Girl Blindly Running Through an Intersection!

Is "I was in the right" ever a good excuse for running over someone with a vehicle?
 
Fiery254 said:
In most of Europe the pedestrian would never have chanced crossing unless the light was exactly in her favour and traffic had stopped.
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That's not entirely true. When I was in Rome, I exited the subway and tried to cross Via Cavour to get to my hotel. I waited patiently at the pedestrian hash marks for a good 3-4 minutes trying to figure out how and when to cross the street. Suddenly an Italian woman boldly - without looking - started crossing the street INTO rushing traffic. Every car stopped. I hurried behind her and I learned that in Rome, you must have faith and just start crossing the street as cars will stop at the hash marks.

Anywho, no offense to anyone here, but in my experience its mostly the 905'ers who J-walk as if it is their right to cross the street. It's especially bad during Raptors games or Leaf games like last night. Stupid people who just walk across the street and expect you to stop.
 
BuFFaLoB said:
That's not entirely true. When I was in Rome, I exited the subway and tried to cross Via Cavour to get to my hotel. I waited patiently at the pedestrian hash marks for a good 3-4 minutes trying to figure out how and when to cross the street. Suddenly an Italian woman boldly - without looking - started crossing the street INTO rushing traffic. Every car stopped. I hurried behind her and I learned that in Rome, you must have faith and just start crossing the street as cars will stop at the hash marks.

Anywho, no offense to anyone here, but in my experience its mostly the 905'ers who J-walk as if it is their right to cross the street. It's especially bad during Raptors games or Leaf games like last night. Stupid people who just walk across the street and expect you to stop.
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Try driving past the "Irish Embassy" Pub, on St. Patrick's day.
 
Rob MacLennan said:
Try driving past the "Irish Embassy" Pub, on St. Patrick's day.
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Don't even get me started about St. Paddies. I left the house forgettting St. Paddies and it took me 30 minutes to go 4 blocks. Got so fed up I turned around, taking another 30 minutes to go anoterh 4 blocks. The worst are all the marathons/10 k's that occur.

in my opinion, they should limit running races to the suburbs where there is space to be able to do those kind of races....why do insist on running downtown?!?!?

end rant.
 
BuFFaLoB said:
Don't even get me started about St. Paddies. I left the house forgettting St. Paddies and it took me 30 minutes to go 4 blocks. Got so fed up I turned around, taking another 30 minutes to go anoterh 4 blocks. The worst are all the marathons/10 k's that occur.

in my opinion, they should limit running races to the suburbs where there is space to be able to do those kind of races....why do insist on running downtown?!?!?

end rant.
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If Toronto actually had a waterfront, instead of a wall of condos, they could do marathons downtown without screwing everyone else over.
 
Rob MacLennan said:
If Toronto actually had a waterfront, instead of a wall of condos, they could do marathons downtown without screwing everyone else over.
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+1 on that.

Regardless of who is more at fault, the video is a good reminder of the dangers of city riding.

I was in a similar situation (unfortunately didn't have my camera running at the time) when riding north on Broadview last summer. A streetcar was stopped at a green light, doors closed, no pedestrians in sight. I'm assuming the driver was conversing with a passenger. I passed it on the right, was about to enter the intersection when a cyclist, riding along the pedestrian crossing despite a red almost collided with me.
I was going way way slower than the limit (busy intersection + streetcar) and the light had been green for a bit. It's just that the cyclist had decided to cross while the streetcar was stationary with no visibility of the right lane.

No idea who would've been legally at fault, but I know that despite being careful, I could've done better and it was pure luck that we didn't end up at the same spot in the same time. Not sure that would've been the case if I was in a car.
 
BuFFaLoB said:
Anywho, no offense to anyone here, but in my experience its mostly the 905'ers who J-walk as if it is their right to cross the street. It's especially bad during Raptors games or Leaf games like last night. Stupid people who just walk across the street and expect you to stop.
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I'm just wondering why you stop J-walkers, and ask their phone numbers?
 
Rob MacLennan said:
They don't ALWAYS run across. Sometimes they casually stroll across. Into live traffic. Without looking.
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That's the exciting way to cross Church st. :D

But seriously, I spend a lot of time around that intersection. Gotta be careful around there for sure....
 
BuFFaLoB said:
Don't even get me started about St. Paddies. I left the house forgettting St. Paddies and it took me 30 minutes to go 4 blocks. Got so fed up I turned around, taking another 30 minutes to go anoterh 4 blocks. The worst are all the marathons/10 k's that occur.

in my opinion, they should limit running races to the suburbs where there is space to be able to do those kind of races....why do insist on running downtown?!?!?

end rant.
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I don't know where to even begin.

You should be grateful that you live in a city where all these people want to hold these events. It's a sign that it's a vibrant, liveable city, plus the events themselves contribute to that life. While it's important for people to be able to drive around the city easily too, you have the other 350 Sundays of the year to drive as you please. Is it so much to ask for you to share your seemingly god-given right to the road for a few hours for the sake of a healthy city? And what makes you think it wouldn't be an inconvenience up in Aurora (or wherever you think is far enough away for you to enjoy the city as if it was yours alone)? Also, given that you choose to reside in such a liveable city, couldn't you opt to cycle, or take transit, or even walk around wherever you have to go? Or buy yourself an island in the Pacific?
 
Just this morning, one of the exact scenarios mentioned happened to me.
Light was at the end of its cycle, major intersection, not one, but TWO people at opposite sides of road start to cross against the signal, one of those old ladys from Hungary or somehwere, that shuffles along with her head down in a giant fur coat, and a black guy that apparently doesn't even use the signals.
So the light goes green, i'm free to go but the lady is crossing from my right on the far side of intersection, and basically in my lane, black guy is almost to the middle island the other way, and plans on continuing it seems.
I look in the mirror and see a speeding pick up truck coming up behind me, i'm in the right lane, i tap the brakes twice to give him some warning, but as i suspected, he shifts lanes to speed through.
I lay on the horn which cause him to lock up his brakes and stop 3ft from the old lady.
I swear to god, she didn't even flinch.
 
UltrA_09 said:
Right. I should have "reasonably foreseen" that there would be a girl running blindly through a clear do-not-cross intersection already somewhat occupied with traffic. [/SARCASM] Even jay-walkers (most of the time) get the idea of looking at both sides of the road before crossing the street, usually in-between intersections. You must be confused with what the word 'reasonable' actually means. More caution is never a bad thing, but that comment is completely....unreasonable .
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Just because you couldn't foresee it doesn't mean it wouldn't have been foreseen by someone with more experience and road smarts. C'mon, someone running across a street at an intersection, in a busy downtown corridor in the largest and most densely populated (or close to) city in Canada... Yup, you're more likely to win the lottery and sleep with Jessica Alba.
 
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fastar1 said:
While it's important for people to be able to drive around the city easily too, you have the other 350 Sundays of the year to drive as you please.
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There's a lot of Sundays in your year!!!! In my year there's 52 Sundays
 
EngineerJoe said:
Just because you couldn't foresee it doesn't mean it wouldn't have been foreseen by someone with more experience and road smarts. C'mon, someone running across a street at an intersection, in a busy downtown corridor in the largest and most densely populated (or close to) city in Canada... Yup, you're more likely to win the lottery and sleep with Jennifer Alba.
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Jennifer Aniston.

Jessica Alba.

The media made a fuss over the number of pedestrians who were killed by vehicles, at the beginning of last year, but didn't bother to ask why it was happening.
 
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