I enjoyed reading Douglas Malcom’s article on pedestrian dangers (“Fear of walking city streets”, Wednesday’s Guardian). I agree with most of what he said and might consider myself a ‘pedestrian of long standing’ as he does. Typically, what I do is park in the parkade, and walk around town doing my errands, etc. so I see lots of ‘interesting’ events at crosswalks.
The only concern I have is his comment “Why are they (the white lines, I assume) only on one side of the crossing rather than on both as they were a number of years ago?” I agree, but until it changes, pedestrians are required to walk only on the marked lines. To expect drivers to stop at an intersection with no lines marked (or signs, for that matter) is inviting disaster.
I’ll add pedestrians to a comment I’ve made before: Pedestrians must obey the traffic laws and respect motorists, just as much as motorists and cyclists must respect said laws and each other. Until they all do this, nothing changes, nothing improves.
And it never hurts to put your arm out when you’re entering a crosswalk.
Lloyd Kerry,
Charlottetown