Quote Originally Posted by Idaho
Jay Walking?

I don't understand the need to reign in where people cross the road. Surely one should be at liberty to use one's own initiative on where to cross?

And in response to this:

jaywalking not only causes the obvious injuries becuase people, especially kids and ESPECIALLY teenagers are stupid and will try to cross when they shoudln't, but it also causes multiple car accidents when a person swerves to avoid little jimmy and instead takes out a couple of cars in the other lanes and/or people on the sidewalk.

Some of the speed limits in urban eareas get as high as 55 on streets with population. While I would generally agree that a lower speed limit would do more to stave off the carnage, the pedestrain casualty rate is incredibly high even in low speed, densely populated areas like san fransisco and chicago.

Crosswalks our a staple of our lives since we were little kids. After school we go to the crosswalk where the crossing guard stops traffic and lets all the kids cross at once. Care to guess what would happen if 100 1st graders were allowed just to cross willy nilly whenever they wanted?

I can't speak for places like NYC, but in the midwest crosswalks and jaywalking laws are used more on the defensive/after-the-fact meter than offensively. I know of no one around here ever, ever getting a jaywalking ticket or write up. I do, however, know plenty of cases of pedestrians getting run over and the driver being cleared of all wrongdoing because the pedestrian chose to dart into the road rather than using the crosswalk located 75 feet away.

There are simply too many cars on the road and too many things going on to have to pay attention to the guy walking on the curb and wondering if he's going to sprint in front of you