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As a pedestrian I will take a busy light controlled intersection with a pedestrian scramble type walk signal over a busy 4-way stop where every single time. Wi

As a pedestrian I will take a busy light controlled intersection with a pedestrian scramble type walk signal over a busy 4-way stop where every single time. With the 4-way stop there is never a time in the cycle when all traffic is stopped. The drivers who are present are continuously paying attention to what other drivers are doing which robs them of situational awareness to note pedestrians. You can try and time it but that's risky. With the walk signal there is a brief moment in time when the drivers are doing nothing but waiting for you and are all stopped so you as a pedestrian can account for them in preparation just before you get your signal and make your move. The author can get lost with this sort of textbook correct but questionable in reality take. Legally having the right of way doesn't make you any less dead when the driver who's got three other drivers to pay attention to doesn't see you.

itishappy 2y ago
> With the 4-way stop there is never a time when all traffic is stopped and the drivers are always paying attention to what other drivers are doing. With the walk signal there is a brief moment in time when the drivers are doing nothing but waiting for you and are all stopped so you as a pedestrian can account for them in preparation just before you get your signal and make your move. That's... not true? With light traffic a 4 way stop should have no cars at all at it most of the time, leaving pedestrians with the right of way, whereas with a traffic light there will always be a road with priority until a pedestrian hits the button. Requiring cars to pay attention to the condition of the intersection is the explicit design goal. This was laid out very clearly in the article we just read.
- potato3732842 2y ago
  >That's... not true? With light traffic a 4 way stop should have no cars at all at it most of the time, leaving pedestrians with the right of way, whereas with a traffic light there will always be a road with priority until a pedestrian hits the button. Requiring cars to pay attention to the condition of the intersection is the explicit design goal. >This was laid out very clearly in the article we just read. <facepalm> This is what I mean about theory vs reality. 4-way stops don't look like the animation they show you in driver's ed. In practice what happens is that non conflicting traffic tends to parallelize so someone taking a left might start their left while the person across from them is finishing theirs (or one of any other bunch of combinations) so there's a car in motion basically all the time the situational awareness of every driver who's about to get their turn is mostly absorbed in monitoring who's turn it is and who's going where. So when you're a pedestrian and you don't time it right you could find yourself starting to cross right before someone wants to drive where you're crossing. Usually this is because you started walking before it was their turn and they didn't notice you until it was their turn and they started moving (because they were accounting for the other traffic) until it was their turn at which point they started looking where they were going as well. Normally this results in absolutely nothing, you speed up a little, they don't gas it as hard, everyone goes on their merry way. But the potential for things to go badly if the conflicting driver is inattentive or further distracted is very much there. Sure, theoretically the rules say they shouldn't do that but that's not how reality works. There's just so much less potential for conflict if there is a scheduled time when all the cars stop and then the walking happens. Even without a dedicated walk time it's just so much easier to time it when there's a light because you can start walking when all the cars have red and only have to look out for right on red or potential red light runners, it's a much easier problem than the degree of swiveling your head around you need to do to at a busy 4-way.
  - itishappy 2y ago
