kwackers wrote:I reckon I do around 50 miles a week as a pedestrian.
IMO the general attitude of drivers (and cyclists) to pedestrians stinks.
Pedestrian crossings are generally not fit for purpose. Despite attempting to use them properly the simple fact is I am usually across the road and on my way before the crossing changes to red.
Despite claims to the contrary they're not about pedestrian safety and more about making sure pedestrians don't interfere with traffic flow.
Zebra crossings are a mixed blessing, in theory they should be preferred by both drivers and pedestrians but the truth is only around half of drivers stop when someone is waiting at such a crossing and even when using one it's not unknown for a vehicle on the far side to continue across.
Crossing a side road? Don't count on rule 170, ime almost nobody will pull short of the junction and wait for you to cross before turning in. Having someone drive at you with their hand on the horn is much more the likely outcome.
Anti-motoring? Definitely, even as a motorist I think we need to move away from personal transport or at least move it away from where large numbers of pedestrians are - and the good news is slowly but surely that's happening.
I find it odd that anyone could be pro-motorist, the downsides massively outweigh the upsides.
These are my own feelings and experiences. I find it questionable that some defenders of current motoring practices and culture have never been terrorised by a car. Perhaps they feel that "terrorism" is a word that must be reserved only for people with guns and a queer political cause?
Personally I've been terrorised in many forms: by other children when young; by many authority figures, some of whom used physical as well as other forms of persecution; by employers and most definitely by motorists. These people are generally quite normal otherwise but have been unable to control or properly exercise the power they have in their physical size, authority or other power, including as pilot of the powerful car.
Nor have those in this thread who are anti-car been guilty of tarring all drivers with the same brush. To use terms such as moton or Toad is to indicate drivers prone to a certain set of inconsiderate and very dangerous behaviours. Does every sentence mentioning them have to include a long extra mentioning that the poster is not referring to every driver in the world? A true prejudice would not use differentiating terminology such as moton or Toad but instead merely condemn all drivers, as many car-fans do when they condemn all cyclists rather than just the inconsiderate ilk (who are probably also Toads and motons when in a car).
The facts surely justify the condemnation of the moton or Toad style of car-use. Thousand killed and maimed in Britain each year by such people. Whilst some collisions might be truly accidental, the vast majority are due to, at the very least, carelessness - in situations where lack of care is known to be sometimes lethal. Many "accidents" are due to a mad aggression and a truly dangerous behaviour.
Some seem to think that because this is a norm in our society, it shouldn't be complained of in bitter terms. Will they have the same view should they or one of theirs be mowed down by some speeding or punishment-passing lunatic? Perhaps, as people are often very versatile at excusing egregious situations that they are ideologically in favour of for some queer reason.
Cugel
“Practical men who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence are usually the slaves of some defunct economist”.
John Maynard Keynes
