The Orlando Police Department is enforcing pedestrian crossings this week.
The enforcement is taking place to coincide with the last day of school for Orange County Public Schools.
“Over 180,000 kids will be out of school and back on our streets this week,” Amanda Day, Project Director for Best Foot Forward told Bungalower.
OPD officers are warning and ticketing drivers who fail to yield to pedestrians.
A plain-clothed officer makes a very clear attempt to cross at a crosswalk. Legally drivers must stop to allow her to cross.
Drivers failing to yield could face a fine of up to $164, and three points on their driver’s license.
The enforcement is part of the Best Foot Forward coalition which is partnership among regional agencies to make Orlando safer for pedestrians through enforcement, engineering and education.
This morning they were out by Florida Hospital and tomorrow they will be enforcing the Orlando Urban Trail crossing on Virginia Dr. along with other locations around Central Florida.
You’ll recall we covered a previous enforcement at the Urban Trail where drivers were flying by the plain clothed police officer who was attempting to cross. You can watch that video here.
I wonder if they’ll find a correlation between the number of violations and the officer being used as the walker. This morning they were set up next to our building on Virginia with female officers in running attire – and over the 10 minutes that I watched not a single driver failed to notice her…
Hate to ask but we one need laws against texting and walking. I can’t tell you how many times people have stepped off the curb or walking In front of you in a parking lot and completely oblivious to the fact that they’re walking right into traffic
Okay now those drivers definitely deserve tickets. I don’t think I’ve noticed the lights there, but it’s good to know there’s more than one “sign” for right of way crossing. Thanks, I’ll check out that video!
Also…part of Best Foot Forward is making engineering improvements so that it’s safer to cross both by making sure drivers see the crosswalk but also so pedestrians use the crosswalks.
Absolutely and almost all of these enforcments are at places where there is a sign telling drivers there is a crosswalk there. The one on Virginia drive has flashing lights and people still fly though. Take a look at the video from last time. That person deserves a ticket. Saw two people today honk because another car stopped to let the pedestrian cross (they got a ticket for honking).
Orlando has recently ranked as the most dangerous place for pedestrians. All local police departments need to educate motorist via tickets. Drivers in the area need to become aware of the world outside of their car.
Actually I’m asking because too many pedestrians do that here whether or not crosswalk signs are in place. Giving them the right of way has been an open invitation for dangerous traffic situations. Unless there’s a sign stating to yield to pedestrians in a crosswalk, they should wait until it’s safe to cross the road instead of expecting traffic to constantly stop for them. How many unregulated intersections are there in town that make it difficult for anybody to cross after waiting for traffic to pass by? If that bike crossing is causing pedestrians and and bicyclists to wait for an obscene amount of time, then there should be signs. I realize this rule is in place for safety measures, but realistically, what makes waiting for traffic to pass more dangerous than expecting traffic to stop?
They are waiting at the start of the crosswalk to cross. If she wasn’t looking she would be in the hospital because most people flew right by her.
Actually I’m pretty sure that while they were doing this there probably weren’t any. Also, people die and get hurth because folks don’t yield to peds. OPD isn’t just here for murder and robberies. 🙂
It’s just good to know we live in a city with no shootings, stabbings, and robberies to deal with.
Duh….this pertains to areas where there aren’t any crossing signals!!!!! Pedestrians have right of way in Florida…..
Are these officers just flagrantly walking out into traffic at any time? Because that kind of defeats the purpose of learning to look both ways before crossing the street or using crosswalk lights.