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21/7/11 12:47This is one of those cases that just breaks my heart.
A mother and her three kids were coming home from a long bus trip in Atlanta, made longer because they missed a transfer and had to wait over an hour for the next bus. When the bus arrived at their stop, there wasn't any crosswalk at that intersection -- the nearest crosswalk was over a quarter-mile away -- so they and the other bus riders jaywalked across the highway. They arrived at the median; the four-year-old broke away into the road, and a van driven by a drunk driver killed him.
The mother was charged with vehicular homicide and is facing up to three years in jail.
I lived in the south without a car for a couple years while I was in grad school. For a southern town, Carrboro is pretty friendly to the carless. I lived across the street from a laundromat and a Food Lion. The bus infrastructure was pretty good, even though they only ran every 30 minutes, and not at all on Sunday or after 8:30 p.m. But, to live in most places in the south, and not have a car? It's hard. And it's usually not an option to move somewhere more central or urbanized, because the houses there are far more expensive (and smaller, which is a consideration when you've got three kids).
I lived across the street from a laundromat and a Food Lion. But the street in this case was a four-lane highway. There was a cross-walk, though it was kind of an annoying detour, and it was physically impossible for me to actually cross the crosswalk before the light turned red, and then everybody would honk at me. So, mostly, I ran across the highway and took my chances.
I'm not sure how it happened. I guess it was twilight, not dark enough that the driver realized he needed to have his lights on, but too dark for me to see the car as it was coming at me. It just barely missed me. I crossed to the other side, yelling at it, and the car swung a U-turn just to come at me again and curse me out.
I remember being twelve years old and moving to my new neighborhood in Raleigh, North Carolina. A very nice new development with... no sidewalks. Nobody walks, I guess, so why would you spend any money putting sidwalks in?
Apparently if you're poor, and you spend too much money on driving a car, it's your fault. And if you're poor, and you suffer the consequences of not having a car, that's also your fault.
A mother and her three kids were coming home from a long bus trip in Atlanta, made longer because they missed a transfer and had to wait over an hour for the next bus. When the bus arrived at their stop, there wasn't any crosswalk at that intersection -- the nearest crosswalk was over a quarter-mile away -- so they and the other bus riders jaywalked across the highway. They arrived at the median; the four-year-old broke away into the road, and a van driven by a drunk driver killed him.
The mother was charged with vehicular homicide and is facing up to three years in jail.
I lived in the south without a car for a couple years while I was in grad school. For a southern town, Carrboro is pretty friendly to the carless. I lived across the street from a laundromat and a Food Lion. The bus infrastructure was pretty good, even though they only ran every 30 minutes, and not at all on Sunday or after 8:30 p.m. But, to live in most places in the south, and not have a car? It's hard. And it's usually not an option to move somewhere more central or urbanized, because the houses there are far more expensive (and smaller, which is a consideration when you've got three kids).
I lived across the street from a laundromat and a Food Lion. But the street in this case was a four-lane highway. There was a cross-walk, though it was kind of an annoying detour, and it was physically impossible for me to actually cross the crosswalk before the light turned red, and then everybody would honk at me. So, mostly, I ran across the highway and took my chances.
I'm not sure how it happened. I guess it was twilight, not dark enough that the driver realized he needed to have his lights on, but too dark for me to see the car as it was coming at me. It just barely missed me. I crossed to the other side, yelling at it, and the car swung a U-turn just to come at me again and curse me out.
I remember being twelve years old and moving to my new neighborhood in Raleigh, North Carolina. A very nice new development with... no sidewalks. Nobody walks, I guess, so why would you spend any money putting sidwalks in?
Apparently if you're poor, and you spend too much money on driving a car, it's your fault. And if you're poor, and you suffer the consequences of not having a car, that's also your fault.