Police 'targeting downtown pedestrians' - Spec

[Jon Dalton]

I guess this includes alot of us.

http://www.thespec.com/News/Local/article/562624

Police targeting jaywalkers
May 08, 2009
John Burman
Hamilton police are going after downtown pedestrians next week as one of a number of initiatives to mark Canada Road Safety Week.

Officers will be watching for all the usual safety hazards, drinking and driving, speeding, seatbelts and car seat installations as well but Constable Claus Wagner says pedestrians who dart out on a ‘Don’t Walk’ signal will get special attention.

Pedestrians, says Wagner who is the police traffic safety and centralized breath testing unit co-ordinator, don’t always have the right-of-way as they may think.

And, he says, there is a problem in the downtown core and people who walk out into traffic do nothing for motorists’ nerves except make them angry and that can lead to other problems.

So the downtown patrol officers will be watching.

Wagner says police also want to get the message out about drunk driving, because, in spit of the recent changes in law allowing for a three-day licence suspension instead of a warning and a 12-hour suspension, “younger drivers just don’t seem to get it that three beers is too many.”

There have been 183 arrests for alcohol related driving offences so far this year, slightly ahead of last year, he said, so police will have RIDE lanes running in various locations all week.

And they around going to be looking for “hazardous moving” offences as well. Those tickets are for the people who make a left turn from the second lane across a curb lane, or make idiot lane changes or forget turn signals are not only polite but the law.

Those sort of things, says Wagner, are significant in Hamilton.

[FairHamilton]

They should go after the lousy cyclists as well. You know the ones I mean they ride on sidewalks, ride the wrong way on oneway street, blow red lights and stop signs, etc.

[Jon Dalton]

They are already going after cyclists from what I've heard.

[highwater]

They could make a fortune nabbing all the cyclists who whip along the sidewalk endangering school children in front of GR Allan School in Westdale. All the more inexcusable as there is a bike lane a couple of metres away. And God help you if you point out the bike lane to them.

[FairHamilton]

Originally Posted by highwater

They could make a fortune nabbing all the cyclists who whip along the sidewalk endangering school children in front of GR Allan School in Westdale. All the more inexcusable as there is a bike lane a couple of metres away. And God help you if you point out the bike lane to them.

With the cyclists I see riding east on King and West on Main and on sidewalks in my neighbourhood, I'm betting they could make some outstanding warrant arrests.

[FairHamilton]

Originally Posted by highwater

They could make a fortune nabbing all the cyclists who whip along the sidewalk endangering school children in front of GR Allan School in Westdale. All the more inexcusable as there is a bike lane a couple of metres away. And God help you if you point out the bike lane to them.

With the cyclists I see riding east on King and West on Main and on sidewalks in my neighbourhood, I'm betting they could make some outstanding warrant arrests.

[adam]

Here's a novel idea - ticket automobile drivers who go past the 50km/h speed limit along Main and King.

[Blurr]

Originally Posted by FairHamilton

With the cyclists I see riding east on King and West on Main and on sidewalks in my neighbourhood, I'm betting they could make some outstanding warrant arrests.

I find that riding east/west east of king william at wentworth is a pain. There are no side streets from main to barton that go through in this area. It is a a one way highway battle to make it back to a calm street that goes through, such as dunsmure.

That is why I go opposite ways on King especially, east of wentworth.

[Millstone]

Originally Posted by adam

Here's a novel idea - ticket automobile drivers who go past the 50km/h speed limit along Main and King.

Oh shut up and stop jaywalking.

[hmagazine]

I see Millstone and Adam didn't meet up at the SSP event last night to hug it out.

[Millstone]

I was too busy not breaking the law

[hmagazine]

Someone give Millstone a hug. Really. She needs one.

IN reality though - most of us are breaking some kind of law. Jaywalking or as I call it - meandering is harmless. I just wish cars and trucks downtown actually treated the area as more of the destination it is - instead of a quick cut through.

[Jon Dalton]

'Jaywalking' is simply a fact of life in the city. People don't walk whole blocks to get to a traffic light to cross, just like drivers don't go exactly 50 on city streets.

[Millstone]

It's illegal and is about to be enforced. I saw a bike cop doing just that yesterday. You cannot make up the laws as you go along, sorry.

[Jon Dalton]

It is illegal just like driving 51 km/h is illegal. Enforcing either is a bad allocation of police resources.

[omro]

Really, not crossing at a crossing, even when there's no traffic coming is illegal? I've broken the law then every day I've lived here. Not illegal back in the UK, so never thought about it.

[markbarbera]

Originally Posted by hmagazine

Jaywalking or as I call it - meandering is harmless.

Jaywalking/meandering is not harmless. In fact, it is quite dangerous. "Meandering" unexpectedly into the path of a car can cost you your life. Having witnessed such an event, I really would advise against trivializing the practice of jaywalking.

[hmagazine]

Originally Posted by markbarbera

Jaywalking/meandering is not harmless. In fact, it is quite dangerous. "Meandering" unexpectedly into the path of a car can cost you your life. Having witnessed such an event, I really would advise against trivializing the practice of jaywalking.

It's only dangerous because we've allowed our streets to become freeways for out of control trucks and reckless cars.

It's called commonsense - look both ways and be smart about the way you walk.

Downtown has a long way to go before we can call it pedestrian friendly.

[emge]

I routinely cross the street at the intersection of my side street and Main. No crosswalk, so I suppose it's "jaywalking" but I'm not going to walk the full block up to the main street that has lights and a crosswalk to cross, especially when all the one-way traffic is stopped at that intersection and I can clearly see it down the street.

Jaywalking laws are designed so people don't cross the street in heavy traffic (like those who run across King at James when the King green light is on) and put themselves at risk, not to make them walk a hundred metres to arbitrarily cross at an intersection when they're crossing safely.

When I lived in the country, there's no way you could call crossing the street without walking a kilometre to the nearest intersection "jaywalking" no more so than if you're crossing to your neighbour's house in Hamilton across the street. Though how it's enforced/talked about in Hamilton, you'd think that was the purpose of the laws.

That's a far different matter of safety than biking the wrong way on a one-way street, or driving 70 km/h. They're all designed for safety reasons - pedestians crossing in busy traffic are more likely to be hit than at crosswalks, cyclists going the wrong way are more likely to be splattered across the street, and the higher speed people drive at, the more severe any accidents are.

[mic67]

Omro:

In London England, they have zebra crossing = to crosswalks here.

Here we haave be taught the best/safest place to cross the street is at an intersection. But when I was in London I got some excellent advice from a "bobbi" That the best place to cross the street is in the middle between 2 intersections, he was right unless it is a busy hiway or road. In an intersection cars are comming for all directions and is usually a place where people make u-turns.

In paris at the arch de triumph, instead of using the underground crossing some friends tried the surface route and they learned to keep going forward as the cars swirve behind you.

If you are walking say along Bartons st. and you have to cross a side street there is no cross walk there, so how can that be jaywalking?
mic67