Crosswalk Controversy

We were shocked and angered to learn that our Southern California municipal bureaucrats have decided to remove crosswalks because people are being hit in them by automobiles. (“Increasingly a Walk on the Wild Side” by Mike Wyma, July 6). This is a typical reactionary response by our automobile-oriented traffic engineers to automobile overpopulation.

It’s time for our city officials to look ahead, rather than simply react to an existing problem, and start to plan a transportation system for human beings. The automobile has already been given a position of dominance in large cities on the East Coast and in many foreign countries, where pedestrians have virtually no rights.

Crosswalks should be raised to the sidewalk level so that cars would have to cross the pedestrian walks rather than pedestrians having to cross the street. The city should be promoting “slow streets” designed for pedestrians and bicycles--not high-speed high-volume streets such as those destroying downtown Los Angeles.

JERRY AND DIANE ESTBERG

San Diego