Do we stop or do we go?

Diddums

Diddums

Diddums

Caporegime
Joined
24 Oct 2012
Posts
25,831
Location
Godalming
I'm sure you've all seen the people who just walk across red lights with their faces in their phone, music on, whatever the case may be. Here in London, I see tons of them daily. My reaction to them when the light goes green will generally depend on my mood, how many of them there are, and how far they are across the road.

Today my light went green so I twisted the throttle of my vicious and intimidating 125 scooter and caught this girl out the corner of my eye with her headphones on, clearly not paying attention. Because she had yoga pants on and was quite hot I gave her the little helmet shake to indicate that she can cross and off she went.

Thing is - in that moment I was faced with a choice. She wasn't far enough for me to let her go and had already stopped when she saw me, so I could've easily gone, but I stopped and let her go.

Question tiemz! Is my behaviour promoting people not paying attention?

Some random musing for you, I'm sure I'll have all the experts telling me that if my tyre pressures were a bit lower this wouldn't have happened :p
 
yep, it is manipulative behavour on her part if she uses her good looks to make you become mr nice guy

She will begin to learn if she steps out regardless of circumstance everyone will just stop for her.

By doing this you are reinforcing her behavour that she can just cross the road and everyone will just give way to her.

I see this happen a lot, people too glued to their phones to actually look where they are going. IF she knows that people are going to keep stopping for her, she will get used to it and just think that she always has right of way regardless. Problem with this is that one day she will just step out in front of a hgv or some kind of large vehicle and become mrs pancake

next time hoot at her, giver her the finger and then move on


----- my advise from mr angry :D
 
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Sometimes I hold the door open at the top of a 3-story staircase when the person is like 2 flights up. I feel so powerful knowing I can make them jog the last staircase. I follow up by asking a question which highlights their utter lack of fitness as they can barely speak for catching their breath.
 
dLockers said:
Sometimes I hold the door open at the top of a 3-story staircase when the person is like 2 flights up. I feel so powerful knowing I can make them jog the last staircase. I follow up by asking a question which highlights their utter lack of fitness as they can barely speak for catching their breath.
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See, that's chaotic neutral.

I close the door just before they get to it.
 
Diddums said:
I'm sure you've all seen the people who just walk across red lights with their faces in their phone, music on, whatever the case may be. Here in London, I see tons of them daily. My reaction to them when the light goes green will generally depend on my mood, how many of them there are, and how far they are across the road.

Today my light went green so I twisted the throttle of my vicious and intimidating 125 scooter and caught this girl out the corner of my eye with her headphones on, clearly not paying attention. Because she had yoga pants on and was quite hot I gave her the little helmet shake to indicate that she can cross and off she went.

Thing is - in that moment I was faced with a choice. She wasn't far enough for me to let her go and had already stopped when she saw me, so I could've easily gone, but I stopped and let her go.

Question tiemz! Is my behaviour promoting people not paying attention?

Some random musing for you, I'm sure I'll have all the experts telling me that if my tyre pressures were a bit lower this wouldn't have happened :p
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Not sure OP. But with cyclists in London that jump the reds, I'd like to "promote" my Nike Airs to their faces, but usually only manage to catch their back wheels sometimes.
 
Pop a wheelie next time whilst making sure to wear a jacket with short enough sleeves so that you can show off a Casio watch as you fly by. If that doesn't work, at the next set of red lights 10 yards down the road, lift the visor beforehand with the Gucci glasses on and repeat.
 
Rai200 said:
Pedestrians always have the right of way, even the ugly ones.
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This, not necessarily always the "right of way", but certainly they have priority over vehicles and according to the updated highway code, you should stop to allow pedestrians to cross the street. Any accident that occurs as a result of you not following the highway code recommendations is likely to result in you being found liable to at least some extent for any injury or property damage someone suffers if an accident occurs.

Intimidating a pedestrian by revving your throttle would certainly be a significant aggravating factor if it was deemed any driving offence had occurred.
 
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I have a moment etched in my mind of approaching traffic lights as a passenger in a friend's car on a fast main road, and he wasn't exactly driving slowly..., when the lights suddenly changed from green to red for us instantly with no amber and every person waiting to cross reacted to the pedestrian light changing by stepping out without a single glance at traffic... I have no idea how my friend managed to react and stop in time - I was pretty convinced we were about to mow down 6-7 people at significant speed. Even with him skidding only about half of them even reacted - others probably had headphones on, etc.

Unfortunately tiny image and it doesn't quite describe the problem properly but eventually the council investigated it after people complaining for awhile those lights weren't working properly:

gHmYOjZ.png
 
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Diddums said:
I'm sure you've all seen the people who just walk across red lights with their faces in their phone, music on, whatever the case may be. Here in London, I see tons of them daily. My reaction to them when the light goes green will generally depend on my mood, how many of them there are, and how far they are across the road.

Today my light went green so I twisted the throttle of my vicious and intimidating 125 scooter and caught this girl out the corner of my eye with her headphones on, clearly not paying attention. Because she had yoga pants on and was quite hot I gave her the little helmet shake to indicate that she can cross and off she went.

Thing is - in that moment I was faced with a choice. She wasn't far enough for me to let her go and had already stopped when she saw me, so I could've easily gone, but I stopped and let her go.

Question tiemz! Is my behaviour promoting people not paying attention?

Some random musing for you, I'm sure I'll have all the experts telling me that if my tyre pressures were a bit lower this wouldn't have happened :p
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Everyday when I drive, they just walk across without looking, sometimes right next to the car.
 
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If one motorist waving you across gives unfounded faith in other motorists then the issue should resolve itself quite quickly.

I have a potted memory of an opposite scenario. Light changed to red and a nice girl who was paying attention thanked me for stopping :)

Maybe she thought it was different to see a pushbike sprinting down the road then doing an emergency stop instead of blowing through :p
 
Energize said:
This, not necessarily always the "right of way", but certainly they have priority over vehicles and according to the updated highway code, you should stop to allow pedestrians to cross the street.
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Umm, no. It's only about crossing the road at junctions. I guess you'd better go off and learn about the new rules.
 
Energize said:
This, not necessarily always the "right of way", but certainly they have priority over vehicles and according to the updated highway code, you should stop to allow pedestrians to cross the street.
Click to expand...

Freakbro said:
Umm, no. It's only about crossing the road at junctions. I guess you'd better go off and learn about the new rules.
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And even then, it's only junctions without a light controlled crossing. Plenty of junctions have light controlled pedestrian crossings and so, unlike non-light controlled, they don't have priority and should wait for the green man before crossing.
 
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