A woman walking her bike in Tempe AZ was struck and killed by a driverless Uber car.
Uber and others should consider the old joke about automated airplanes.
“Ladies and gentle, welcome to the world’s first completely automated flight. Although there are no pilots in the cockpit, we would like to assure you that every detail has been worked out. Please sit back and enjoy your flight, flight, flight,…”
Showing posts with label pedestrian. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pedestrian. Show all posts
Thursday, March 22, 2018
Tuesday, December 31, 2013
Disaster is only one step away!
Sunday afternoon I went out our front door to take two containers of compost to the bins at the corner restaurant. One moment I was vertical on our front walk, the next I was flat on my back. There seemed to be no transition, no feeling of falling. I felt my head bang against the concrete. I hollered my wife's name.
The next thing I remember is being inside asking my wife to get the container of sidewalk salt.
Then I remember my wife telling me to sit in a chair and relax. After a bit I felt fine and got up to put salt on the sidewalk. When I got outside I saw little holes in the ice. Somebody had already salted. As hard as I tried, I couldn't remember being out the first time. I did remember later, but was that just a reconstruction?
My wife's reconstruction is that our grandson, looking out the front door, said, "Grandpa!" and then she heard me holler. She went outside and found me in a fetal position and helped me get up and inside. She said a neighbor across the street watched her, wondering if he needed to help. She said I wanted to take the compost then and there, but she made me sit down.
Now let's look at the what ifs.
What if instead of my head hitting the sidewalk it had hit the bottom step? Would I have a broken neck?
What if I had not been wearing a hat? My winter hat is not very thick, but it seemed to be thick enough to absorb some of the force. Later I did see the imprint of the hat in the snow.
What if I had been home alone? Would anybody have seen me in a timely fashion? Chuck Frederick, Editorial Editor of the Duluth News Tribune, wrote "Duluth didn't watch out for student frozen on porch" 2013-12-12. My situation could have been similar. The neighbors on one side are gone for college break. The neighbors on the other side rarely go out the front door. Even if they did, the snow banks might have hidden me. Drivers going by aren't checking every notch in the snow banks for pedestrians lying on the sidewalk. Pedestrians going by are checking where they walk and will rarely turn their heads to look up a house walk. Whatever, I doubt if all of Duluth should be held accountable if I were not found in a reasonable time.
Why did I slip? I had cleared the sidewalk the previous day, there shouldn't be a problem, right? Not quite, the temperature was around freezing on Saturday. Some of the snow had melted and flowed in a thin layer across the sidewalk. Carrying two containers did not give me a free hand to hold on to the railing. I probably went "charging" down the steps like it was a spring day. Skid, flop, plop!
Well, all's well that ends well. I did have a headache later, but that was a sinus headache around my eyes, not on the back of my head.
The next thing I remember is being inside asking my wife to get the container of sidewalk salt.
Then I remember my wife telling me to sit in a chair and relax. After a bit I felt fine and got up to put salt on the sidewalk. When I got outside I saw little holes in the ice. Somebody had already salted. As hard as I tried, I couldn't remember being out the first time. I did remember later, but was that just a reconstruction?
My wife's reconstruction is that our grandson, looking out the front door, said, "Grandpa!" and then she heard me holler. She went outside and found me in a fetal position and helped me get up and inside. She said a neighbor across the street watched her, wondering if he needed to help. She said I wanted to take the compost then and there, but she made me sit down.
Now let's look at the what ifs.
What if instead of my head hitting the sidewalk it had hit the bottom step? Would I have a broken neck?
What if I had not been wearing a hat? My winter hat is not very thick, but it seemed to be thick enough to absorb some of the force. Later I did see the imprint of the hat in the snow.
