If you’re in New York City and you enjoy cell chatting, web surfing, listening to music, or texting while walking the streets of Manhattan, you may soon be in for a really big change.
NY State Sen. Carl Kruger wants to make it illegal to use an electronic device while crossing a big city street on foot. He says if you must talk or text on the street, then pull it over to the side and stop walking. Kruger has even enlisted the help Arkansas state Sen. Jimmy Jeffress, who wants to ban pedestrians from even wearing headphones in both ears on or near a roadway. Sheesh!
Now before you call their proposed laws over-reaching and heavy handed, at least take into consideration that it really is in the interest of public safety. Many accidents and injuries have come from distracted pedestrians, who were so busy chatting, texting, or listening to music, that they forgot their mother’s first law — to look both ways before crossing the street.
One woman was recently the butt of a national joke, when she was caught on camera at a local mall so busy texting, she failed to see a huge water fountain in her path — which she promptly fell into. Although the woman was not seriously injured, hundreds of NYC street pedestrians per year aren’t so lucky, walking unknowingly into oncoming traffic at the hands of their cell phone distraction.
But opponents of the proposed ban are already asking some very valid questions: How does a cop know if your music device is on or off when you hit the crosswalk? Or how will they know if you are talking to someone on your Bluetooth, or just mumbling to yourself? In a city where police never even enforce existing laws against jaywalking, it will be difficult to see how a major metropolis such as New York City would be able to effectively implement such a law, even if it is for your own good!
