Crossings

A crossing only protects you once the traffic has actually stopped. Look before you step into the road, and keep looking while you are in it.

Where a crossing is marked with alternate wide black and white stripes and no robot or police officer controls it, drivers are required to give way to anyone crossing or waiting to cross. That is the law, not a guarantee. Give approaching traffic enough time to see you and pull up, and give it far more when the road is wet, because a vehicle on a wet surface takes much longer to stop. Wait until traffic in both directions has stopped, or the road is genuinely clear, before you start across.

Watch for a driver overtaking a vehicle that has already stopped for you. That driver has probably not seen you at all. Where there is an island in the middle of the road, treat each half as a separate crossing: reach the island, stop, and look again at the traffic coming from the other direction.

At a robot the signal governs. Cross on the green, and where a signal is provided for pedestrians, follow it. Where there is none, wait until the robot has stopped the traffic on the road you are crossing and the vehicles have come to rest. A robot often holds one lane while releasing another, so a red in front of you does not mean everything at the intersection is stopped.

Turning traffic is what people forget. A driver turning left or right must give way to a pedestrian already on the crossing, but see the turn coming before you commit to it.

Where no crossing is provided, pick a straight stretch where you can see well both ways, and give way to vehicles. Never cross in front of a stationary bus or from close behind one, since neither you nor the driver coming past can see the other.