The SMH published this article today about a proposed ‘change’ to the road rules:
“The solution is simple,” Pieglowski said of an idea he is championing at next week’s Sydney Summit, inspired by his son’s question: change traffic rules so anyone travelling along the main road – either walking, cycling or driving – has the right of way, and anyone wanting to intercept is forced to give way. It’s what he describes as “an imaginary zebra crossing on every road and intersection”.
Maybe I’m missing something, but isn’t this already the rule? There are diagrams in Australian Road Rules reg 72 and reg 73 that seem to show pretty clearly a driver already has to give way in this situation.
The SMH article later says:
The change would mean pedestrians walking in the same direction of traffic as the roads would, when approaching an intersection, have a green pedestrian light for as long as drivers get a green light.
But it seems like this is usually the case anyway, except that the pedestrian light will change to ‘flashing red’ earlier than the motor traffic light goes orange, because it takes longer for pedestrians to move through the intersection.
Am I just totally missing what is being proposed here?
It isn’t the exact proposed solution, but the roads in Melbourne seem a lot like this already. The green pedestrian lights stay green with the traffic lights, or a lot longer than Sydney pedestrian lights