(no subject)
Dear Care and Feeding,
Our house sits on a heavily wooded hill, and there isn’t much in terms of street lights—and no sidewalks. Though there are only a few houses on our bend of the road, we get people speeding through. We have new neighbors. The mother’s behavior is going to end in tragedy.
The neighbors have several very small children. The mom, for some unholy reason, thinks nothing of letting them bike in the street. She lets her babies ride around well ahead of her as she strolls leisurely several yards behind. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it myself.
My husband has already had a close call with one of the kids. He was backing out and the toddler zoomed right behind the bumper. Luckily, my husband was paying attention and was fast to put his foot on the brake. Even going as slow as he was, just a few miles per hour, it would have been a tragedy if he hadn’t been alert.
The mother’s reaction was to lay into my husband for not being careful enough! The kicker is that she said her kids have a right to play in the street. (There is a park five blocks away, but that is too far for her to go, apparently.) My husband said it was a bad conversation.
What do we do here? It would haunt me if one of these kids got hit because their mother was too lazy to care.
—Blind Corner
Dear Blind,
Well, not only has this neighbor of yours created a dangerous situation, she’s preemptively precluded me from giving the advice I wanted to give. I was going to suggest that you look for an opportunity to “accidentally” discover her kids being reckless so you could loudly tell them to be careful because you were sure their mom wouldn’t want them to get hurt!
Unfortunately, since a non-staged version of this has already happened, and your neighbor’s reaction was to get all indignant and annoying with your husband, I think this ship has sailed. You don’t have the plausible deniability required to pull off such a passive-aggressive act anymore, and I don’t have any confidence that she’d be moved by it!
I’m not sure you have any direct courses of action. Short of egregious negligence, what people let their kids do is their business, and if she’s at least near her children while they’re in the street, I’m not sure this warrants a call to the police or protective services. But there are some things you could try. You could put up a “kids playing” sign in your own yard, if you have kids, and you can continue to drive carefully and slowly yourselves. It does also seem like the kind of issue you could raise inconspicuously with other neighbors if you know them well enough; maybe someone else expressing concern to her in a situation other than a near-accident would be the right kind of nudge. Another constructive idea: Look for a pedestrian/cyclist or safe streets advocacy group in your area that you could get involved with. It sounds like the area could maybe use sidewalks—or curb extensions or speed bumps to slow traffic.
Link
Our house sits on a heavily wooded hill, and there isn’t much in terms of street lights—and no sidewalks. Though there are only a few houses on our bend of the road, we get people speeding through. We have new neighbors. The mother’s behavior is going to end in tragedy.
The neighbors have several very small children. The mom, for some unholy reason, thinks nothing of letting them bike in the street. She lets her babies ride around well ahead of her as she strolls leisurely several yards behind. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it myself.
My husband has already had a close call with one of the kids. He was backing out and the toddler zoomed right behind the bumper. Luckily, my husband was paying attention and was fast to put his foot on the brake. Even going as slow as he was, just a few miles per hour, it would have been a tragedy if he hadn’t been alert.
The mother’s reaction was to lay into my husband for not being careful enough! The kicker is that she said her kids have a right to play in the street. (There is a park five blocks away, but that is too far for her to go, apparently.) My husband said it was a bad conversation.
What do we do here? It would haunt me if one of these kids got hit because their mother was too lazy to care.
—Blind Corner
Dear Blind,
Well, not only has this neighbor of yours created a dangerous situation, she’s preemptively precluded me from giving the advice I wanted to give. I was going to suggest that you look for an opportunity to “accidentally” discover her kids being reckless so you could loudly tell them to be careful because you were sure their mom wouldn’t want them to get hurt!
Unfortunately, since a non-staged version of this has already happened, and your neighbor’s reaction was to get all indignant and annoying with your husband, I think this ship has sailed. You don’t have the plausible deniability required to pull off such a passive-aggressive act anymore, and I don’t have any confidence that she’d be moved by it!
