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Awful Pedestrian Shaming Campaign Gets the Smackdown It Deserves

12:50 PM PST on November 7, 2016

Montgomery County, Maryland, used this ill-considered poster to blame pedestrians who are hit by cars. Photo: Montgomery County
Montgomery County, Maryland, thought this was a good public safety message. Photo: Montgomery County
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This PSA from Montgomery County, Maryland, has got to be one of the all-time worst examples of pedestrian shaming. The young girl with tire treads across her face, it's implied, was struck and killed by a driver because she was "wearing black."

The message was the county's response to two recent pedestrian fatalities. According to the county, police will be ticketing drivers, pedestrians, and cyclists who break laws. The victim-blaming posters combined with the everyone-gets-fined approach to enforcement tells us this "safety campaign" won't make pedestrians any safer.

On Twitter, Colin Browne succinctly summed up what's wrong with Montgomery County's approach:

.@MontgomeryCoMD here I fixed it for you pic.twitter.com/yJKfUVcKKT

— Colin (@ColinTBrowne) November 3, 2016

Can Montgomery County replace its campaign imagery with Colin's version?

Angie Schmitt
Angie is a Cleveland-based writer with a background in planning and newspaper reporting. She has been writing about cities for Streetsblog for six years.

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