SMPD conducts citywide crackdown on failure to yield to pedestrians
SAN VICENTE BLVD Seated on his black and white motorcycle at the busy intersection of Fourth Street and San Vicente Boulevard Friday morning, Officer Rob Dawson gripped the handlebars tightly as he waited for drivers to speed passed him, failing to stop for pedestrians clad in workout wear.
He didn’t have to wait long. Within a few seconds Dawson and his fellow traffic officers flipped on their emergency lights and sped off in pursuit of violators. Within the span of an hour, the officers wrote nearly a dozen tickets, a sobering reminder of how dangerous it can be to step out into the street, even if you are strolling across a marked crosswalk in broad daylight.
“We could do this all day long,” Dawson said. “For some reason people just don’t want to stop for pedestrians. … It almost has to be a close call for someone to stop. Some just don’t know the law. As soon as that pedestrian steps into the crosswalk, that intersection belongs to them.”
While City Hall works hard to encourage people to get out of their cars and walk, spending millions to modify streets and sidewalks to make them more pedestrian friendly, Santa Monica has seen an increase in the number of auto accidents involving pedestrians, many of them elderly. Over half of injury accidents are auto versus pedestrian.
To bring that number down, the SMPD conducted a citywide crosswalk sting, posting motorcycle officers like Dawson at busy intersections to catch drivers who failed to stop for a mixture of decoys and unsuspecting pedestrians out for their morning walks.
“The bottom line is this is a serious violation that is occurring,” said Sgt. Larry Horn with the SMPD’s Office of Special Enforcement/Traffic, who was overseeing the sting. “The public is constantly complaining about it. It is no doubt a serious problem and a lot of it is due to people just being impatient, while for others it is an honest mistake. Either way we are here to raise awareness.”
The citywide enforcement effort was the largest of its kind, involving seven intersections, eight decoys and 20 officers, including two from the Culver City Police Department. Officers were deployed around 9 a.m. and worked well into the afternoon. In all, 192 citations were issued for failing to yield, a handful of cars were impounded and some misdemeanor citations were issued, Horn said.
Those who were cited were suspected of breaking one of two laws — Sections 21950 FROM STING PAGE 1 ■ Main Street at Hollister Avenue: 20 citations, 1 misdemeanor traffic citation ■ Main Street and Kinney Street: 5 citations ■ Main Street at Bay Street: 6 citations, 1 misdemeanor traffic citation, 1 vehicle impound ■ San Vicente Boulevard at Fourth Street: 34 citations, 1 vehicle impound ■ Montana Avenue at 15th Street: 18 citations,1 misdemeanor traffic citation ■ Wilshire Boulevard at Franklin Street: 12 citations ■ Wilshire Boulevard at Ninth Street: 12 citations ■ Wilshire Boulevard at 16th Street: 14 citations ■ Pico Boulevard at 23rd Street: 12 citations ■ Pico Boulevard at 31st Street: 30 citations, 2 misdemeanor citations ■ Ocean Park Boulevard 18th Street: 18 citations ■ Ocean Park Boulevard at Third Street: 10 citations, 1 commercial enforcement stop resulting in an overweight citation
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on June 28, 2008. Read the original PDF.