NHTSA Now Concerned Over Increasingly Distracted Pedestrians

A PEDESTRIAN, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), is “any person on foot, walking, running, jogging, hiking, sitting or lying down.” As a recent NHTSA analysis of 2010 data shows, 4,280 of them were killed in traffic accidents across the country. “On average,” the report says, “a pedestrian was killed every two hours and injured every eight minutes in traffic crashes.”

What’s especially worrying is that the 2010 data reveal a 4 percent increase in pedestrian deaths from the previous year — the first rise in five years. In more urbanized states, the figures seem to be spiraling out of control. Pedestrians account for 22.1 percent of all traffic-related deaths in California and 25 percent of those in New Jersey. In the District, the figure is a shocking 54.2 percent, the highest in the nation.

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AlleVier - 8/14/2012 1:52:45 PM

+2 Boost

Let's create a zone for pedestrians to traverse the street safely across vehicular traffic. We shall paint lines, within which they must stay if they want to be safe. It shall have lights in the shape of a pedestrian to demonstrate when it is safe for them to cross and a hand when it is not. It shall have lights for vehicular traffic to indicate it is not safe to cross when the pedestrians are crossing. Laws shall be created to punish those who do not follow the instructions of this zone. We shall call this safe zone a "crosswalk".

Aww, would you look at that! They're using the crosswalk as if it's really safe. We should enact a law that prohibit pedestrians from behaving as if a crosswalk is safe.

vdiv - 8/14/2012 2:56:46 PM

+1 Boost

We should enact a law that prohibits pedestrians, period.

MBCLS07 - 8/14/2012 4:10:00 PM

+4 Boost

You can only do so much to protect people from their own stupidity. In another time these are the people who would've mindlessly ambled into a saber-toothed tiger's den or eaten strange brightly colored berries. While there are certainly very sad cases of pedestrians struck through no fault of their own, the fact is, many victims cross the road illegally and/or are intoxicated. You can't legislate irresponsibility/ignorance out of the population. In fact, many politicians seem to encourage it with their nanny state policies.

AlleVier - 8/14/2012 4:29:32 PM

+2 Boost

I'm going so far as to say that protecting people has a point at which it encourages their stupidity. God help me, I'm channeling Ayn Rand today.

I95SPEEDINGTICKETS - 8/14/2012 4:39:48 PM

+3 Boost

I call it Natural Selection.