    > ... the situational awareness of every driver who's about to get their turn is mostly absorbed in monitoring who's turn it is and who's going where. Right, that's the intent. Drivers paying attention to their surroundings is the goal. > So if you're a pedestrian and you don't time it right you could find yourself starting to cross right before someone wants to drive where you're crossing. Usually this is because you started walking before it was their turn... You have the right of way! > There's just so much less potential for conflict if there is a scheduled time when all the cars stop and then the walking happens. How about a system where all cars are expected to stop all the time?
    - david-gpu 2y ago
      > Drivers paying attention to their surroundings is the goal. In the real world, drivers don't pay attention to their surroundings; instead, they look for other cars to avoid being hit. Further down the list is avoiding static obstacles like street lights or bollards. Lastly, they may think of looking for pedestrians. In other words, they care about their safety, not their neighbor's. Cyclists, if even noticed in the first place, are seen as nothing but a nuisance that should be overtaken at all cost, even when they are about to reach a stop light and there's no room to pass safely. > You have the right of way! A non insignificant number of drivers believe that "might is right" and will knowingly play chicken with you if they perceive that they are safer in the event of a collision. As a vulnerable road user, you don't know whether the driver you are interacting with will be one of the 95% of reasonable people or one of the 5% of insecure bullies.
      - roguecoder 2y ago
        If you treat that as a given, rather a thing for us to change with environmental design, the only ethical solution is banning private drivers entirely. Encouraging anti-social people's deadly hobbies is terrible for the community.
        david-gpu 2y ago
- PittleyDunkin 2y ago
  > With light traffic a 4 way stop should have no cars at all at it most of the time Unless there's protected right turns, of course.
  - itishappy 2y ago
    Agreed, but I would not call an intersection with a dedicated turning lane a 4 way stop, or at least not a low traffic one.
    - PittleyDunkin 2y ago
      At least in my neighborhood these aren't dedicated turning lanes. Most people do pull into the bike lane to make the turn. Instead, the traffic shifts between straight (which leaves open an opportunity to cross) and right turns (which occupy the entire intersection).
throwway120385 2y ago
> With the walk signal there is a brief moment in time when the drivers are doing nothing but waiting for you and are all stopped so you as a pedestrian can account for them in preparation just before you get your signal and make your move. Having almost been hit a few times by drivers making a right turn on red, I can tell you the drivers never wait even if you have the right of way. You'll be lucky if they even look for you. > Legally having the right of way doesn't make you any less dead when the driver who's got three other drivers to pay attention to doesn't see you. Also, and I know this is unpopular, but maybe you shouldn't dress like that if you don't want the attention.
- afhsrtjwrtj 2y ago
  Why is right-on-red always cited as the biggest problem with turns? My anecdotal experience is that drivers turning on green are way more likely to hit me when I have a walk signal on the cross-street than drivers who turn right on red.
  - RC_ITR 2y ago
    On a green arrow turn, drivers are looking to where they are going. Legally crossing pedestrians are in that cross walk where the driver is looking. With right on red, the driver is also looking to where they are going, but legally crossing pedestrians are not there, they are directly in front of the car. The riskiest thing for a pedestrian is approaching a right on red car from the left, because the driver is simply not looking at you.
    - potato3732842 2y ago
      The big problem with right on red is that it perfectly synchronizes them to hit each other. Say a driver and pedestrian are at the same corner facing the same way and the pedestrian wants to cross into the area the driver wants to turn. The street is busy so the driver can't turn right on the red and the pedestrian isn't gonna just walk against the signal into the traffic. Cross traffic lets up, either because of a big gap or because the light has cycled to red for the cross traffic. The conditions that both parties require before making their move have just been satisfied at the same time. The pedestrian walks and the driver turns, leading to inevitable conflict. If both the driver and the pedestrian are in a hurry and trying to shoot a gap in traffic and go quickly there can be no time for either party to avoid the accident. Edit: The above example is crosswalks only, no dedicated pedestrian signals.
