My daily commute takes me through a couple of small towns.
Every day I encounter the same thing, pedestrians who do not pay attention to the walk/dont walk signs, and pedestrians who do not cross a street at a crosswalk, they dart in and out of parked cars to cross in the middle of the block.
Over the past year I have twice almost hit a pedestrian. In each case I was going very slow, but still had close calls.
The first incident happened when a young lady crossed on a do not walk sign while wearing headphones. I missed her a by mere inches...
The second incident happened when someone crossed the street in the middle of a block, and not the end. Didnt even look, just ran right in front of me.
Today was the third incident. I was at a red light waiting for a left turn signal so I could make a left turn. the signal changed indicating I could turn left, and there was clearly a do no walk signal for people crossing the street I was turning onto. On my left, and in my blind spot two people decided to cross anyway. There was no way I could have seen them start to cross as they were totally in my blind spot. Basically what happend is as I turned onto the street my truck came with in a couple of inches of both of them. Had I been going 5-10 miles faster (as it was I was going 5 mph), I would have struck one or both of them.
None of these close calls were my fault, but were the fault of the people who chose to ignore traffic laws for pedestrians. If I were to have hit one of these people they would have been seriously injured, and I would have had to live with the guilt.
So please, for your safety pay attention when walking in small towns and cities, use crosswalks, and pay attention to the signals....
Every day I encounter the same thing, pedestrians who do not pay attention to the walk/dont walk signs, and pedestrians who do not cross a street at a crosswalk, they dart in and out of parked cars to cross in the middle of the block.
Over the past year I have twice almost hit a pedestrian. In each case I was going very slow, but still had close calls.
The first incident happened when a young lady crossed on a do not walk sign while wearing headphones. I missed her a by mere inches...
The second incident happened when someone crossed the street in the middle of a block, and not the end. Didnt even look, just ran right in front of me.
Today was the third incident. I was at a red light waiting for a left turn signal so I could make a left turn. the signal changed indicating I could turn left, and there was clearly a do no walk signal for people crossing the street I was turning onto. On my left, and in my blind spot two people decided to cross anyway. There was no way I could have seen them start to cross as they were totally in my blind spot. Basically what happend is as I turned onto the street my truck came with in a couple of inches of both of them. Had I been going 5-10 miles faster (as it was I was going 5 mph), I would have struck one or both of them.
None of these close calls were my fault, but were the fault of the people who chose to ignore traffic laws for pedestrians. If I were to have hit one of these people they would have been seriously injured, and I would have had to live with the guilt.
So please, for your safety pay attention when walking in small towns and cities, use crosswalks, and pay attention to the signals....
