[email protected] (Hunrobe) wrote in message news:<
[email protected]>...
> It's not a matter of "convenience for motorists". Cars and trucks don't belong on sidewalks, in
> front or back yards, or on playgrounds. Preschoolers don't belong in the street. Why would anyone
> want to "turn that around"?
In the metro area I live in, neighborhood streets don't have sidewalks. (Maybe less than 5% of
neighborhood streets do, within a 5-mile radius of where I live in the Kansas City metro area).
So pre-schoolers, or anybody else who wants to go anywhere in their neighborhood, gets to walk, or
ride, or whatever, **in the street**.
That is simply because there is no where else to go, but in the street.
Personally I would like to turn this situation around, but until the time 50 or 75 years in the
future when sidewalks, traffic calming measures, or whatever, are installed on all these streets,
the alternative is to teach drivers to drive as though there might be a 3 year old or a 33 year old
or a 93 year old walking or riding around every corner, over every hill, and out of every side
street or driveway.
You're absolutely right, Bob, that this approach will not stop every possible incident or injury.
And maybe not the particular one we're discussing right now. But I'll wager that it would stop
somewhere between 70 and 90 percent of them.
And, as near as I can tell, no one is even trying to put into place such a strategy or educate
drivers to drive that way. Driver's manuals and the like are all written on a "car vs. car" basis,
with an occasional reference to pedestrians thrown in.
Right now, 0% of our roadway safety spending in Missouri is on bike/ped safety. That, despite the
fact that about 10% of injuries and deaths are bicyclists and pedestrians.
--Brent
bhugh [at] mwsc.edu www.MoBikeFed.org
