Comments

1
Here Sarah, I've set up a few future posts for you along this same theme, whereby you talk about a different issue for awhile and then make a clumsy pivot to your pathological hatred of cars:

"Of course, the big issue isn't famine, but drivers."

"Of course, the big issue isn't the Middle East, but drivers."

"Of course, the big issue isn't colon cancer, but drivers."
2
This last week I had to do a lot of work as a motorist to insure people weren't walking out in front of my moving vehicle. I am mobile in a van for my job and the number of texting cyclists and mouth breathing smart phone drool fests I see on a daily basis is staggering. I always assumed it was a Portland thing because something in the Kool Aid dissolves your sense of self preservation. Walking in middle of busy streets expecting cars to stop, cyclists running stop signs, motorists texting while driving, and of course the not looking up from your phone while walking downtown and walking into traffic. It hurts. I don't know what's next for the digital culture but I'm excited to see the analog revolt.
3
@Blabby - why do you got to make everything political?

You should really wait for a more respectful time to make comments, someone did die, you know.
4
texting drivers, speeding drivers, intoxicated drivers (be it via Nyquil, booze, or pot), incompetent drivers, distracted drivers -- whatever -- our laws are not strict enough when it comes to punishing these all-too-typical sorts of behaviors. the consequences are not harsh enough to change our dangerous, myopic ways.

also, i think it's waaaay too easy to obtain a driver's license in the first place -- an I.Q. test should be involved, for starters.
5
@Blabby, because if I'm texting while I'm walking, I could hit someone and kill them.
6
Agree with Blabby. No one should ever talk about all the horrible things that result from the stupid things people do behind the wheels of their 2-ton vehicles. To bring that up betrays an obvious anti-car agenda, and for some reason it goes against all the principles of objectivity that we expect from blogs like this!
7
Darwinism still does exist!
8
fidelity, I wasn't meaning to be disrespectful of the death.

This post just had a certain "...but what I REALLY want to talk about is..." quality to it.
9
If I'm texting while walking (which isn't that often), I always put my phone away when I cross a street. It's just common sense!
10
Common sense that a great many people seem to lack. Worst part of all: when you say, "wake up," or something to prevent them from running into you, they sneer. Because you're the asshole who isn't doing something incredibly important on their phone.
11
@blabbly - I understood, my comment was meant as a parody on the NRA and the debates in general. Perhaps I should have put “respectful time” in quotation.

I text and walk all the time, chicks dig it - 'cause I'm busy yo. And no matter how much Mirk and the Nanny State tries, they’ll have to take my Natural Right of Movement and Communication from my cold dead hands.
12
I think there does need to be a bigger push for pedestrian safety in this city. It is damn near impossible to spot underlit cyclists or pedestrians, say, at night wet roads with other cars coming (multiple headlights reflecting off the wet street = blindness to small, Columbia-Sportswear-shrouded bodies), but that doesn't stop people from walking out in the middle of the damn street whenever they want.

Just because YOU can see a car, doesn't mean the person in the car can see you, even with the best of attention and intentions. Even if you're in a crosswalk, you NEED to make sure the driver sees and acknowledges you before you move forward. The pedestrian might have the right of way, but they're the one who is going to get killed in that collision.

Preventable tragedies, man.

Please wait...

Comments are closed.

Commenting on this item is available only to members of the site. You can sign in here or create an account here.


Add a comment
Preview

By posting this comment, you are agreeing to our Terms of Use.