Posted on 11/24/2017 12:06:18 PM PST by 4Runner
TAMPA — A mother of two was in critical condition Wednesday night after a car struck her and her two children as they attempted to cross S Dale Mabry Highway, Tampa police said.
(Excerpt) Read more at tbo.com ...
I've posted threads like this before because this kind of atrocity occurs with regularity in the Tampa Bay area where we have an inordinate percentage of the population driving without licenses or insurance. I will leave it to your imagination as to who these drivers are and what their demographics look like.
The fact that the victims are never in a crosswalk when this happens seems to be giving Tampa Police the leeway to disregard driver responsibility when a driver hits a pedestrian with his vehicle.
Hillsborough County is a sanctuary county.
I’ve seen hundreds of pedestrians killed by cars in youtube videos. Many of them are very instructive. Especially the ones that were the driver’s fault (about half of them).
I was wondering why this was a story, until I saw that there was a video. Wuite a few people die every day like this.
Full auto assault vehicle ?
I hit a pedestrian pretty hard once, about 12 years ago. It was not in a crosswalk and he came out from a row of stopped cars in a left turn lane like a Squirrel. I didn’t even hit the brakes.
I also j-walk a LOT.
My perspective, if you’re in a crosswalk and protected by a light or stop sign, it’s the driver’s fault. Otherwise, it’s your fault.
Every time I cross the road on foot, I believe my safety is wholly my responsibility. Even if it IS a crosswalk. There is an old safety ad that was popular in the 1960’s. The last line: “Yes, he was right. Dead right.”
BTW. just search pedestrian crash on youtube. Some very geraphic (and stupid) stuff there.
The fact that the victims are never in a crosswalk ....
.... are probably why they get run over so often.
And often, pedestrians just do stupid things. While driving through Pinellas Park (Tampa Bay area) Wednesday evening at dusk an older man (60s or 70s) dashed across the road in front of me. It was in the middle of a block on a very busy road. It was very difficult to see him until he was directly in front of me. I braked hard to avoid hitting him. I honked my horn. He gave me the finger.
FL is also packed full of geezers. At night, no crosswalk, if the driver wasn’t exceeding the speed limit and/or drug impaired, I’m thinking geezer.
I live in Pinellas county and I see people all the time trying to cross 6 lanes of traffic between crosswalks and it scares the hell out of me.
I damn near got hit crossing the street to my house. I live on a corner and I do have surveillance cameras and have a recording. I wish I knew how to down size it and post it. I have the license plate from the videos.
this kind of atrocity
“Every time I cross the road on foot, I believe my safety is wholly my responsibility.”
You could not be more right. Rules of physics trump the rules of the road every time. Whether on a bike or on foot, I always make eye contact with a driver who is stopped or moving before I cross their path. Otherwise, you can never be sure that they’ve seen you.
I came frighteningly close to hitting a grade school child once who darted, on her bike, from between two stopped cars into my path as I was making a left turn onto her street. The dad was standing right there. I knew the family vaguely. She was one of my daughter’s classmates. I stopped and told him that he needed to tell his daughter to look both ways ALWAYS before crossing a street. I guess this offended his parenting abilities and he lamely told me I needed to watch out for kids. I WAS watching, just as I always do, but that child was literally a streak of green on her speeding bike. No driver can stop that fast, especially when you’ve been distracted by watching a line of oncoming traffic, waiting for a break so you can make a left hand turn and the kid comes flying out from behind a stopped car. I just hope that, in spite of his bluster and attempt to assign blame to me, that the incident shook him up enough that he had a talk with her. Sometimes people need danger demonstrated to them. Rules of the road do NOT protect you from getting run over and righteously blaming someone else will not bring your child back.
Moron. Drivers HITTING people with their cars IS AN ATROCITY. There is no fucking excuse for it. Period. I have been driving for 50 years in six states, ten of these professionally and I have never so much as scratched another human being with any of my vehicles. I’m not lucky. I’m not special. I’m just respectful of HUMAN LIFE. Moron.
Someone running out of between parked cars, no where near a cross, is the atrocity. Idiot.
i was just reading a story about jacksonville that matches my own impressions about Florida, they have stroads right by residential areas that dont have crosswalks for MILES! nothing wrong with not having a license or a car and streets should be built for people too.
Always tragic but I'v had to dodge too many idiots to automatically assume who was at fault.
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