Oh no, not Jaywalking!

Considering what RantWoman is about to say about certain red-hot jaywalking and pedestrian life issues in her 'hood, it is probably a good thing RantWoman has been away forw awhile, out of the loop, out on the frontiers where indoor plumbing and access via automobile intersect with various forms of nature.


RantWoman returned home as refreshed as one can get on retreats that are too short. RantWoman has heard threads of news about jaywalking in front of Franklin High School and someone getting punched in the face and various other realities in collision. RantWoman has heard nibbles of the news but has not so far felt a need to sound off.

Recently RantWoman hitched a ride home with someone she knew was traveling the direction she needed to go and had an earful. RantWoman's driver has run programs aimed at street youth. RantWoman's driver has peers who also run youth programs who are aggravated by youth behavior including W A L K I N G V E R Y S L O W L Y A C R O S S T H E S T R E E T W I T H O U T A N Y R E G A R D F O R C A R S C A U G H T I N P E D E S T R I A N S' P A T H S.

Both of RantWoman's out-of-town excursions involved the peculiar synchronicity of extensive travel by automobile and seething concern about peak oil and global warming, trends RantWoman tends to battle with hopeful embrace of public transit and real engagement about pedestrian-friendliness and associated issues of urban planning. Plus RantWoman is a fanatic about the importance of school and people being able to get to and from school safely.


But back to RantWoman's 'hood. RantWoman has seen people jaywalk across Rainier Avenue S. in daylight, in darkness, in sunshine, in rain, morning, noon, and night. RantWoman has seen people jaywalk where there are bus stops and crosswalks and RantWoman has seen people jaywalk in the middle of long stretches of sidewalk. RantWoman has seen people jaywalk in clothing one MIGHT reasonably be able to see and RantWoman has seen people jaywalk in pitch darkness while wearing dark clothing. Considering all of this RantWoman thinks it is probably some kind of an intergalactic miracle that Rainier Avenue is not a much bigger pedestrian kill zone than it is.


RantWoman has personal experience with the intersections and street crossings around Rainier and Martin Luther King. RantWoman thinks the current built environment, pedestrian and traffic routings embody the word "stupidity" even before one adds mouthy teenagers and one hapless beat cop. In short, RantWoman finally decided she better read up and weigh in.

Here goes, with selected media clips including 409 comments on just one article that RantWoman may or may not read.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2012136804_coppunch17m.html

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2012146689_pedestrian18m.html

http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2010/06/15/jaywalking-is-not-a-crime

http://www.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2010/06/15/on-jaywalking-and-police-brutality&view=comments

http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2010/06/18/the-punched-jaywalker-apologizes


http://www.seattlepi.com/local/421888_punch17.html


http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattle911/archives/211555.asp


RantWoman's views:
--RantWoman needs to hear a lot more statistics from the jaywalking is a human right / not a crime/ a boon to walkability crowd before RantWoman is at all going to be sold on that line of thinking.

--RantWoman is glad the young woman who got punched apologized and glad the officer was willing to meet about the apology.

--RantWoman is not charmed by all the Monday morning quarterbacks, either the ones giving the officer grief for how long it took him to contain the woman he was trying to control or the ones who praise his "restraint." In RantWoman's experience physics and traffic safety do not respect gender or skin tone and the officer has a right to the same respect from everyone. It's patronizing and insulting to the officer's job to think he should have treated women behaving obnoxiously any differently than he would treat men behaving obnoxiously and women get to deal with responsibility for their part in the situation.

--Independent of the young women's behavior, someone getting punched in the face by a cop during a jaywalking stop is not a great outcome for anyone. It does not matter whether his response was "measured" for the situation and "consistent with his training." It's still not a great day when something like that happens.

--RantWoman does not think of herself as someone who would give tactical advice to the police, but as long as everyone else is Monday-morning quarterbacking, here is RantWoman's angle: SoundTransit sends fare inspectors through the Light Rail three at a time. If SPD needs to run an emphasis patrol about jaywalking the last week of school in an effort to get the youthful jaywalking hordes safely out of school, why send only one officer?

--RantWoman thinks the pedestrian overpass at that location is a joke. It symbolizes attention to pedestrian realities and provides almost nothing that does any good. RantWoman has used the overpass a time or two when she is alone, but it's way too steep for RantMom. Even worse, RantWoman would not want to be using the overpass while trying to avoid, say, high school classmates.

RantWoman does not want to imply that Franklin students are all hoodlums. Well RantWoman assumes Franklin might have the same percentage of , er, difficult people as RantWoman's high school in a city and state far away. RantWoman wants only to point out that people for any number of reasons sometimes need to put space between themselves and other people, something that is darned hard to do 20 feet in the air on a concrete ribbon over a major roadway.

--RantWoman dislikes crossing Martin Luther King on the east side of Rainier. There is a traffic signal, but from the south there always seem to be people trying to zoom around the right hand turn on red lights. The walk signal seems really short and the x pattern of traffic makes it very difficult to be confident one is crossing with the light. RantWoman thinks vigorous youth might have a slightly easier time of it than RantWoman but still has a hard time recommending that crossing. RantWoman herself tends to cross MLK at McClellan when travelling southbound and to pray really a lot or take the bus when travelling northbound.

--If getting away from Franklin on foot is tough, the bus is little better. Either students clamber onto an overloaded northbound 7, at least to the Mount Baker transit center or, if they do not want to use the overpass but want to go southbound, they have to walk 1/4 of a mile to Rainier and Walden. In short, RantWoman thinks jaywalking across a major thoroughfare is a dumb idea, but she can darn well fathom why lots of people do it!

RantWoman's advice:
--RantWoman happens to know that there are lots of neighborhood planning discussions going on about issues related to teh pedestrain environment around the Mount Baker light rail station and transit center. RantWoman would definitely encourage students, staff, teachers at Franklin to get involved. You might not make an immediate difference, but the work will still matter down the line.

--For those of you who really MUST block traffic and get in people's faces to protest global warming, underinvestment in civic infrastructure or many targets ripe for protesting, RantWoman recommends serious thoughtful in-depth study of strategic and tactical nonviolence! RantWoman is pretty much in go-to-meetings mode herself, but rather than just isolating and hmming in individuals in cars, RantWoman urges people with beefs about cars and walkability to strategize and get serious and do protest right. (RantWoman is NOT giving lessons; she is just saying...)


In any case, there are plenty of reasons for the community to have conversations before school resumes in the fall!