Ok, that’s it! Last Sunday at 8:23 p.m., a seven-year-old boy was struck as his family was crossing at Mountain on Coast Highway. The family pushed the button, all of the lights were working, and they waited to cross safely.
A car in the right lane did not stop, and although the father tried to pull his son out of harm’s way, the boy was hit and thrown in the air, landing on his head and body. He was taken to Mission Hospital. With time, he will recover from his injuries.
Can you imagine the terror of watching your seven-year-old son hit by a car and thrown in the air? I can only imagine what the family’s thoughts were for those couple of seconds.
A few months ago, concerned Laguna citizens formed a committee called Residents for Pedestrian and Driver Safety. After Stanley Isaacs was killed at Pearl Street last year, we felt something must be done. Our goal is to ensure pedestrian safety. After studying each crosswalk in question and resident recommendations, the committee formed recommendations, including consistent messaging to drivers and pedestrians for each crosswalk.
Working with Caltrans has proved to be challenging. After a recent conversation with Mayor Whalen, we are hopeful he will review our recommendations and help ensure Caltrans will listen and act before another child is hit or worse. For questions or more information about the committee, please get in touch at [email protected].
Christy Miller, Laguna Beach
I visited your beautiful city on Thursday august 17th . On my way out , traveling north from cress street on S. Coast Highway , I was driving through dense traffic in a four way intersection through a green light and out of no where a young male in his late teens threw an ice-cream cone on the hood and seemingly kicked the side of my rental car. I was shook up but able to keep my composer till I was able to stop to get out of my car and see if there was any damage to my rental . There was no damage and my little boy who was strapped to his car seat in the back was oblivious to what happened .
So I googled j-walking in California and discovered it’s legal . That’s the only way he could have felt justified trying to deface my rental when I was driving through a green light in heavy traffic . I also realize it was the beach but in that stretch there is nothing to alert the driver that pedestrians have right of way. I had just crossed that same street twice and everyone walking along with me and my little boy utilized the pedestrian crossing lights . I’m a south Florida resident . Along the beach we have signs and flashing lights all along the pedestrian crosswalks with pillars and reflectors indicating pedestrians have right of way (in the cross walks only and pedestrians lights in dense traffic). I didn’t see any of that in Laguna . About a half a mile up I saw a green pedestrian sign on the traffic light , but that was the only indicator that I saw and probably because I was now looking for it . So between no signals for the driver and now the confusing legal J-walking law I would imagine crossing streets there is very dangerous .
After seeing the article above I felt like I should say something to prevent anyone else from getting hurt . The city needs to do more to protect everyone . It’s an easy fix .