Here we go. Thursday ends in a y, so it must be time for me to rant.

Subject: Are more people running red lights?

It seemed like that was rare for me to witness anywhere outside of Japan, which was over thirty years ago. I’d see one sometimes in the Bay area, especially in San Jose.

Now, here in little Ashland, I typically witness two cars or more a day running red lights. I rarely if ever saw them before the COVID era began. Now they’re increasing. While some are people turning left across traffic and waiting for an opening that doesn’t come until the light changes, the huge percentage are going straight, speeding up to hurtle through an intersection before the light goes red.

They often don’t make it. People get the green light and begin to go and then, here comes the red light runner, forcing everyone with the green light and right of way to slam on their brakes. I often witness very close calls between vehicles, or the speeding vehicle and cyclists or passengers.

It reminds me of the one crash I saw when someone ran the redlight.

This was around 1997. We were living in Mountain View, California, and had decided to go to the Mall of America in Milpitas. Stopped at a traffic light, I realized I needed to be in the lane to the right. Only one car inhabited it, so I thought I’d delay until they went and then shift over.

The light changed. The car in the next lane started off. I followed.

Suddenly, here comes a Cadillac sedan. Running the light from my left, they slammed into the driver’s side of the first car.

That could’ve easily been me.

We went right, around the block, coming back to check on the cars. Took a few minutes and by the time we arrived, the cops were there and the people from the crash were in a parking lot. But my wife and I stopped anyway, to share what we witnessed, and to check on the people.

As we approached, we heard the young female driver whose car was hit say with heavy sobbing, “I thought the light had changed.” On the parking lot’s other side, an old man paced while an elderly woman fumed beside him, arms crossed, lips tight.

I immediately said to the young driver, “It had changed. I was there. It was green when you went.”

The cops looked at me and asked who I was. I explained it all. My wife and I verified, the light was absolutely green when the woman went forward.

I heard the fuming woman say, “You’re always doing this. I knew this was going to happen.” As I looked her way, she finished to the old man, “You’re lucky you haven’t killed someone yet, but you will, if you don’t change.”

Watching these people taking greater and greater risk, I often now think the same thing which that woman said that day.