Slashdot Mirror
How Walking With Smartphones May Have Changed Pedestrian Etiquette
An anonymous reader writes The phenomenon of 'distracted walking' — pedestrians who walk while using smartphones — has raised civic attention in the last few years, with Utah issuing fines and cities in China creating dedicated 'smartphone lanes' for walkers who need to keep up with Whatsapp on the move. This article argues that smartphone users have become so accustomed to other people getting out of their way that they will no longer negotiate for sidewalk space even when not using their phones.
When my wife and I were fairly new as a couple she would get annoyed when I would precede her through crowds. What she came to realize though, was that since my work takes me into secondary schools and I have to navigate halls between periods, I've had to become a master of the Morpheus Walk, referring to the scene in The Matrix where Fishburne's character is teaching Neo of the risks of agents in the Matrix, and the crowd parts for him while Reeves' character is colliding with all of the simulated people. I'm also fairly tall, and I'm able to put on a demeanor that usually gets people to move out of my way.
Once she saw how much easier it is to navigate a crowd that way she has been a lot happier in crowded situations to let me go first. If she sticks close behind then she can follow easily and we end up where we want to faster.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Last week when I was driving to work as was approaching a traffic light that turned from red to green as I approached. I noticed a youth crossing the other side, head phones in and face down in his phone, slowed down in anticipation of him walking out in front of me. He did, I braked and blew my horn in warning and stopped and stepped backwards onto the central refuge and launched into a tirade of abuse and offensive gestures. Despite the fact I'd just saved him from serious injury at minimum as a result of his own stupidity.
You just cannot help some people.
He's saying the truth. 8-9 / 10 asshats on bikes don't follow the rules of the road that they are legally required to. Just a few things:
1: don't stop for stop signs... many times not even slowing down, then expecting traffic to magically not hit them. I have personally witnessed several tickets being handed out to them since my city is FINALLY starting to crack down on them, they will even do it right in front of a cop....
2: riding on sidewalks instead of using the apparently wasted bike lanes, and hitting people walking ( you know the ones that belong on the sidewalks ). Happens with different asshats several times a month in my city alone, and I doubt it is a fluke since you see all the other asshattery anywhere you go. Hell because of #1 I have been hit by a stupid ass biker in a fucking crosswalk with the light in MY favor.
3: they observe speed limits worse than 4-wheel car drivers. School zone? Still going as fast as possible, on the sidewalk where they don't belong. They should be ticketed just as if a car was speeding ( this does occasionally happen, just needs to more often).
There you go, took mere minutes to come up with just a few things that 80% of the observed bike riders do to make everyone look down on bike riders. Sucks for the last 10-20% that actually are courteous, but then maybe THEY should start bashing heads of the rest if they want their image to look better.
To err is human; effective mayhem requires the root password!
If they maintain their lane, and just follow the traffic rules robotically then there is no problem. When I was a kid I'd walk and read a book at the same time, no problem. The problem is that people aren't following the traffic rules when they are paying attention, so when they're not paying attention they're just sortof stumbling into the street without knowing what the state is. If they're practiced in following the rules, they can do that on autopilot and they'll wait for the light to change before crossing without consciously even realizing they had stopped for it. And they'll maintain their lane, too.
Actually, it is the best way to get through a rough neighborhood. If you can walk tall, confident, but not swaggering or strutting, you can pass right through almost anything. You do have to weave around gang-bangers, you can't crash into them, but if you maintain the right walk they usually won't even see you, you're just background. If they're also walking, they always make room for me, I only have to weave around them when they're loitering. I've done that in most major American cities, and I've never had a problem.
In fact, the places I have had problems have been small towns, usually without sidewalks. Places where it doesn't matter how you walk, because there isn't enough traffic for it to matter.
As somebody who lived in rough neighborhoods as a teen, one thing I picked up on: You're actually less likely to get shot/stabbed or randomly assaulted there. A lot of people have some means of self defense. Picking a fight could get you shot, so people don't pick fights unless you're obviously walking scared. You're unlikely to get robbed in a drug neighborhood, for example, because most people either don't have anything to steal, or have a weapon, or will fight to the death over their last $2. There are people getting robbed, but the perp knows the victim, and knows they have drugs, or knows they have money that they're trying to buy drugs with.
The neighborhood where you might get stabbed over stupid shit is usually a University Neighborhood, the same place where you're likely to be assaulted by strangers. Those high crime neighborhoods, they're stabbing/shooting people that they know, and have a real dispute with. Don't borrow/loan money, don't borrow/loan drugs, don't arrange drug deals that might go bad, etc., and they probably won't involve you.
Except that in cities we have this concept of "keep right* except when passing." There is room for travel in both directions. If there isn't room, the obstruction is on one person's side, or the other person's side. The person on the side of the obstruction is expected to wait. Some people, mostly youngsters, haven't figured this out. But it is actually somewhat rare. Most of the people will sort themselves to the correct lane if you force them to. You're not in "their" way if you're on the right side of the sidewalk.
* Some locations use a different side than this.
Some people find this keep right except to pass on a sidewalk a strange concept... I think it's even in our motor vehicle act. Even on a sparsely populated suburban sidewalk I keep to the right edge so if a runner or a faster walker comes up behind me, I'm predictable and they can pass with ease. It irritates me to see slow walkers erratically walking all over the sidewalk making it difficult to pass.
Sometimes people will walk two abreast, which is fine, but if you saw an oncoming walker you think you'd go single file. A surprising number of people (not just youngsters) fail to do this. I don't bowl them down, but I just keep walking till I'm a step from them, stop, then let them negotiate the fact that they can't just walk straight.
There's plenty of time when "lanes" on a footpath dissapear and you have to be more dynamic in your pathfinding. People looking at their smarphone arent doing this to the point that it's rude.