Seconds later they hit actually children on the sidewalk or just hit that telephone pole.

By detailed risk assessment, do they mean that they predict that people seeing it for the first time will all react predictably? Idiotic. I expect an addendum post to this one indicating that an insurance company is suing the shit out of Preventable and the city for putting this up. Either that, or someone in the city will spray paint over it.

(Bad idea for the reasons the previous commenters have already pointed out; plus it could cause drivers to react in ways that make them more dangerous, such as slamming on their brakes or swerving to miss the “child” in the road.)

“Well we’re going down the tubes right now, so we’ve got to do something!”

How many other horrible ideas have been perpetuated with this same “reasoning?”

What they need to do is have a setup where you’re driving along, minding your own business when all of the sudden a pneumatic cannon fires pig guts and cow blood all over your windshield, while a $2000 stereo system plays the sound of a small child being hit with a car. In case that you can successfully still control your vehicle, the next bit of road will tilt your car into a nearby ditch.

Then, while you’re pulling yourself out of the wreck and cursing yourself as a murderer, a guy with a big bushy mustache and a purple top hat and tails stands at the top of the ditch and goes “Surprise! It was all an ill-OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSion!”

Preventables: we’re not complete morons, so we try harder.

-Darren MacLennan

It’s a terrible idea. We had a prime example of this some years back here. A IIRC 13 year old girl walks up to the school crosswalk, looks *ONE* way and starts walking. It was 2 minutes before the lights came on and she stepped right in front of a pickup.

But as a single-use, temporary, public-awareness installation, looks great to me.

How the Preventable folks intend to use it, I have no idea. Hopefully they are using their powers for good.

Speed limits and enforcement should be all it takes, but enforcement is rare enough that people gamble on it. Step up the enforcement and the problem will solve itself.

Also, we should be setting better expectations for pedestrians. I live near several schools in a small Canadian city, and I’ve had the chance to observe all different ages crossing the street. Little kids are the safest and least-likely to be hit. You know why? They are scared of the traffic. Every time I’ve seen a kid under 9 cross the street, they have looked both ways, waited for traffic to stop, and even waited for the drivers to wave them across. By high school age, kids know that they have the right of way and they expect cars to stop, so they just walk right into the middle of a busy street. University students and other adults are often no better, with the difference being that the adults often become indignant when drivers are upset about it.

We need to spend less time convincing pedestrians that it’s perfectly safe to step out into a busy street because the traffic will stop for them, and more time convincing drivers and pedestrians to communicate and work together. Drivers need to be cautious of pedestrians and pedestrians need to be cautious of drivers.

mumphLT

Also, I wonder how this sticker looks when a car is 30 feet ahead of you? It may look like the car ahead of you dropped or birthed a kid. Or maybe that the car ahead of you just ran over a kid. I bet the warning signs don’t let you know that might happen.

Also, are they doing anything about pedestrian education at the same intersection? The marketing group says it’s very concerned about these preventable injuries. If they are concerned, then educate. If you want a lot of PR then why bother?

Next to the obvious dangers of trying to fool traffic into an accident situation, all I can see is this eventually desensitizing some drivers and making others more jaded. Neither of which makes anyone any safer.

Then again, I did have to cycle through a dozen annoying captchas to find one I could read, so it’s not all good.

I would like to see that “detailed risk assessment”! Somehow I have a feeling it isn’t.

If nothing else, I don’t want a driver to _ever_ think it might be just a decal, if he/she sees a child in the middle of the road. The reaction should be “BRAKEBRAKEBRAKE!!!” not “is that real or not?”. I’m honestly spitting mad at that bleepety bleep “safety awareness group”. I hope no other group gets any ideas from them, or at least stay out of my bleepety bleep country!

Perhaps the sticker people should next time do similar illusions.

This I think is a much better reminder (“keep _me_ safe in traffic”), and it doesn’t create wrong kind of reaction paths. You see a kid with a yellow cap in the middle of the road, you better brake!