SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Pavement lights have been installed at a pedestrian crossing in a Netherlands town to help smartphone users cross the road safely.
The light strips are designed to catch the eye of people looking down at their device, and change colour to match traffic signals.
The lure of games and social media has come "at the expense of attention to traffic", said councillor Kees Oskam.
But Dutch road safety group VVN said the idea "rewards bad behaviour".
Augsburg, Germany has done much the same thing according to the Washington Post.
Will pavement lights built into kerbs curb accidents?
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
Pavement Lights Guide 'Smartphone Zombies'
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 21 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, be nothing.
-- Elbert Hubbard
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 18 2017, @07:49PM
If I walked into the street when I got a walk signal without checking for idiot drivers, I'd get hit or cause a car accident at least twice a week. I walk through 4 controlled (but rather stupidly designed) intersections every day where I'd get hit be people running red lights (late left turns mostly) or people taking free rights if I just used the cross walk signed. I almost got hit yesterday, and that was in some other safer intersection (who seriously accelerates into a lane change, and takes a free right out stopping through a crosswalk with a person crossing in bright daylight...). Car dodging is an important life skill.
I've only personally seen one pedestrian get hit (hit and run on a free right..., the guy (a coworker of mine) was fine), but if we were doing the phone zombie thing the roads would all be stained with blood around here.
(Score: 2) by fishybell on Saturday February 18 2017, @08:29PM
I've personally been hit three times. Two were essentially nothing, and the other was very minor.
You can look someone in the eyes, they'll come to a complete stop at an intersection, and then slowly hit you as soon as you cross. One person even said something along the lines of "I didn't believe you were there."
I'm very glad my commute keeps me in a metal box these days.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Saturday February 18 2017, @09:02PM
Car dodging is an important life skill.
Until the self-driving car collision avoidance algorithms are fully developed. Then once the malicious crackers come in and s/avoidance/seeking/, I bet that car dodging life skill will be promoted to parkour.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Sunday February 19 2017, @01:16AM
This is probably an unpopular opinion here, but I am a motorist first and a cyclist/pedestrian second. When I cross a crosswalk I jog across it, because when that motorist is in the middle of the intersection for their unprotected left turn waiting for your ass to walk out of their path, the safer it will be for everybody else so there's no last-minute cluster-fuck at the yellow light. If the road is totally clear I'll even run across 4-lane boulevards to avoid tying up some intersection later.
There is nothing which makes my blood boil more than seeing fuckers slowly shuffle across the crosswalk when they know there's a queue of cars waiting to make unprotected left-turns at the intersection. Old people, gimps, and the mentally ill get a free pass (the latter because they're entertaining to watch) but others are just being lazy or rude shimmying and shuffling (especially Blacks) slowly across just to be difficult.
(Score: 1) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Sunday February 19 2017, @02:43AM
here, I avoid jogging because I don't want to be moving faster than expected through the intersection.
Doubly true if I am mounted on my bike.
That said, I don't exactly shuffle either.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Sunday February 19 2017, @07:15AM
I see, you just couldn't resist adding a bit of racism to your post.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 19 2017, @06:58PM
FWIW: that's been my observation as well. They are usually the heavyset black women with loads of attitude. I think they purposefully go slow so that they can make some kind of personal statement about how important they are.