I’m surprised that such buttons even exist in the US.
They’re referred to by city planners and those in the industry as “beg buttons”.
They exist in my city but the only use they have is to turn on the speaker to help the visually-impaired
Why? I live in a state that is currently ranked 48th in many metrics including accessibility and I have still almost never seen a signaled intersection that didn’t have one. In fact I have seen several at places that aren’t even an intersection just a place where people cross the street often like near a school.
I’m pretty sure they are almost always placebo
That seems unlikely to me. If they were fully timer-based, that would mean there are times when cars would have to stop even though there are no pedestrians trying to cross, and we can’t have that(!)
in NZ they are on every intersection, you don’t get a pedestrian crossing signal without someone pressing it. Even better are the diagonal cross intersections where all the cars stop once a cycle for pedestrians to cross to whatever side they want
THIS has to be satire.
I have become convinced that people get addicted to speed. One of the fastest ways to make some people’s blood boil is simply making them drive a little slower; even if it’s so marginal that it can’t actually possibly affect when they arrive at their destination they become furious.
The US loves to have wide, straight roads with great visibility and no obstacles on which cars could easily, safely do 80MPH (in the absence of other drivers of course) but with artificial limits of 30-40 miles per hour that everybody obviously ignores because - hey, just look at the road, it’s begging for people to go faster. The Netherlands by comparison generally does a great job of managing drivers’ expectations by adding artificial curves, places where cars have to gently swerve, setting trees along the roads that give a feeling of constraint and not “wide open place to floor it”, etc. Of course you still see people here losing their minds because they have to wait for pedestrians to cross once the light turns green, but it’s not as bad as my experiences in the US.
I have a more metaphysical take on it: One’s level of suffering is proportional to the distance between where one’s body is located, and where one’s mind is. It applies in a lot of different scenarios, and I think is kind of the secret behind the mindfulness movement. (If your mind and body are in the same place, you are much happier.)
The way that this applies to cars is in two ways: 1) The driver’s body is physically located in a torture chamber, essentially. Sure, they put in a cushy recliner, and an entertainment system, but those can only do so much to mitigate how awful it is to drive. 2) The speed of the car promises a quick trip, so the driver’s mind is already at their destination, and the separation makes them miserable and furious.
Yeah, yeah, that’s pretty woo-woo. It’s just a metaphor for the impatience drivers feel because, in their minds, they’re already walking in the door, they’re already ordering food at the restaurant, they’re already kissing their spouse, they’re already answering work emails, or whatever it is they have at the destination. And you, pedestrian, you are directly responsible for keeping them from it.
But I notice the real effects myself. Last weekend, I went up north to my vacation spot, where I’ve found that riding my bicycle to the beach is subjectively much faster than driving. It’s almost like teleporting! Objectively, it takes longer, but when I’m riding my bicycle, I’m mentally on the road riding my bicycle, so the trip doesn’t even register as part of the beach experience the way driving does.
Often their mind is already at a destination that they hate (work), making it even worse.
I do believe you’re absolutely correct in essence, even if the mechanisms are subject to debate.
I switched to only getting around by E-bike 90% of the time, and the effect you describe regarding bicycle trip time subjectivity is absolutely real.
Taking 45 minutes to go 15 miles away feels a lot faster and relaxing than the 20 minutes it would be by car. People wave at you and you at them, that’s still a thing!
About the only time the American psyche is confronted with the prospect of mindfulness and driving, is during the now nearly mythical “road trip” and even that experience has long since been reduced to listening to nav voice as you drive fast from point to point.
I have become convinced that people get addicted to speed.
While that part is certainly true, the modern homo sapiens automobilis seems more addicted to crawling along in slow moving traffic while hating everyone moving faster or able to escape in any way.
I don’t think speed is the main factor, I think it’s entitlement. With public transportation, you might have to go somewhere specific to get your ride, rather than it being just outside. Then you wait til a certain time, share the ride with others, the path and speed arent in your control so it may not be the most efficient route. With a car, you can go when you want, where you want and how you want. Until you know, others get in the way. If something is making you drive slightly slower, you now have less control.
