Re: The Victoria police have recently been cracking down on jaywalking.

Jaywalking is permitted on Government not because it has been deemed safe (indeed, drivers tend to drive faster on one-way streets) but to “foster a pedestrian-friendly atmosphere”. In other words, city council is willing to sacrifice a few pedestrians to try to carve a tiny area of walkability out of our car-centric city. For example, some writers have specifically mentioned the danger of jaywalking on Douglas. It is dangerous because Douglas is designed as a thoroughfare: four lanes and no left turns to move cars as fast as possible.

Every time someone jaywalks it’s a symptom of poor urban design. People are just trying to get from point A to point B: they look around and it’s harder than it should be, so they take shortcuts. As long as our city is designed for cars, you can’t blame pedestrians for trying to find their own way through. Rather than criminalizing jaywalking, we should be figuring out how to make it safer by slowing and reducing cars.