I was going to post a rant about the police response to a dramatic increase of pedestrian-vehicle fatalities (and we all know which side of that equation suffered the fatalities), but the Star's Christopher Hume beat me to it, articulating what is most galling about the cop's propensity to blame the victim. When we have a traffic system that never ensures the safety of pedestrians (and cyclists, for that matter), whether they obey the rules or not, any incentive to obey the rules is removed.
People wonder why there's been such a rash of accidents. My theory: drivers are more cautious when there is a certain threshold of pedestrians around. Drivers have to see a decent number of human beings to register, "Hey, there are people around I have to watch out for." (As a cyclist, I've learned that the most dangerous time to bike is spring, just as biking weather hits. Drivers have to re-learn how to navigate us.)
Un-vehicled people are scarce on many streets and neighbourhoods in the winter so drivers become more cavalier. Our warm snap brought pedestrians to places where motorists weren't expecting them, but not enough to make them more careful.
Regardless, any response that treats pedestrians and people zooming around in 5,000 pound worth of fast-moving, gas-guzzling armour as equally responsible is a response that's out of touch with reality.
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