Montrealers are known for the tendency to cross the street wherever they want. Simply put, most of us have no aversion to jaywalking, and there’s no greater proof than the corner of Ste. Catherine and Stanley. One a bone-chilling February day in 2006, I stood for five minutes at this busy downtown intersection and witnesses no fewer than 100 people crossing against a red light. Take a close look at the colour of the light in the photo above: it’s green. All of those people are jaywalking.
Lately, though, we’ve noticed more and more people waiting for the light to change even when no cars are coming. On some weekends at corners like Ste. Catherine and University, jaywalkers often seem to be in the minority. What’s going on? Have the police’s occasional crackdowns actually changed our pedestrian habits? Or is it simply the tourists and suburbanites who flock to Ste. Catherine who change the natural order of things? Every summer, pedestrians seem as unruly as ever, but things might be changing.
That’s why we’re launching our very first poll. We want to know: do you jaywalk?
5 comments
I think the poll might need some tweaking. I answered the first answer (like most of the rest), but that doesn’t mean I’m reckless. It means when there’s no traffic on a street, I don’t have a problem crossing it.
There are some people who cross even when there are cars there waiting to go through. Or people who cross four-lane roads. It’s all a matter of degree. I cross when it’s safe for me to cross, whether that means waiting for the light to change or not.
That’s fodder for a future poll. Once we’ve established how many people actually jaywalk (and it looks like, at least according to this entirely and utterly unscientific survey, nearly all of us do), we can start to explore how we jaywalk.
Jay-walking is a term that was coined over 100 years ago (maybe 150). A “Jay” was a country person who came to the city and did not adhere to urban walking norms.
There are a few pedestrian advocates in Toronto who are trying to rid the term ‘jaywalking’ from our urban planning lexicon. Mid-block crossing is the new phrase to use. Plus, jaywalking/mid-block crossing is not illegal in Toronto. Only crossing against a red light.
The poll is flawed. Mr Blackett identified Toronto as a municipality where “jaywalking” does not exist in law. And although Sgt. Tom O’Brien is attempting to modify our local Streets By-law, for now at least, there is no “jaywalking” in London. Something that was confirmed for me via registered mail by a former Police Chief when I complained about such behaviour by uniformed officers. However, our Streets By-law does restrict crossing the road within a specific distance of (but outside of) an intersection’s marked pedestrian zone. That being the case, I respectfully suggest that terminate this poll, and start another which reflects all of the legal possibilities for all jurisdictions, or that you restrict your poll to a specific community.
I didn’t mention this when I first read this article back at the beginning of the month because I wasn’t sure, but on my walk down Ste-Catherine yesterday evening I confirmed a nagging suspicion.
In your item, you mention that you occasionally noticed at Ste-Catherine and University a majority of people respecting the lights. There is a significant difference between this intersection and many others along this street, including the one at Stanley: there are pedestrian lights.
It’s always eluded me why so many corners in the city centre lack this otherwise common feature. Especially baffling is René-Lévesque around Place Ville-Marie and Central Station: how many times have I seen people start sprinting half-way across the wide boulevard because the cross-street’s light suddenly turned yellow!
I also noticed yesterday that at the corner of de Maisonneuve and Bishop pedestrian lights were installed. I’m quite certain there were none before; they likely came with the advent of the new bike path. Can anyone speak to this and whether or not they’ve noticed at this foot-trafficked corner if there’s been any decrease in jaywalking?