Skip to Content
Streetsblog San Francisco home
Streetsblog San Francisco home
Log In
Car Culture

Eyes on the Street: Hey Driver, Look, I Got the Light!

_1.jpgPhotos: Bryan Goebel

The one-way traffic sewers around my neighborhood on Sutter Street in the Tendernob (aka Lower Nob Hill) encourage speeding, so as you can imagine, there are constant near-misses by drivers intent on ignoring the pedestrian right-of-way. What you see in the photo above happened Monday evening on Sutter Street at Jones, as I was taking a leisurely stroll through one of the densest neighborhoods on the West Coast.  

An impatient young SUV driver trying to go left onto Jones boils over with anger, throwing his hands up behind the wheel, as a pedestrian, a man who looked like a senior from my vantage point, slowly crosses the street in the crosswalk and points to the green light to illustrate to the driver that he has the right-of-way. The driver, as cranky as he was, did eventually let the man cross before he screeched down Jones Street.

These photos make me angry and sad. I look forward to the day when our traffic engineers and political leaders can begin to seriously rethink one-way arterials. Let's breath life back into our streets instead of noise, pollution and carnage.

Got a photo you think would make a good Eyes on the Street? Please send them to our flickr pool, or email tips@sf.streetsblog.org.

-2_2.jpg

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from Streetsblog San Francisco

Caltrain Needs Help with Bike Stuff

Interested in helping guide future bike and pedestrian features on the Caltrain system? Time to step up... or ride up, as the case may be

November 4, 2024

Alameda Advocates Celebrate Clement Bike Heaven

The tiny island city-state keeps hitting it out of the park with new, concrete, pretty-darned-quick-build infrastructure

November 1, 2024
See all posts