Excerpt from article:

“We all play a role in keeping our roads safe and Crime Stoppers Victoria is offering vulnerable pedestrians the tools they need to use our roads safely,” she [Crime Stoppers Victoria Chief Executive Stella Smith] said.

“We have seen 175 pedestrians killed on our roads over the last five years, and a significant number of those have been in 60 km/h zones.

“We hope with more education and awareness we can reduce the number of injuries and most importantly, deaths on our roads.”

As part of the campaign, Crime Stoppers Victoria will hit the streets to actively engage with high-risk pedestrians to educate them on how they can help keep our roads incident-free.

I guess that means police will be out in force handing out fines to pedestrians and cyclists. “Job done!”

Archived: https://archive.md/UOcHu

  • Roadkill 🇦🇺 @lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Perhaps they are just talking to pedestrians and cyclists that are in a world of their own? Not everything to do with the copers has to do with fines.

    The number of pedestrians I see crossing roads with their heads glued to their phones, cyclists at night with no lights or cruising through red lights, groups riding 4 abreast on narrow, winding and hilly 100kmh roads (just a few examples) is astonishing.

    Like it or not vehicles will always exist and it is up to everyone to play their part in not being a danger to anyone else or themselves.

    Yes there are a lot of reckless, careless, distracted or entitled drivers but there are also pedestrians and cyclists that fit squarely in one or more of those categories.

    I say this as someone who has been severely injured on my bicycle as the result of a hit and run, but also continues to ride. I also ride motorcycles and drive over 1000km per week for work for over 40 years, avoiding idiots multiple times a day, be they driving, walking or riding.

    Perhaps we all need to be more spatially aware, courteous and in less of a hurry with more sense of self preservation, regardless of our mode of transport.

    Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk. ✌️

    • pec
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      1 year ago

      Everyone here reacts very negatively to this because blaming pedestrian has been, via jaywalking rules, in the past, a strategy encourage by car companies to push cities toward more car centric cities. Also it’s been proven over and over that car speed is the main factor in pedestrian collisions.

      Obviously everyone should be well aware of the dangers of their everyday life and education is good as long as the lesson isn’t “get the fuck out of the way or die”

      • Roadkill 🇦🇺 @lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        The education should be "everyone and everything on the road is trying to kill you. I think jaywalking rules may be an american thing. But simply Cars are more noticeable visibly and audibly, pedestrians can stop and change direction orders of magnitude faster than cars. Do I think built up urban areas should discourage car use? Yes

        • AJ Sadauskas@aus.social
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          1 year ago

          @RoadkillUgly @pec The problem is cars.

          Cars are an inherently dangerous mode of transport.

          According to the WHO, car accidents kill 1.3 million people worldwide each year.

          Let’s put that number into perspective.

          There’s around 212 seats on a Boeing 777 jumbo jet, depending on configuration.

          So 1.3 million deaths is equivalent to around 6132 plane crashes each year. That works out to be equivalent to around 16 plane crashes globally each day.

          Cars also make every other mode of transport more dangerous, slower, and less efficient.

          You raise walking while looking at your phone. Well, that’s generally not a deadly act (try it in a park sometime). Well, what makes that deadly is cars.

          Riding a bike, e-bike, or scooter is significantly more dangerous in mixed traffic than it is on a dedicated cycling path or barrier protected bike lane.

          It is car drivers who are in control of a deadly multi-tonne vehicle.

          Responsibility always rests with the driver.

          Full stop.

          Now, there are a range of measures that the Victorian state government could put in place to make streets safer for all modes.

          Barrier-protected cycling lanes along major streets and roads. Reducing speed limits to 30 KP/h on local streets. Road diets. Pedestrianising major shopping strips.

          But suburban Melbourne’s backwards car-dependent approach to planning means it’s a long way behind the world’s best practice, in countries, such as the Netherlands.

          It’s a long way behind countries in Europe that aren’t quite at world’s best practice, such as Austria.

          It’s a long way behind cities and countries that were behind the iron curtain during the Cold War.

          It’s even falling behind Sydney.

          So yes, the problem is with cars. And trying to place the blame on anything else is blaming the victim.

          #urbanism #UrbanPlanning #cars #cycling #bikes #traffic #walkability #cities #walking

    • buckenmuck@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      “Yes there are a lot of reckless, careless, distracted or entitled drivers but there are also pedestrians and cyclists that fit squarely in one or more of those categories.”

      There is a lot I disagree with in your comment, but I am wondering why you’re making this false equivalency. How many people have “distracted pedestrians” killed or severely injured? In the same vein, from the article one of the most vulnerable groups is kids 4-12. What’s the way to make sure kids, famous for their inhibitory control, aren’t distracted?

    • Zagorath@aussie.zone
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      1 year ago

      I’m curious, what is your relationship to fuckcars and urbanism in general? Which subreddits and/or YouTube channels do/did you frequent?

        • Zagorath@aussie.zone
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          1 year ago

          Wow. First of all mate, let’s chill out a little, hey? Personally, one of the things that I’ve loved about Lemmy so far is how much more civil it has been than Reddit. Let’s try and keep it that way.

          As to your main point: I’ll be satisfied with an answer of “literally anything”. I just suspect that this person isn’t an urbanist, and has in fact just blown in from the wider car-brained community. I’m happy to be proven wrong on that though.