Parents teach their children many things about being a safe pedestrian as kids that people still abide by in our adulthood:

Don’t run or play in the street.
Good idea.

Look both ways before crossing the street.
Probably the most useful thing you’ll ever learn. I nearly ran over two women in a parking lot who had neglected this basic rule.

Always cross at the corner.
This one is not such a good idea.

Different cities have different environments for pedestrians. In big cities, there is often enough traffic that crossing at the corner with the light may be the only way to get to the other side. That, and there are enough pedestrians to provide safety in numbers.

You don’t really need to worry about crossing the street in a rural area. If there are more than three or four cars driving by in an hour, you must be lost, because where you’re at is not that rural.

Image Credit: Boon Low

Conditions are different in a suburban environment. Since everyone in the suburbs drives their own minivan, very few people walk. If you are seen walking in the suburbs, it will be assumed that you are either exercising, or your car is broken. Since everyone who walks for exercise wears cute coordinated work-out clothes and sticks to cute residential neighborhoods with cute little walking paths, this possibility is often easy to eliminate.

Suppose you are at a major intersection. There are two lanes going in all four directions, plus separate left turn lanes that can turn on green or wait for an arrow. There are four possibilities for crossing.

1. Cross with the signal

If you have a ‘Walk’ signal, then traffic on your left and right will be stopped by a red light. What could possibly go wrong?

Even with a red light, the cars to your left can make a right turn on red. Their right turn will take them directly through your path. These drivers are probably looking towards the oncoming traffic, and not at you. It’s very easy for them to roll forward to get a better view of the oncoming traffic. They might even be talking on a cell phone or wrestling with the kids in the back seat. You are relying on them to see you, and there’s a good chance they won’t.

After you cross the median, there’s even more danger. Cars making a right turn from the lane in front of you are turning on green, so they are also less likely to see you. After all, green means go!

The most dangerous are drivers who are making a left turn on green coming from the street behind you. Their attention is on the oncoming traffic. They are looking for a gap, and trying to find one before the light changes. If there’s a narrow space, they will be accelerating. They might not see you until the last second, and that might be too late.

So unless you’re in a large group of people who are more visible and offer some cushioning in a crash, crossing with the signal is not your best bet.

2. Cross without the signal

This is a little better, but still dangerous. In this scenario, you ignore the walk signal and decide to wait until it’s clear. If you go against the light, then the traffic in front of and behind you is stopped, and the traffic to your left and right is going.

The advantage here is that you’re not relying on the drivers to see you and stop. If it’s clear to the left and the right, you can go . . . until the guy making the right turn on red in the lane in front of you nails you.

The disadvantage of this technique is the number of variables. You have cars coming from 1) your left, including people who plan to turn left or right, meaning they might change lanes while you’re trying to cross, 2) your right, which can be hard to see if there’s a big intersection, 3) people in front of you turning right and 4) if the light changes, people turning left from the lane behind you.

It can be difficult to keep track of who’s going when, and it’s easy to be halfway across when you realize the lane behind you just got a green turn arrow. It is also illegal, as I found out when I was stopped by police in Prague for crossing this way (they let me off when I couldn’t speak Czech).

3. Cross in the middle of the street

This sounds dangerous. You walk thirty or forty feet away from the intersection to the end of the median. You look left. If no one is coming, you cross to the median. Then, you look right. If it’s clear, you cross to the other side of the street.

The disadvantage is that cars are not expecting you to cross there, and they might not be watching for you. Of course, cars are often not watching for you wherever you cross, so this doesn’t seem like a big problem. You’re the pedestrian; it’s your job to watch out for the cars (it’s not who’s right, it’s who’s left).

It is also illegal. Fortunately, jaywalking is a joke law, and can be ignored (as long as there are no cops around).

There are two advantages to this method. First, there are no surprises. Cars aren’t turning, so what you see is what you get. Second, there are fewer variables. You have to worry about one lane at a time. If it’s clear, go. If not, stay. Simple and easy.

I am always pleasantly surprised when statistics support a logical conclusion, and in this case they do. This is a chart of the number of pedestrians hit by cars over five years in New York. The percentage of people hit is organized by location.

As you can see, 9.6% of accidents occurred when people crossed on their own (no light, no signal). You are almost twice as likely, 18.3% to be hit crossing at the corner against the light, and you are almost twice as likely as that, 35%, to be hit crossing with the signal!

So here are the revised rules for crossing the street:

Always look both ways before crossing the street.
That’s still a good one.

Don’t cross at the corner.
Go down to the middle of the street and you are statistically safer.

Always assume that a car is going to try to hit you.
You should never assume that a car can see you, or that the driver is paying any attention whatsoever. Just assume they’re aiming for you. I’ve had days where I was tempted to nudge an obnoxious pedestrian, and not everyone has the same self-control. If you can cross the street and no car could hit you even if they tried, then you’re in pretty good shape.

Until you fall through the open manhole.