The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1912-04-30
PEDESTRIANS WILL
Be WELL GUARDED
Chicago Plans a System That
Ought to Facilitate Motor
Movement.

Capt. G. c. Healy of the Chicago
mounted police plans to put in opera
ton in Chicago plan for the control
OF pedestrians at street Intersections
The congested loop district is made
almost impossible for autoui.lilists
not alone by the heavy traffic, but also
by the way in which pedestrians iri-
pede travel when the whistle has
blown to make it proper for automo-
biles to move.
1T has always been my hobby, this
matter of controlling the pedestrians
the same as we do drivers of vehf-
cles" says the captain, land it looks
as If we would attempt it in Chicago
before the summer is over. Shortly
there will be introduced into the Coun-
Gil a bill which will give the police
power to make arrests if pedestrians
do not mind the whistle at the cross
ings. With that power given us | ven-
ture to say that inside three months
we will greatly improve the service
inside the loop.
"Of course it is going to be hard at
first, for the people hardly will under
stand such a law. But with the police
standing firm and making arrests
where arrests are necessary / see no
reason why we could not be in COM
mand of the situation inside three
months at the outside.
"Chicagoans hardly realize just
what the police have done inside the
loop since we undertook to handle the
vehicle traffic and make it answera-
BILE to our whistle. We had couple
of prominent Englishmen in the city
the other day and / was asked to il
lustrate our system, that, controlling
the ebb and flow of trafffce by means
of the whistle. l chose two of my bus
lest corners, State and Madison and
Randolph and Dearborn. Purposely
! called the officers from their posts
and left the vehicles and pedestrians
with a loose rein. Inside six minutes
we had the traffic at Madison and
State tied up so tight that dog
would have had hard work crossing
the street. This simply showed the
benefits of the system.
I'VE have things running pretty
smoothly now controlling only the
vehicles, but if we can make the Pc
destrians heed the whistle the same
way our efficiency will be increased
100 per cent. Drivers of automobiles
will appreciate what that would mean.
AS it is now, when the motorists get
the whistle to go ahead they lose many
valuable seconds lodging the pedes-
TRANS who invade the right of way
of the vehicle. All this ought to
be changed and | am going to do all
can to help it along. l think it is the
right track.
Another thing the police intend TAX
ing up is enforcing the rules of the
road. We are going to see that slow
moving vehicles keep close to the
curb, that when a vehicle stops that
it's right wheele are alongside the
curb, that there is no turning in the
moiddle of the block and that there is
no cutting corners"
At the conference at the City club
last week this idea was brought up by
F., H. Elliott, the representative of
the Touring club of America, and met
with the approval of the conferees.
They thought it would be a good
thing to have in operation in New
York, where although there is no loop
district, there are many points where
such regulation is desirable and ne
cessary.
In some foreign cities stringent reg
ulations forbid pedestrians being in
roadways at points other than the
street crossings. In fact if pedes-
TRANS come to harm in the roadway
other than at a crossing they are
likely to be prosecuted for being
where they should not have been.
Such strictness as all this doesn't
obtain anywhere in this country and
the understanding Is that the high