Last edited by john mac; 10-05-2009 at 12:36 AM. Reason: wrong thread
Haha.. so true.. took me a bit of time to get used to this when I was in Vietnam. You have to see it to believe it! Basically the normal technique there for crossing the road is walking straight into the traffic, and to treat it a bit like a Frogger game..
Incidentally, from what I recall, jaywalking is quite rife in Melbourne (unless police are around), where I lived and it generally does not seem to cause problems as people generally do it carefully. I was thinking that maybe this might partly be the case because we generally all drive in Australia, and so would be quite confident about looking at the roads and the traffic lights, etc from the point of view of a driver when walking as a pedestrian. There are also many roads outside of the main city centre back at home with no traffic lights, so we are all used to crossing streets 'independantly'.
Last edited by muse07; 10-05-2009 at 02:22 AM.
Having said that, the thought of alll the masses of people in, say, Causeway Bay all being able to jaywalk would perhaps be somewhat scary. I'm still not used to the huge volume of pedestrians in many places here in Hong Kong!
The herd mentality can take over at traffic lights, if one person starts walking people will follow whatever the colour of neon is glowing, however many cars are driving past.
In the UK green means only go if it's safe, it's not to common for people to actually check here. Often I've had to shout at someone to avoid a gnarly accident.
Well Hector is fine in HK and the UK, but he'd be getting the kids killed in China and North America as the cars are coming on different sides of the road. That for me has been the largest adjustment as a pedestrian here. Trusting looking the right way as I am from Vancouver and they drive on the other side of the road there.
Also the reality that pedestrians don't have the right of way at all intersections. I understand that the cars only need to stop here if you are at a marked pedestrian crossing - but I don't assume here or anywhere that the vehicle will stop for me.
My local friend says jaywalking is a more recent phenomenon in HK as no one did it much when he was younger (50 yr old). His favourite expression when someone does something dumb in HK is to say "come from China".
Cars can't turn right on red lights as they do in most North American cities and the signals including those for pedestrians seem to take longer here to change than back home. This affects people's decisions I am sure to just go for it.
But in China they are nuts as no one - cars or peds - seems to worry about traffic laws.
There is rule in speed studies referred to as the 85th percentile. This in essence says that 85% of the vehicles will find the right speed for the conditions of the road and they don't need a road speed sign or other warnings. They just know and get it right. This must also apply possibly to jaywalkers - however it is the other 15% that stupidity sets in.
I had hoped this thread would have reflected the significance that HKChigger and I put on it in the first two replies.
Seems too many people are bored and in good health ( thanks to our wonderful governments actions ) this weekend so as to waste time on this insignificane. Don't we all realise the sky is falling in ?
RUN RUN RUN.
I follow the pedestrian signals because:
1. I look to both sides of the road and stay aware of my surroundings, but there's always a chance I'm distracted by one thing or another and waiting a few seconds for the light to change isn't going to alter the course of my life dramatically. HK is also the first place I've lived where the cars drive on the left side of the road, which still occasionally confuses me.
2. With my luck, if I do decide to jaywalk, that'll be exactly the time when a cop is around to give me a fine.
3. Many drivers here are just as idiotic as pedestrians, only they have mass and momentum on their side.