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drop_bear. How could crossing the road be _inherently_ illegal, even if done in a safe manner!?

Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#57

Post by giantg2 »

seanr88 wrote: post #42
retrac wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, not obeying pedestrian signalling is one of the exceptions. I'd say that's fairly reasonable -- if people cross freely against indicators it messes with the flow of traffic. I've only seen this actually enforced with examples like in the article, outside a busy transit station.

Even the concept that the flow of traffic is more important than the pedestrian's flow is indicative of the change in attitude. Somehow the car has come to be most important while the pedestrian is a nuisance. Both own and pay for the road but the pedestrian is a second class citizen (obviously some people will moan on about road tax and fuel tax, but these taxes don't come close to paying for the road infrastructure…

"Even the concept that the flow of traffic is more important than the pedestrian's flow"

Is it? It seems like in the example, both parties are following a signal. Cars must yield to pedestrians in crosswalks. Sure, some places have jaywalking laws when not in a crosswalk (in some cases including implied/unmarked crosswalks), and most require impeding traffic as a component. A few places could move towards common sense of adding impeding traffic as a requirement. Nothing I've seen says pedestrians are second class. It's like saying that one should be allowed to run a red light. Everyone can wait their turn.

Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#58

Post by inglor_cz »

sandworm101 wrote: post #2

How quickly we forget history. Horses were also lethal. Look at the number of people killed by horses, either being thrown from them, trampled by them, or run over by carts pulled by horses. Streets were not some utopic garden of pedestrian safety prior to cars. There were no jaywalking rules because society had evolved over thousands of years being rather acceptive of horse-related dangers. When the new device came…

One famous person who was killed by a horse cart was the Nobelist Pierre Curie.

In 1906 no less, at the twilight of the long horse cart era.

Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#59

Post by talideon »

drunner wrote: post #22
Fricken wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quite the opposite. Automakers passed the responsibility on to people who don't even drive.

Same with the oil industry and `reduce, reuse, recycle` nonsense. Like I wouldn't need to be concerned with that if your product didn't individually wrap every item I can purchase in a store.

Reduce, reuse, recycle isn't nonsense, but good sense. What is nonsense is how the fossil fuel industry uses it as a shield to avoid taking responsibility for the damage they do to the world.

Re: Automakers invented the crime of jaywalking (2015)

#60

Post by alexfoo »

talideon wrote: post #53
alexfoo wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could phase it in slowly like Ireland did. Cars on a Monday. Lorries and HGVs switch on Wednesday. All remaining traffic on the Friday. Done!

Citation, please?

https://www.engineersireland.ie/Engineers-Journal/Civil/coul...

(Note that it was a follow up to patently satirical parent comment, but it does remind me that Sweden made the change on 3rd Sep 1967)

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