Ensorceled 2y ago
This is just not true. In Toronto for instance, the majority of pedestrian deaths are caused by impaired/distracted drivers with a significant portion of failure to yield by left turning drivers at major, light controlled intersections. There isn't even a category for "four way stop" pedestrian fatalities.
- jonpurdy 2y ago
  Speed is nearly everything and controlling (ie. reducing) speed should be the primary way to influence fatality rates. Having lived in both Toronto and SF, both cities with 4-way stop and controlled lights intersections. I'll take 4-way stop any day since speeds are lower. Much better to get hit by a car at near zero speed than a right or left turning car at higher speed. Which is probably why Toronto doesn't have a category for four way stop fatalities. (The worst are SF's 2-way stops at intersections between equally-sized roads that show up randomly throughout Sunset. Worst of both worlds.)
  - michaelleslie 2y ago
    > (The worst are SF's 2-way stops at intersections between equally-sized roads that show up randomly throughout Sunset. Worst of both worlds.) As a cyclist, I've been yelled at by drivers for not stopping at that type of intersection, where they have a stop sign and I don't. People are working off of their personal version of the rules of the road, where they are always right.
  - Ensorceled 2y ago
    > I'll take 4-way stop any day since speeds are lower. Exactly. People are, at worst, doing a "rolling stop" so they are still only going a few kph when they "didn't see" you.
    - gowld 2y ago
      A municipality could (and should) add speed bumps or other traffic-calming measures even at the approach the light-controlled crossing where pedestrians are often present.
JB_Dev 2y ago
Make it a roundabout with protected pedestrian crossings. That forces drivers to be looking at the conflict point with pedestrians as they manoeuvre the roundabout.
- rhplus 2y ago
  This. Roundabouts with medians. The answer is (almost) always roundabouts.
- gs17 2y ago
  Those don't fix it in my experience. There's one about a quarter mile from where I'm sitting right now and I avoid it when walking because of how dangerous it is. Yes, they will see you crossing... as they almost hit you. They recently redid it to be a bit safer for driving on (before people were unclear on how many lanes it had and which lanes could turn where) but it doesn't seem to have improved the pedestrian experience much.
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  in practice i find this does not work well at all… for some reason in roundabouts is when cars most feel justified in running down a pedestrian in a crosswalk. sometimes i think they’re just afraid to slow bc of the cars behind them
- roguecoder 2y ago
  I was very impressed in Denmark, where that roundabout approach worked very well. Every car slowed down & stopped for me at the crosswalks. It turned out that that was because they installed a cobblestone speed bump in front of every crosswalk. Cars slowed down even if no pedestrians were around, because otherwise they were going to pop a tire. It made walking so much safer than anywhere else I've been.
unethical_ban 2y ago
A stat of how many injuries occurred at this intersection would help settle your point. You're talking a lot of theory, where this person seems to have lived and traversed this intersection many times without incident. Was the upgrade worth $600,000 in this town, this street? And why, if it is a small town with heavy pedestrian traffic, does it default to vehicular movement instead of pedestrian movement?
throwawayffffas 2y ago
It's not even a textbook correct take. Its less risky to run a stop sign in a clear intersection than to run a red light. There are more people likely to run a stop sign on an empty intersection than a red light.
rob74 2y ago
I get your point, but still, while the "pedestrian scramble" is maybe good for pedestrian safety, it's probably the worst solution for pedestrian speed. If the pedestrian lights were at least green at the same time with the car light in the same direction, you would at least have a chance of crossing the street without having to wait. This way, the lights never turn green on their own (as seen in the video), so you always have to press a button and wait.
