Increasing Danger to Pedestrians
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Recently, I read an article about a young woman who was going for a run during the day time on a road that wasn’t terribly busy when she was struck and killed by a motorist who simply wasn’t paying attention. It struck a chord with me because as a self proclaimed runner, I have had my share of recent mishaps with drivers on the road ?during the day? in which had I not been the more vigilant person, I may have wound up in the hospital with a serious injury.
Since living in North Carolina and attending a local university on a running scholarship, I have been able to witness not only the huge population growth that has taken place over the last few years, but also the increasing amount of people behind the wheel of cars who simply are not paying attention while they are driving. I remember going for a run once while I was in college. There was a group of us running on the street (or sidewalk rather) when the light turned green, indicating that we had the right of way to cross the street safely. Most of the cars had yielded to let us cross, but then a woman who had been sitting at the light and was waiting to make a turn had only been looking in one direction. She didn’t realize that there was a ‘no turn on red’ sign in front of her; and to top it off, she was on her cell phone. She quickly stepped on the gas in an effort to escape traffic that was already stopped at a red light, and in doing so, she almost ran one of my teammates over. However, because my teammate had quick responses, she was able to jump up onto the woman’s car hood while the rest of us ran into each other as we tried to stop ourselves before hitting her car.
The other drivers were annoyed to say the least because they had all been stopped and were watching it unfold. The lady in the car didn’t get out despite the fact that she was being yelled at in all directions, but rather, put her head down in what I can only fathom was shame. I was just thankful that no one was hurt. Things only progressively got worse as the years went on. Before we would go for runs, the coaches would warn us to be careful. The funny thing was that we were always the more careful ones when it came to sharing the road with vehicles. We never ran in the street. We always ran on the sidewalk. However, because there were so many distracted drivers out there, we were always fighting a 50/50 chance of not getting into an accident.
There has bee a long standing battle between drivers and not wanting to share the road with pedestrians. The biggest conflict comes with cyclists and drivers because cyclists, by law, are supposed to ride their bicycles in the roadway for the mere fact that they are often going too fast for those who are on the sidewalks walking their dog, running or just walking. Hopefully, one day, things will get resolved.