Clueless Driver Overlooks Wheelchair User in the Crosswalk

is there an update to this? I want to see the face of the bastard who did this and see how many years they got in jail.

Jesus. I was googling this, and there are, like, 5 other different incidents where people in wheelchairs keep on getting hit by cars. one with a white van, one where two cars ran over the same guy, killing him, etc. I hate that this is a thing.

Ive been hit by 3 cars in my life as a wheelchairian, at slow speeds so I wasn’t hurt, every time head down and glowing from a phone.

I’m a truck driver and it’s wild the amount of people I see on their phones while driving. Blatantly driving down a highway while passing my truck with their head down. Light turns green at an intersection? Driving through with their head down. I see all that shit sitting up high. Or the people that think they’re being sneaky by having it down by their console, easy to spot, head down slightly and to the right. Mother fuckers, I can see you. Sorry for my run on rant I’m tired of these terrible drivers.

Rant harder! Drives me insane! Saw a dude bouncing off the curb driving through a playground in front of me. I assumed he was drunk at 2 on a Saturday. Got beside him a little later, head completely down, looking up every 3 or 4 seconds. A lot can happen in 3 or 4 seconds. I wish it had the same penalties as DUI.

Kinda feel like it should be harsher than driving drunk. At least the drunk driver has the “excuse” that the alcohol impaired their descision making process. No such thing here. I personally don’t even use my phone during a red light or something like that.

Where I’m from it’s a $1251 fine if you so much as touch your phone, even if it’s just sitting on your lap. They have cameras that take pictures of drivers and detect phone use using computers (positives are then checked by a human). It’s a serious problem, and it needs reasonable consequences. [https://streetsmarts.initiatives.qld.gov.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/phone-seatbelt-cameras.jpeg](https://streetsmarts.initiatives.qld.gov.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/phone-seatbelt-cameras.jpeg)

I wish we had that in Canada. Getting a distracted driving here is pretty much as bad as DUI but enforcement is low.

Here in Edmonton we have about one crackdown event a year where the cops just sit along 109st downtown during the afternoon rush hour. A lead officer picks out people on their phones and cops down the road wave them into a residential area for tickets. It’s amazingly successful in catching distracted drivers, but I have no idea why they only do it one day out of the year.

Preach brother. Ironically I feel safer around truckers because you guys pay attention!

They’re chockablock full of coffee and meth which really focuses the mind

…most of the time. there are also those videos of the truckers who are also on their phones who then slam into other cars.

Do you ever blow your horn at them? I sure would be tempted.

No, it sounds like a good idea but startled people tend to automatically floor it, and that outcome would not be ideal.

Floor it, or slam on the brakes. Neither is good, especially on a freeway/highway where trucks are often found.

This isn’t funny, but “wheelchairian” made me laugh.

They ride the wheelchariot

As god intended

WheelerDan is so much funnier now. Im cracking the fuck up 😭🤣

My brother in wheels. ♿

My cousin got hit by a local bus and a drunk and a cyclist so far… they all made nasty comments about she’s already disabled so how can we tell she’s hurt ffs. (She calls herself a Wheelchairioteer lol )

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I used to work at a company that designed electric wheelchairs, and one of the the things they had every new starter try out in their first couple weeks was using a wheelchair for a day. We used a manual chair for it rather than electric, but I thought it was a great idea to get a (very surface level) understanding of some of the challenges people using our products would face. When we did it, one thing that we did was go down the street for coffee, which involved crossing the street lined on both sides with parked cars. We had someone walking with us but even so it was terrifying trying to inch out and see if a vehicle was coming, more so when I considered that the majority of our customers wouldn’t be able to lean forwards like I was to see better.

I’ve long believed that all architects, city planners, landscapers (for public settings), etc should all spend time in a wheelchair.

Be an advocate for safer road infrastructure. This stuff happens all the time because we value cars over people.

My road is being worked on and getting massive pedestrian and bike lane improvements. I’m talking raised bike lanes and wider sidewalks. It’s inconvenient for me right now but I’m genuinely happy my city is doing this. It’s such a busy and pedestrian filled area. The city has made some stupid decisions lately but these road changes are the ones I like.

I live in Houston. It’s a public transportation, pedestrian, and biking hellscape. You absolutely can’t trust cars at a pedestrian crosswalk. It’s like a game of Frogger. I can’t imagine trying it with a wheelchair, especially as they are lower down. We also have a high rate of bicycle fatalities compared to the number of people brave enough to ride a bicycle in our city. There are a lot of homeless pedestrians in my area, and they don’t give a fuck what the crosswalk says.

Serious question though, what kind of road infrastructure short of a pedestrian overpass would stop what happened here? Like this guy was either driving with his eyes closed or just didn’t care about anything in front of him. What kind of solutions can prevent an accident when someone decides to drive with zero regard for human life?

There are lots of ideas but I personally think raised crosswalks are the way to go. They’re effectively big speed bumps. If every driver knew they had to slow down before a crosswalk then it would make them drive slower through intersections. Flashing light crosswalks are also great at making people actually pay attention. The few that I use in my town are incredibly effective, but we don’t tend to put those at intersections with stop signs. I think the driver intentionally hit the person in the wheelchair. You can’t do much to stop the bad intentions of people in this situation. But infrastructure like protected bike lanes do help to stop people from intentionally hitting people.

It does look quite intentional, but he’d have probably changed speeds one way or the other if that’s the case. I’m betting a phone was involved as they too frequently are. Then the sub-human in a car decided to drive off rather than help the person they hurt. The sort of infrastructure that would help with this is a bit odd. A roundabout would prevent a high speed collision from occuring like this. Whether or not this is good enough for the intersection requires a lot of data and planning that I don’t have access to. Tortuosity (bendiness) in roads will also help prevent this. Drivers tend to get bored on straight roads, which can lead to them speeding or pulling out a distraction like their phone. Lastly, it’s important to acknowledge that the risk of an auto-ped accident will always exist, but clever design will reduce its likelihood AND consequences.