What if I had been home alone? Would anybody have seen me in a timely fashion? Chuck Frederick, Editorial Editor of the Duluth News Tribune, wrote "Duluth didn't watch out for student frozen on porch" 2013-12-12. My situation could have been similar. The neighbors on one side are gone for college break. The neighbors on the other side rarely go out the front door. Even if they did, the snow banks might have hidden me. Drivers going by aren't checking every notch in the snow banks for pedestrians lying on the sidewalk. Pedestrians going by are checking where they walk and will rarely turn their heads to look up a house walk. Whatever, I doubt if all of Duluth should be held accountable if I were not found in a reasonable time.
Why did I slip? I had cleared the sidewalk the previous day, there shouldn't be a problem, right? Not quite, the temperature was around freezing on Saturday. Some of the snow had melted and flowed in a thin layer across the sidewalk. Carrying two containers did not give me a free hand to hold on to the railing. I probably went "charging" down the steps like it was a spring day. Skid, flop, plop!
Well, all's well that ends well. I did have a headache later, but that was a sinus headache around my eyes, not on the back of my head.
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Pondering while wandering led to floundering
As I returned from a University for Seniors class this morning at UMD, walking on snow-packed and icy sidewalks, I thought of how parental advice can be problematic in these situations: "Stand up straight" and "Watch where you're walking!"
If you stand up straight, by looking farther ahead, you might not see a slippery spot at your feet.
If you watch where you're walking, you'll get a sore back and might walk into an overhanging tree branch or protruding shrubbery.
As I pondered these profound thoughts, I stepped off a curb at an alley, my boot skidded on some ice, and I went down on one knee and then to one forearm. I didn't damage anything, but I soaked a knee of my jeans and my gloves.
Nobody saw me that I know of. I picked myself up and continued the couple hundred feet to my house without any soreness.
I don't remember which advice I was following - "Stand up straight" or "watch where you're walking!" Whatever, one of them didn't serve me well.
If you stand up straight, by looking farther ahead, you might not see a slippery spot at your feet.
If you watch where you're walking, you'll get a sore back and might walk into an overhanging tree branch or protruding shrubbery.
As I pondered these profound thoughts, I stepped off a curb at an alley, my boot skidded on some ice, and I went down on one knee and then to one forearm. I didn't damage anything, but I soaked a knee of my jeans and my gloves.
Nobody saw me that I know of. I picked myself up and continued the couple hundred feet to my house without any soreness.
I don't remember which advice I was following - "Stand up straight" or "watch where you're walking!" Whatever, one of them didn't serve me well.
Thursday, January 03, 2013
God, civility, and the Golden Rule
Some letter writers to the Duluth News Tribune have recently been calling for God in our lives to solve many of our problems. Torquemada, the Spanish Inquisitor, believed in God, and he had thousands murdered because they didn’t believe as he did. The Puritans believed in God, and they had dozens murdered because the innocent victims would not admit to being witches. Plantation owners believed in God, and they kept slaves who they would whip for whatever cause.
The problem with a belief in God is that too many “believers” are very selective in what they believe. Too many ignore a central tenet of monotheistic and other religions.
“Do not unto your neighbor what you would not have him do unto you; this is the whole Law; the rest is commentary.” – Hillel, a Jewish teacher in the first century, B.C.E.
“Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.” – Jesus of Nazareth, Matthew 7:12
“...and you should forgive and overlook: Do you not like God to forgive you? And Allah is The Merciful Forgiving.” _ Qur’an (Surah 24, “The Light”, v. 22)
"What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others." – Confucius
“One should never do wrong in return, nor mistreat any man, no matter how one has been mistreated by him." – Plato’s Socrates (Crito, 49c)
You can find many more variations and sources of the “Golden Rule” at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Rule.
What these religious and ethical variations call for is for us to be part of communities. These communities are at neighborhood, city, national, and world levels. They are as informal as holding a door for a stranger at a public building or as formal as churches and civic associations.
