Tow #18 "When Pedestrians Get Mixed Signals"

In the NYTimes article "When Pedestrians Get Mixed Signals" Tom Vanderbilt explores the topic of jaywalking and whether the pedestrians or drivers should take the blame for the accidents that result. He argues that the pedestrians should not be blamed for jaywalking. Instead, through the use of citations, stats, and anecdotes, Vanderbilt claims that better walking infrastructure, slower car speeds and more pedestrians will increase the safety of the pedestrian and decrease the need for jaywalking. Vanderbilt introduces his article by explaining why enforcement and education about jaywalking is not working. He presents a counterargument by citing a Los Angeles police officer who says, "We're heavily enforcing pedestrian violences because they're impending traffic and causing too many accidents and deaths". Vanderbilt refutes the idea aggressive enforcement, by pointing out that the rules for jaywalking vary greatly between states and internationally and the lack of constancy is confusing for pedestrians. Jaywalking in Canada, Spain, Poland, Singapore and Australia is considered a harsh offense but in Scandinavia and Britain is not considered a big deal. In addition, he provides a general stat that attempts at educating teenage driving films and seat belt usage awareness campaigns have barely had an impact on lowering teen accident deaths. Vanderbilt then explains that he personally jaywalks with his daughter frequently because he feels it is safer then following the pedestrian light. "..the times we came closest to being hit by cars were when we had the "Walk" signal and a driver attempted to make a turn". Finally, Vanderbilt makes a claim of policy and urges that “rather than punishing people for opting out of the system, a more effective approach is to opt in”. He argues that pedestrians are more likely to cross against the signal if lights exist to tell them how long the wait is and encourages cities to be proactive by installing these lights for pedestrians.