Your walking on the wrong side of the road, you just don’t know it
Physics can prove reaction time is reduced with the current set of standards
As summer starts to begin we see a lot more people out and about enjoying the weather and doing things we as humans love to do outdoors. It also brings back an idea that has perturbed me and been sitting on my mind for quite some time. I feel bringing this more attention can help understand the choice for walking against the traffic on a road vs walking with it.
As a declaimer walking on the road in any capacity is a final and last resort when there are no other available paths available. The order of operations for pedestrians is to use sidewalks and other designated walking paths first, outer boundried non-drivable designated areas second, then grass and dirt covered areas and then finally, if no such area is deemed accessible from a reasonable view then a final consideration can be made for using the outer most road covered area with a safe distance from moving vehicles on said road.
The defining moment
I will spare you first any anticipation. No. I did not hurt anyone in any kind of vehicle incident, (knock on wood), nor was I involved in witnessing any such display of the kind. I however everyday do witness people walking on the same side as I’m driving throughout my week more often than I’d like to.
The idea caught me by surprise when I began passing by a hilled area near my home on my way to work and then back in the evenings in the same area again, at a time when most people do their walking with dogs, biking, etc.
The moment that got me thinking was at almost the top of the hill, where you reach a point at which the visibility distance drops extremely and go from a mile or more to under fifty feet. I was at the near top, when a person walking I had not noticed because of the hills separation of visibility led me to abruptly slow down in time to avoid the person.
I was upset no less. It was like, (to me), the person had jumped out of nowhere in almost a split second leaving me hardly any reaction time.
After that I started to compile a list of scientific experimental trials in my head, almost in an infuriating manner thinking to the affect that this most certainly cannot be the correct side to walk on.
Against the traffic, on the same side?
The Use Case
The scenarios I drummed up goes like this…
Scenario A — The Corner
Turning a corner at the same time where trees or shrubbery may be blocking the drivers point of view, especially during the acceleration point. It’s also one of the reason why cars are not allowed to park within two car lengths of a stop sign. There is a small fraction of view, when the driver may only be looking for cars with two quick glances followed by an acceleration after the fact.
Scenario B — The Hill
The driver reaches to the near top of a hill, when at nearly the same time a person is also crossing that threshold of minimal viewing distance where then both meet with the least amount of reaction time.
Science
What is your job when driving? Avoid all obstacles, and provide a more than adequate safe driving distance between those objects among many other things.
Subconsciously, our mind already knows you need to be on the lookout for objects while applying safe distance practices. If a person is on the same side of the road as a person joy riding or driving at a high speed or making turns around curved roads or hilled areas, the reaction time is greatly reduced if both objects are moving closer toward each other faster, than if they were moving in the same direction apart from each other.
Using the relative speed theory we can clearly see that objects moving in the same direction, (if a collision occurred), would result in a less amount of force between those two objects than if they were traveling toward each other from opposite directions.
Let’s just use this theory as a way for how the mind works. Decision making, (to me), would seem to be more rational and easier for someone to make if they noticed a person nearing them but while moving in the same direction. More time to slow down, more time to make a better decision.
If a driver noticed someone moving toward them closer at a faster speed, (the perceived speed between a pedestrian and vehicle), the driver may be more likely to move into a flight or fight response making quicker judgement calls with a greater chance for error because of the split-decision making.
Public awareness
I found a public study from Finland and a small page about awareness about pedestrians walkways. I’m not sure if the study in Finland can adequately compare the pedestrian densities to larger cities or areas when more foliage is present that could cause different conditions for this particular observation.
A study from Finland
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23040508/
Awareness
https://icsw.nhtsa.gov/people/injury/pedbimot/doom-ped-doom/RxFlyer/Rxflyer2.html
CDC transportation safety
https://www.cdc.gov/transportationsafety/pedestrian_safety/index.html
The Takeaway
Is there something to be done? Do you think the safety rule is the way it should be? I think that the reaction time is greatly reduced when a pedestrian is told to walk against the traffic on that same side of the road, which may also cause the driver to potentially create a riskier situation than if in the opposing scenario.
Is it something or a nothing burger?