dylan604 2y ago
> With the walk signal there is a brief moment in time when the drivers are doing nothing but waiting for you In my area, there are plenty of stop lights with pedestrian signals where both are active at the same time. This allows the traffic to flow if there are no pedestrians on the assumption the drivers will recognize the pedestrians have right of way. To me, this is bat shit crazy level of assumptions. Either protect the pedestrians, or you might as well remove the pedestrian signal.
whimsicalism 2y ago
i hate pedestrian scramble systems they make it so slow to walk anywhere
enragedcacti 2y ago
> The author can get lost with this sort of textbook correct but questionable in reality take I find this perspective very weird when (1) the "textbook" take (i.e. the one traffic engineers follow) is to almost always prioritize vehicle speed and driver safety over everything else, and (2) in what world is it questionable in reality when it existed in reality for decades, seemingly without incident?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
dylan-m 2y ago
This is why it's often safer to "jaywalk". If you're in the middle of a block, you only have to look two ways. Even if you screw up, a driver going at a reasonable speed is more likely to see you anyway because you're directly in front of them. I'm not exactly advocating for crossing in the middle of a street in North America since it's depends a lot on the situation, but there's a reason why people sometimes just do it intuitively, and it's unfortunate our infrastructure doesn't know how to address it.
- pclmulqdq 2y ago
  Jaywalking is very common in the Northeastern US, and I believe it is generally safer when done well. I have a rule that if you don't feel like you can calmly saunter across the street, you shouldn't jaywalk by running across, but many people do not follow such a rule, and just take the soonest opportunity they can find to run across the street. Be careful, though - I once jaywalked when I was with some friends from the Midwest and they were very offended.
- jerlam 2y ago
  California just made jaywalking legal in 2023 too.
  - hoherd 2y ago
    NYC legalized jaywalking in 2024, and the change will take effect next month, Feb 2025. https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/jaywalking-legalized-in-nyc/ https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/jaywalking-legalized-in...
- postoplust 2y ago
  mid-block crosswalks exist[1] and can placed where people already "jaywalk". To me it's like installing sidewalks on the desire paths[2]. [1]: https://sustainablecitycode.org/brief/mid-block-pedestrian-crossings-2/ https://sustainablecitycode.org/brief/mid-block-pedestrian-c... [2]: https://99percentinvisible.org/article/least-resistance-desire-paths-can-lead-better-design/ https://99percentinvisible.org/article/least-resistance-desi...
standardUser 2y ago
A 4-way stop is the best intersection for pedestrians in terms of speed. Just keep walking and don't yield your right of way. You may need to put up a hand to make yourself seen by the occasional distracted motorist. But because all vehicles need to stop, the average speed you are dealing with is 0-5mph, so the risk is low and everyone has time to react. Compare that with any lighted intersection where some cars are going full speed, making it a far more dangerous scenario.
toss1 2y ago
Plus, the author is wrong about both drivers running the red light. YEs, they are pushing the yellow, but they are both legal insofar as the car is over the line when the light turns red. The first "running the red light" car at 11sec has his/her bumper fully over the white line in the last yellow-light video frame and his wheel fully on the line in the first video frame when the light is red. The second "running the red light car" has the entire car more than half way across the intersection with the light still yellow. His point still stands that people are rushing to make the light, but it does his point no good to exaggerate like that. While the 4-way-stop was maybe better for pedestrians, as traffic increased that would degrade. Overall, it probably would be favorable to fix it in favor of pedestrians instead of vehicles, and to that end they should be narrowing the street and adding close-in trees and obstacles to cue the drivers that it is a much slower zone.

