tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4183605236529560843.post2592381622520365740..comments2019-02-27T06:35:52.280-05:00Comments on The Walking Bostonian: The term "jaywalker" is a slurMatthewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02027332620204904993noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4183605236529560843.post-21106311143550785112014-01-22T01:56:06.354-05:002014-01-22T01:56:06.354-05:00Thanks for this very thoughtful response to that h...Thanks for this very thoughtful response to that highly disturbing NY Post story. If safety and quality of life were considerations at all, not only should the jaywalking laws have been stricken from the books, but private cars should have been heavily restricted on if not entirely removed from most of the streets of Manhattan decades ago (a commonsense idea that was advanced at least as early as 1961 by the Goodman brothers: http://www.bopsecrets.org/CF/goodman-cars.htm). To read about the same battles being refought a century later, as though nothing has changed, is enormously depressing (and I found Norton's book depressing enough that I had difficulty finishing it). What's heartening is the reaction of the NYC public, which after initially being stunned now seems to be responding with anger directed both at the NYPD and de Blasio himself, who has managed to earn himself some very unflattering press in barely three weeks on the job (his and Bratton's two primary targets, incidentally, seem to be non-auto users of the streets: horses and pedestrians). Gothamist has the best quip, I think:<br /><br />"The mayor who was elected in large part because the police stopped and hassled too many New Yorkers on the street is now overseeing a nascent "crackdown" in which the police stop and hassle New Yorkers on the street."<br /><br />http://gothamist.com/2014/01/20/de_blasio_should_nip_this_jaywalkin.phpCharlie Gardnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07317335121565650040noreply@blogger.com