A major reason for Glendale's appalling pedestrian injury and fatality rates was illustrated on my brief bike ride home tonight. Glendale's pedestrians are RECKLESS, particularly the elderly!
On Maryland between Broadway and Harvard, three teenagers walked into the middle of the street without a glance towards oncoming traffic. I was on my (very quiet) bike, so I dinged my bell and managed to dart around them.
As I waited at the red light at Harvard and Maryland, a very elderly couple walked up to the crosswalk which had been displaying a blinking red hand for some time and started hobbling across the intersection. A few seconds after they entered the intersection, the light changed, and they still were only 1/3 of the way through the crosswalk, which stalled traffic in the left hand turn lane on Harvard.
Then at Harvard and Louise, a very old man started hobbling across the crosswalk well into the flashing red hand. He made it halfway through the crosswalk, saw the light turn yellow, and decided to turn around and walk back to the side where he had started. So he stopped and reversed directions in the crosswalk without looking towards oncoming traffic, and put himself right in my path as I was making a right onto Louise. I braked and narrowly missed him.
All of this pedestrian madness took place within two blocks over a period of 50 seconds or so. Pay attention, people!
Drivers certainly need to slow down too. Look at what happened tonight in Eagle Rock: 3 dead and 2 seriously injured when a car slammed into a tree on Colorado Boulevard. Senseless.
4 comments:
I wonder if the city's PD or community services dept have any
aggressive educational efforts (in Armenian, English and Spanish) targeting pedestrians in the general public as well as regularly going to every classroom?
I saw video of the Eagle Rock crash...that Maxima wrapped around the tree...geez.
The Oinkster for great rotisserie chicken.
Yes, there is a coordinated multilingual safety campaign, as well as loads of lighted crosswalks on the major streets. Occasionally Glendale PD steps up pedestrian traffic enforcement downtown as well.
I find Oinkster's chicken a bit bland.
I wondered about Oinkster because The Times mentioned it in their article yesterday..."a plain, but moist, barely seasoned, slightly wet-brined golden bird".
Emphasis on the "plain".
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