Aside from fighting crime, it seems like police are always finding more creative ways to catch people so they can give them a ticket. Aside from the revenue generators, sometimes these solutions are legitimately for public safety, as evidenced by the San Francisco Police Department’s latest tactic. SFGate reports that SFPD are using Halloween costumes to catch people that don’t stop for pedestrians who are using the crosswalk.
California law states that pedestrians have the right of way when in a crosswalk. When someone is in the crosswalk, traffic is supposed to come to a complete stop until that person exits the crosswalk, i.e. their foot goes from crosswalk to sidewalk. You’re probably wondering why a police department with a near $800 million budget is doing something wacky like this. As one officer pointed out to SFGate, the costumes serve two purposes.
The ostentatious costume, according to police Capt. Amy Hurwitz, serves two purposes.
“I don’t want them to get run over,” she told me. “But the costume is so bright, it’s like, how can you miss it?”
Apparently, this works. A video posted to Twitter shows an officer wearing a rainbow chicken costume easing into the crosswalk as cars fly by. SFGate reporter Alec Regimbal was on hand to witness the exercise, and it turns out a lot of people don’t pay attention to anything.
Over the next hour, police pulled over so many drivers that I eventually lost count. Hurwitz guessed that the previous five exercises — other costumes include a unicorn and “Sesame Street’s” Big Bird — resulted in 30 to 40 citations each. But Ozol believes the exercises are having the desired effect.
Those drivers could be hit with a fine as much as $400. Police aren’t just doing this as ticketing exercise; there’s precedent for pedestrian crosswalk safety. Earlier this year, a 76-year-old man was struck and killed by a driver at the same crosswalk where police were conducting their costume test. Police were quick to point out that this isn’t simply a revenue generator either, saying that nearly half the drivers that are stopped aren’t given a ticket. As San Francisco police Lt. Jonathan Ozol pointed out, this all may appear silly, but it’s making a difference. “It’s having an impact. Drivers seem more aware, more cognizant. Certainly when they see the chicken.”