What Should Be Done to Curb Jaywalking?
Contributor
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When police try to enforce jaywalking laws, it's often a cause for a lot of verbal bashing by the anti-government, anti-establishment types and even some city officials. See what happened last July when police officials in the City of Savannah tried to make their city safer for pedestrians by issuing jaywalking tickets. Now their fines were out of line, but some complained just about the enforcement.
But what should be done? Just last night on my way home I had a man cross against the light with his two young children running along behind him. Now we had the green light but traffic had to wait for them to all get across. Then at the next light, another man ran into traffic - crossing on the green light and again cars had to screech to a halt to miss him. You also see a lot of folks step out between parked cars to cross the street, practically scaring the living daylights out of the drivers who pass them. Then yesterday an elderly woman in South Daytona tried to cross the street in her motorized wheelchair, not at a crosswalk, and unfortunately was struck and killed by a passing vehicle.
Now if a pedestrian, or individual in a wheelchair, is hit and found to be at fault, of course the driver would not be cited. The pedestrian would cited if they lived through accident. But who wants to go through life knowing you killed someone with your car - even if it wasn't your fault? I can imagine you would still have nightmares.
Apparently walking to the corner to cross and then waiting for the light is just too much trouble. So what's the solution? Do we need more education? More enforcement? I don't have an answer - but I do know that I stay vigilant watching for jaywalkers just waiting to step in front of my car.