itishappy 2y ago

> With the 4-way stop there is never a time when all traffic is stopped and the drivers are always paying attention to what other drivers are doing. With the walk signal there is a brief moment in time when the drivers are doing nothing but waiting for you and are all stopped so you as a pedestrian can account for them in preparation just before you get your signal and make your move. That's... not true? With light traffic a 4 way stop should have no cars at all at it most of the time, leaving pedestrians with the right of way, whereas with a traffic light there will always be a road with priority until a pedestrian hits the button. Requiring cars to pay attention to the condition of the intersection is the explicit design goal. This was laid out very clearly in the article we just read.

potato3732842 2y ago
>That's... not true? With light traffic a 4 way stop should have no cars at all at it most of the time, leaving pedestrians with the right of way, whereas with a traffic light there will always be a road with priority until a pedestrian hits the button. Requiring cars to pay attention to the condition of the intersection is the explicit design goal. >This was laid out very clearly in the article we just read. <facepalm> This is what I mean about theory vs reality. 4-way stops don't look like the animation they show you in driver's ed. In practice what happens is that non conflicting traffic tends to parallelize so someone taking a left might start their left while the person across from them is finishing theirs (or one of any other bunch of combinations) so there's a car in motion basically all the time the situational awareness of every driver who's about to get their turn is mostly absorbed in monitoring who's turn it is and who's going where. So when you're a pedestrian and you don't time it right you could find yourself starting to cross right before someone wants to drive where you're crossing. Usually this is because you started walking before it was their turn and they didn't notice you until it was their turn and they started moving (because they were accounting for the other traffic) until it was their turn at which point they started looking where they were going as well. Normally this results in absolutely nothing, you speed up a little, they don't gas it as hard, everyone goes on their merry way. But the potential for things to go badly if the conflicting driver is inattentive or further distracted is very much there. Sure, theoretically the rules say they shouldn't do that but that's not how reality works. There's just so much less potential for conflict if there is a scheduled time when all the cars stop and then the walking happens. Even without a dedicated walk time it's just so much easier to time it when there's a light because you can start walking when all the cars have red and only have to look out for right on red or potential red light runners, it's a much easier problem than the degree of swiveling your head around you need to do to at a busy 4-way.
- itishappy 2y ago
  > ... the situational awareness of every driver who's about to get their turn is mostly absorbed in monitoring who's turn it is and who's going where. Right, that's the intent. Drivers paying attention to their surroundings is the goal. > So if you're a pedestrian and you don't time it right you could find yourself starting to cross right before someone wants to drive where you're crossing. Usually this is because you started walking before it was their turn... You have the right of way! > There's just so much less potential for conflict if there is a scheduled time when all the cars stop and then the walking happens. How about a system where all cars are expected to stop all the time?
  - david-gpu 2y ago
    > Drivers paying attention to their surroundings is the goal. In the real world, drivers don't pay attention to their surroundings; instead, they look for other cars to avoid being hit. Further down the list is avoiding static obstacles like street lights or bollards. Lastly, they may think of looking for pedestrians. In other words, they care about their safety, not their neighbor's. Cyclists, if even noticed in the first place, are seen as nothing but a nuisance that should be overtaken at all cost, even when they are about to reach a stop light and there's no room to pass safely. > You have the right of way! A non insignificant number of drivers believe that "might is right" and will knowingly play chicken with you if they perceive that they are safer in the event of a collision. As a vulnerable road user, you don't know whether the driver you are interacting with will be one of the 95% of reasonable people or one of the 5% of insecure bullies.
    - roguecoder 2y ago
      If you treat that as a given, rather a thing for us to change with environmental design, the only ethical solution is banning private drivers entirely. Encouraging anti-social people's deadly hobbies is terrible for the community.
      - david-gpu 2y ago
PittleyDunkin 2y ago
> With light traffic a 4 way stop should have no cars at all at it most of the time Unless there's protected right turns, of course.
- itishappy 2y ago
  Agreed, but I would not call an intersection with a dedicated turning lane a 4 way stop, or at least not a low traffic one.
  - PittleyDunkin 2y ago
    At least in my neighborhood these aren't dedicated turning lanes. Most people do pull into the bike lane to make the turn. Instead, the traffic shifts between straight (which leaves open an opportunity to cross) and right turns (which occupy the entire intersection).

throwway120385 2y ago

> With the walk signal there is a brief moment in time when the drivers are doing nothing but waiting for you and are all stopped so you as a pedestrian can account for them in preparation just before you get your signal and make your move. Having almost been hit a few times by drivers making a right turn on red, I can tell you the drivers never wait even if you have the right of way. You'll be lucky if they even look for you. > Legally having the right of way doesn't make you any less dead when the driver who's got three other drivers to pay attention to doesn't see you. Also, and I know this is unpopular, but maybe you shouldn't dress like that if you don't want the attention.