I also think driving in general is an unpleasant experience. For most of the time driving, you are staring at asphalt, concrete and other cars, nothing is fun to look at. You have to focus constantly and any distractions become annoyances. Because of cars everything is so far away it always requires the car to do ANYTHING. For all the supposed freedom, you are constantly being told what to do. This is the speed limit, this is a stop sign, this is your designated lane, you have to yield. At every point you run into people and the more you run into the less you can do what you want. And those people can act like don’t understand rules, aren’t paying attention, interpret the rules differently, think they don’t apply to them, know they can get away with it because the rules aren’t heavily enforced or they are selectively enforced. Sometimes the rules don’t always make the most sense, they are the way they are so it’s easier to assign blame to someone in a insurance claim or court case. Or sometimes the rules make sense for someone else, but not your entitlement machine.
I press the button every time, and if there’s a break in the traffic, I cross before it changes.
I also recline my seat on the plane as far as it goes. I don’t have any problem with others doing the same.
I’ve pressed the button when I don’t need to cross when the flow of traffic is being unsafe together.
The sense of entitlement of people inside cars is staggering
Not 50 minutes of human life; 50 minutes of carbrain life. There’s a difference
I definitely don’t want my life in the hands of someone that can’t afford to be 30 seconds late to wherever they are going.
Fuck Jeremy Kauffman.
I agree…
but not in the way the Twitter OP expects.For the majority of intersections, if you don’t press the button (or more often, don’t press it in time), you don’t get the walk light. Doesn’t matter if the parallel car traffic has a green and all cross traffic is blocked, if you didn’t press it beforehand, it stays on the red hand and skips your turn.
I say the buttons should not be there to “beg” for crossing permission. They should be used to say, “Hey I’m in a wheelchair or carrying a heavy can you give me 15 extra seconds?” And it should not need to be pressed beforehand.
the length of the pedestrian’s signal may be adjusted longer as well, especially for crossing wide multi-lane and divided roadways.
It may be, but it isn’t.
Honestly fuck the button entirely, we live in the modern era, you can use human detection technology to detect people waiting to cross
There’s plenty of places that have that
Ah, so like in Europe
Europe’s a big place. I don’t have anything resembling that here in Romania. You mean like in the Netherlands?
France too, in cities the buttons is mostly just switching on a speaker to announce when it’s green for pedestrians for the visually impaired or if you like “ding ding” sounds
Love ding ding sounds. I’d hit em all even if I wasn’t crossing just for the ding dings. My local transit agency is probably onto this fact, because instead of ding dings ours make a sound similar to when you flick a spring-loaded doorstop, but bassier.
Everyone knows that europe is js the nederlands
Yeh
In my corner or Europe there are indeed many of those buttons that don’t work and are purely cosmetically. It gives people something to focus on in the minute or so they have to wait for their light to get green which it would also do anyway when no one was there.
And it’s a somewhat standardized way of putting a vibrating indicator for people with impaired sight at the pole, whether it doubles to actually request a green light or just fakes it doesn’t matter.
I ignore crossing signals at intersections that don’t turn the walk sign on by default
I’ve been honked at for it. nothing worse. hasn’t actually happened in a while now, but my reaction would definitely be a lot more aggressive towards drivers if they did it to me now
I hit these buttons in both directions whenever I get to an intersection. The more stopped cars in the city, the better.
jokes on you, I run the red light
definitely satire
everybody knows an intersection like this has at least a 90s light cycle
This HAS to be satire
Par for the course, it would seem.
State Libertarian Party leader charged for disorderly conduct after fender bender
Jeremy Kauffman, a former Free State Project leader who now chairs the New Hampshire Libertarian Party, is facing criminal charges stemming from an incident where police say a fender bender in a Manchester parking lot prompted Kauffman to fight “several people” and yell racist epithets.
Hint of misandry too, implying it’s not manly to follow traffic safety laws. Dude probably has personal hygiene too and Mr. Jeremy Kauffman would point out washing one’s butt is gay.
Calling a man gay or effeminate in a derogatory way is not misandry. That’s homophobia and/or misogyny. Misandry isn’t a real thing just like heterophobia and reverse racism isn’t a thing.
How dare we let the elderly, children, and disabled cross streets! They’ll get away!!!
Just one more lane, bro 🙏
But they stop anyway for the other traffic
