A Brief Discussion on”Chinese-Style of Crossing The Road”
Recently, a vocabulary with Chinese-Style tag is popular in weibo,which is getting a lot of attention. Thisvocabulary is "Chinese-Style of crossing the road ".
"Chinese-Style of crossing the road" is a kind ofridicule on the phenomenon of part of Chinese jaywalking collectively. People cross the road when there areenough crowds of people standing on the roadside as well. Cross or not just depends on the sizeof the crowd but not the traffic lights. Althoughthe phenomenon of jaywalking collectively is also common in other countries,the problem in China is still prominent especially. According to the phenomenon, thisarticle will give the analysis of the causes, and try to put forward some effectivemeasures to solve this problem.
In Chinese < Road Traffic Safety Law >, there are somefollowing laws to be listed obviously. The"Law" said that, motor vehicles and non-motorized vehicles must passon the right side and pedestrians when through the intersection or crossing theroad should walk in the crosswalk or pedestrian crossing facilities. Besides,the "Law" also said clearly that pedestrians should pass thecrossroad according to the traffic lights when there is the facility. So, under the circumstances like that,why there are so many people disregard the traffic laws as usual. The reasons are diverse.
According to the results of the survey, one of the reasons is"Conformist Mentality ". ConformistMentality refers to individuals presenting a behavior conforming to publicopinion or most people's action in their own perception, judgment or knowledgewhen they were affected by the behavior of outside crowds. According to the result of experiment,only a few people keep their independence to wait the traffic light but notfollow others. So the"Conformist Mentality " is a common psychological phenomenon to allindividuals. In China, peoplehave a weak legal sense and consciousness of collective laws in their heartgenerally. For most people, theygenerally hold a Conformist Mentality of "more people produce greaterstrength ": others do not obey the traffic rules, so why should I do that;others run the red lights, so do I. However,the safety factor do actually increases when large crowds of people run the redlights, because most drivers will stop their car and wait when meeting thesituation. As a result, peopleform an opinion of popularity, they found it hard to stick to their own moralbase line. They have developedthe habit. On the other hand, italso reflects the quality of the Chinese people.
The second important result I think is the loopholes of law. We should also see clearly that thereis a tendency to ignore pedestrian in city planning when we accused thepedestrian of crossing the road illegally, this is also contribute to theproblem of "Chinese-Style of crossing the road ". A car is much faster than a man, thetraffic lights give two or three minutes to pass for cars, but for thepedestrians, the time is only twelve or thirteen seconds. At the same time, vehicles turningright are not polite to the pedestrian, they also rob times from pedestrian. As a result, pedestrians don't haveenough time when they cross the road. Thetruth is that there is a problem in traffic lights. According to a survey from TongJiUniversity, Chinese will endure much longer time on red lights than foreigners. Some places even have a longer waitingtime for red lights of 100 seconds. Tryto imagine that, who can tolerate the red lights which has such a long time atthe peak hour.
In addition, motor vehicles often rob the road resources frompedestrians and non-motor vehicles, this also lead to the case of"Chinese-Style of crossing the road ". In most city planning andconstructions, people considered the vehicles only when road was beingconstructed or reconstructed, they didn't consider the traffic of pedestriansand non-motorized vehicles. Thesituation means that the allocation of public traffic resources is extremelyunequal. The road carries currentor recent flows of motor vehicles only. Inpractice, pedestrians and non-motor vehicles also need to be loaded of theroad. The situation lead to acontradiction between motor vehicles and pedestrians (non-motorized vehicles).
Based on analysis of the reasons for the formation of"Chinese-Style of crossing the road ", I'll put forward some advicethat correspond each of the reasons to solve the problem of "Chinese-Styleof crossing the road ".
First of all, we should improve consciousness of people by extensivepublicity and education. A goodtraffic condition needs people self-conscious. Improve the consciousness ofcivilization, the moral quality and responsibility. Solving fundamentally the problem ofpeople's Conformist Mentality.
Secondly, we need a deep reform in the laws of road traffic. Correct the habit of people whencrossing the road. At the presentstage, we can force people to cross the road to correct the bad habits by thecoercive laws. Try to adjust thecontrol methods of traffic lights. Atthe same time, some of the appropriate regulatory system should also beestablished.
At last, distribute reasonably the right to use the road, try bestto treat pedestrians, vehicles and non-motorized vehicles. Put forward some relevant laws toguarantee the protection of rights of pedestrians. Reduce the time that pedestrians needto wait on the roadside to the endurance limit.
According to the advice talked above, we could clear that we stillhave lots of work to do, more laws need to be put forward to protect the rightsof pedestrians. China is gettingmore and more famous in the world, and all people around the world are watchingus. To us, maybe"Chinese-Style of crossing the road" is a joke, but to foreigners,that present us Chinese.
All our Chinese need to improve our consciousness of moral,collective, safety and honor. Startfrom ourselves, start small. Everyone of us need to obey the traffic laws and regulations unswervingly. If we can do these, I believe that wewill soon get rid of such a not glorious tag of "Chinese-Style of crossingthe road ".We are all Chinese and we have our own honors. So, show that to the world!