Unfortunately, many of us don’t act as if we are in some of these communities. We walk out of our houses to our car on the street or in the garage and drive somewhere else without even seeing a neighbor. We don’t bother to shovel our sidewalks because we don’t use them, completely ignoring all the footprints in the snow. As we drive we are focused on thoughts elsewhere, whether in our heads, on our radios, or even on our cell phones. We drive over crosswalks without even looking for pedestrians. We drive through red lights ignoring any traffic or pedestrians waiting at the cross streets. We race through parking garages without headlights and without watching for vehicles backing out.
Our first try at building communities should be to consider doing unto others what we appreciate others doing unto us. Do we want to walk on clear sidewalks? Do we want other drivers to be attentive to vehicles around them? Do we want drivers to be attentive to us as we cross a street? Do we want other drivers to wait for us to back out of a blind spot?
If we start with these small changes, maybe we can look at how we treat others in a larger context. Do we talk about public employees as “they” or do we consider them our neighbors. Did “they” make a patch on our street, or did a city crew make the patch? Did “they” plow our street, or did an overworked city plow driver make our street more drivable?
Remember that the Good Samaritan of the Book of Luke was an “other”. To build communities, we need to be open to including the “other” as our neighbors.
The problem with a belief in God is that too many “believers” are very selective in what they believe. Too many ignore a central tenet of monotheistic and other religions.
“Do not unto your neighbor what you would not have him do unto you; this is the whole Law; the rest is commentary.” – Hillel, a Jewish teacher in the first century, B.C.E.
“Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.” – Jesus of Nazareth, Matthew 7:12
“...and you should forgive and overlook: Do you not like God to forgive you? And Allah is The Merciful Forgiving.” _ Qur’an (Surah 24, “The Light”, v. 22)
"What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others." – Confucius
“One should never do wrong in return, nor mistreat any man, no matter how one has been mistreated by him." – Plato’s Socrates (Crito, 49c)
You can find many more variations and sources of the “Golden Rule” at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Rule.
What these religious and ethical variations call for is for us to be part of communities. These communities are at neighborhood, city, national, and world levels. They are as informal as holding a door for a stranger at a public building or as formal as churches and civic associations.
Unfortunately, many of us don’t act as if we are in some of these communities. We walk out of our houses to our car on the street or in the garage and drive somewhere else without even seeing a neighbor. We don’t bother to shovel our sidewalks because we don’t use them, completely ignoring all the footprints in the snow. As we drive we are focused on thoughts elsewhere, whether in our heads, on our radios, or even on our cell phones. We drive over crosswalks without even looking for pedestrians. We drive through red lights ignoring any traffic or pedestrians waiting at the cross streets. We race through parking garages without headlights and without watching for vehicles backing out.
Our first try at building communities should be to consider doing unto others what we appreciate others doing unto us. Do we want to walk on clear sidewalks? Do we want other drivers to be attentive to vehicles around them? Do we want drivers to be attentive to us as we cross a street? Do we want other drivers to wait for us to back out of a blind spot?
If we start with these small changes, maybe we can look at how we treat others in a larger context. Do we talk about public employees as “they” or do we consider them our neighbors. Did “they” make a patch on our street, or did a city crew make the patch? Did “they” plow our street, or did an overworked city plow driver make our street more drivable?
Remember that the Good Samaritan of the Book of Luke was an “other”. To build communities, we need to be open to including the “other” as our neighbors.
Monday, September 18, 2006
Hang up and drive!
The other day just as I was ready to step off the curb a pickup truck from a local institution turned right in front of me and pulled into the lot of the coffee shop I was heading for.
I thought the driver was someone I knew and I walked up to the driver's side to kid him about nearly running me over. The driver was on the phone and wasn't who I thought it was. I should have told him that he could have hit me, but I was too polite for my own good and said nothing more than "I thought you were somebody else."
I thought the driver was someone I knew and I walked up to the driver's side to kid him about nearly running me over. The driver was on the phone and wasn't who I thought it was. I should have told him that he could have hit me, but I was too polite for my own good and said nothing more than "I thought you were somebody else."
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