afhsrtjwrtj 2y ago
Why is right-on-red always cited as the biggest problem with turns? My anecdotal experience is that drivers turning on green are way more likely to hit me when I have a walk signal on the cross-street than drivers who turn right on red.
- RC_ITR 2y ago
  On a green arrow turn, drivers are looking to where they are going. Legally crossing pedestrians are in that cross walk where the driver is looking. With right on red, the driver is also looking to where they are going, but legally crossing pedestrians are not there, they are directly in front of the car. The riskiest thing for a pedestrian is approaching a right on red car from the left, because the driver is simply not looking at you.
  - potato3732842 2y ago
    The big problem with right on red is that it perfectly synchronizes them to hit each other. Say a driver and pedestrian are at the same corner facing the same way and the pedestrian wants to cross into the area the driver wants to turn. The street is busy so the driver can't turn right on the red and the pedestrian isn't gonna just walk against the signal into the traffic. Cross traffic lets up, either because of a big gap or because the light has cycled to red for the cross traffic. The conditions that both parties require before making their move have just been satisfied at the same time. The pedestrian walks and the driver turns, leading to inevitable conflict. If both the driver and the pedestrian are in a hurry and trying to shoot a gap in traffic and go quickly there can be no time for either party to avoid the accident. Edit: The above example is crosswalks only, no dedicated pedestrian signals.

Ensorceled 2y ago

This is just not true. In Toronto for instance, the majority of pedestrian deaths are caused by impaired/distracted drivers with a significant portion of failure to yield by left turning drivers at major, light controlled intersections. There isn't even a category for "four way stop" pedestrian fatalities.

jonpurdy 2y ago
Speed is nearly everything and controlling (ie. reducing) speed should be the primary way to influence fatality rates. Having lived in both Toronto and SF, both cities with 4-way stop and controlled lights intersections. I'll take 4-way stop any day since speeds are lower. Much better to get hit by a car at near zero speed than a right or left turning car at higher speed. Which is probably why Toronto doesn't have a category for four way stop fatalities. (The worst are SF's 2-way stops at intersections between equally-sized roads that show up randomly throughout Sunset. Worst of both worlds.)
- michaelleslie 2y ago
  > (The worst are SF's 2-way stops at intersections between equally-sized roads that show up randomly throughout Sunset. Worst of both worlds.) As a cyclist, I've been yelled at by drivers for not stopping at that type of intersection, where they have a stop sign and I don't. People are working off of their personal version of the rules of the road, where they are always right.
- Ensorceled 2y ago
  > I'll take 4-way stop any day since speeds are lower. Exactly. People are, at worst, doing a "rolling stop" so they are still only going a few kph when they "didn't see" you.
  - gowld 2y ago
    A municipality could (and should) add speed bumps or other traffic-calming measures even at the approach the light-controlled crossing where pedestrians are often present.

JB_Dev 2y ago

Make it a roundabout with protected pedestrian crossings. That forces drivers to be looking at the conflict point with pedestrians as they manoeuvre the roundabout.

rhplus 2y ago
This. Roundabouts with medians. The answer is (almost) always roundabouts.
gs17 2y ago
Those don't fix it in my experience. There's one about a quarter mile from where I'm sitting right now and I avoid it when walking because of how dangerous it is. Yes, they will see you crossing... as they almost hit you. They recently redid it to be a bit safer for driving on (before people were unclear on how many lanes it had and which lanes could turn where) but it doesn't seem to have improved the pedestrian experience much.
whimsicalism 2y ago
in practice i find this does not work well at all… for some reason in roundabouts is when cars most feel justified in running down a pedestrian in a crosswalk. sometimes i think they’re just afraid to slow bc of the cars behind them
roguecoder 2y ago
I was very impressed in Denmark, where that roundabout approach worked very well. Every car slowed down & stopped for me at the crosswalks. It turned out that that was because they installed a cobblestone speed bump in front of every crosswalk. Cars slowed down even if no pedestrians were around, because otherwise they were going to pop a tire. It made walking so much safer than anywhere else I've been.

unethical_ban 2y ago

A stat of how many injuries occurred at this intersection would help settle your point. You're talking a lot of theory, where this person seems to have lived and traversed this intersection many times without incident. Was the upgrade worth $600,000 in this town, this street? And why, if it is a small town with heavy pedestrian traffic, does it default to vehicular movement instead of pedestrian movement?

throwawayffffas 2y ago

It's not even a textbook correct take. Its less risky to run a stop sign in a clear intersection than to run a red light. There are more people likely to run a stop sign on an empty intersection than a red light.

rob74 2y ago

I get your point, but still, while the "pedestrian scramble" is maybe good for pedestrian safety, it's probably the worst solution for pedestrian speed. If the pedestrian lights were at least green at the same time with the car light in the same direction, you would at least have a chance of crossing the street without having to wait. This way, the lights never turn green on their own (as seen in the video), so you always have to press a button and wait.

dylan604 2y ago

> With the walk signal there is a brief moment in time when the drivers are doing nothing but waiting for you In my area, there are plenty of stop lights with pedestrian signals where both are active at the same time. This allows the traffic to flow if there are no pedestrians on the assumption the drivers will recognize the pedestrians have right of way. To me, this is bat shit crazy level of assumptions. Either protect the pedestrians, or you might as well remove the pedestrian signal.

whimsicalism 2y ago

i hate pedestrian scramble systems they make it so slow to walk anywhere

enragedcacti 2y ago

> The author can get lost with this sort of textbook correct but questionable in reality take I find this perspective very weird when (1) the "textbook" take (i.e. the one traffic engineers follow) is to almost always prioritize vehicle speed and driver safety over everything else, and (2) in what world is it questionable in reality when it existed in reality for decades, seemingly without incident?

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

dylan-m 2y ago

This is why it's often safer to "jaywalk". If you're in the middle of a block, you only have to look two ways. Even if you screw up, a driver going at a reasonable speed is more likely to see you anyway because you're directly in front of them. I'm not exactly advocating for crossing in the middle of a street in North America since it's depends a lot on the situation, but there's a reason why people sometimes just do it intuitively, and it's unfortunate our infrastructure doesn't know how to address it.

pclmulqdq 2y ago
Jaywalking is very common in the Northeastern US, and I believe it is generally safer when done well. I have a rule that if you don't feel like you can calmly saunter across the street, you shouldn't jaywalk by running across, but many people do not follow such a rule, and just take the soonest opportunity they can find to run across the street. Be careful, though - I once jaywalked when I was with some friends from the Midwest and they were very offended.
jerlam 2y ago
California just made jaywalking legal in 2023 too.
- hoherd 2y ago
  NYC legalized jaywalking in 2024, and the change will take effect next month, Feb 2025. https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/jaywalking-legalized-in-nyc/ https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/jaywalking-legalized-in...
postoplust 2y ago
mid-block crosswalks exist[1] and can placed where people already "jaywalk". To me it's like installing sidewalks on the desire paths[2]. [1]: https://sustainablecitycode.org/brief/mid-block-pedestrian-crossings-2/ https://sustainablecitycode.org/brief/mid-block-pedestrian-c... [2]: https://99percentinvisible.org/article/least-resistance-desire-paths-can-lead-better-design/ https://99percentinvisible.org/article/least-resistance-desi...

standardUser 2y ago

A 4-way stop is the best intersection for pedestrians in terms of speed. Just keep walking and don't yield your right of way. You may need to put up a hand to make yourself seen by the occasional distracted motorist. But because all vehicles need to stop, the average speed you are dealing with is 0-5mph, so the risk is low and everyone has time to react. Compare that with any lighted intersection where some cars are going full speed, making it a far more dangerous scenario.

toss1 2y ago

Plus, the author is wrong about both drivers running the red light. YEs, they are pushing the yellow, but they are both legal insofar as the car is over the line when the light turns red. The first "running the red light" car at 11sec has his/her bumper fully over the white line in the last yellow-light video frame and his wheel fully on the line in the first video frame when the light is red. The second "running the red light car" has the entire car more than half way across the intersection with the light still yellow. His point still stands that people are rushing to make the light, but it does his point no good to exaggerate like that. While the 4-way-stop was maybe better for pedestrians, as traffic increased that would degrade. Overall, it probably would be favorable to fix it in favor of pedestrians instead of vehicles, and to that end they should be narrowing the street and adding close-in trees and obstacles to cue the drivers that it is a much slower zone.