I’m not sure you have any direct courses of action. Short of egregious negligence, what people let their kids do is their business, and if she’s at least near her children while they’re in the street, I’m not sure this warrants a call to the police or protective services. But there are some things you could try. You could put up a “kids playing” sign in your own yard, if you have kids, and you can continue to drive carefully and slowly yourselves. It does also seem like the kind of issue you could raise inconspicuously with other neighbors if you know them well enough; maybe someone else expressing concern to her in a situation other than a near-accident would be the right kind of nudge. Another constructive idea: Look for a pedestrian/cyclist or safe streets advocacy group in your area that you could get involved with. It sounds like the area could maybe use sidewalks—or curb extensions or speed bumps to slow traffic.
Link
no subject
2. In the meantime, LW and Husband need to stop backing out of the driveway. It's a million times safer to back in and drive out, precisely because sometimes children or animals or mail carriers can surprise you. If visibility is really that poor in that driveway then they'll also want to get into the habit of going out in front of the car and actually looking before they get in and drive off.
3. All this reminds me of a long post on a parenting board back in the day, which I will recount:
OP: OMG! My inlaws are ridiculous! They let their kids leave their bikes in their own driveway, and when we visited we ran over one of the bikes and ruined it, and now they want us to pay to replace it! Agree with me, tell me that's insane!
Everybody: Your husband should've walked around the car before getting in, this is Drivers Ed 101. He's lucky he didn't hit a kid. Offer to pay half, and thank your lucky stars.
OP: No, you don't get it, it's unreasonable to ask a grown man to walk around the car and check for obstructions or pets or children every time he gets in! The kids should've known better, this is their fault!
Everybody: It's their own house. They're both under the age of 10. You said the parents don't have a car and allow the children to leave their bikes in their own driveway. Regardless of everything else, your husband should have checked and he's lucky he didn't hit a child.
OP: No! Don't you see how ridiculous that is? He shouldn't have to check!
This went on for hours and hours, guys, with OP getting increasingly strident on the subject of how her husband didn't need to be more responsible, the children were at fault.
no subject
I guarantee the fact that a driver should have been safer will be no comfort at all when her kid is plastered across the road.
Yes, it sucks that others don’t exercise due caution at all times. But they’re simply not going to. This is why I teach my kids things like “don’t use your cell phones while crossing the road” because every year pedestrians get turned into roadkill because a driver plows into them while they’re distracted. Other people are going to do dangerous things so we need to protect ourselves - and teach our kids to do so - when we’re in very foreseeable situations where we’re vulnerable to the actions of others.
no subject
no subject
no subject
It sounds like this mother needs to figure out age-appropriate rules for her children and actually enforce them.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
But I’ve never seen kids riding bikes recreationally while their mom walks behind them. Riding while their mom is on her own bike, sure. Riding while she’s on the porch, yes. Walking behind? Looks like transport to me.
no subject
no subject
no subject
Buy the kids flags for their bikes and frame it as an apology for the close call? (I have a neighbor who has a recumbent bike he likes to use around dusk in our neighborhood. I've never seen so many lights and flags on a bike.)((It's too hot to bike here when the sun is up in summer. It's obvious when you see him it's part of his ongoing PT.))
Call up whoever is in charge of streetlights and speed limit signs and volunteer to get one of each put in your yard. (This worked for an aunt and uncle who live on a busy street.)
no subject
no subject
no subject
Not just for the safety of pedestrians and children, but also for their own safety in ensuring they don't back out into the path of a speeding car.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
Oh what a good suggestion! You deserve whatever the columnist was paid.
no subject
no subject
no subject
a) reduce car vs pedestrian
and car vs cyclist incidents
b) increase the survival rate of car vs pedestrian
and car vs cyclist incidents
"Road safety expert calls for 30kph speed limit in urban areas across WA.
WA's Centre for Road Safety research says the measure is the only foolproof way to protect all road users."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-07-03/road-safety-expert-calls-for-30kph-zones-in-wa-urban-areas/105477616
no subject
no subject
no subject
but whoever decided to
a) not install footpaths
b) not set speed limits that protect cyclists
c) not install street lights.
LW should contact local cyclist advocacy groups and see if they can get some safety improvements to the road.
For starters, are there any trees where pruning the branches back a bit (not removing the tree) would really improve driver visibility?
no subject
Neighbours in these areas can help increase overall pedestrian safety by keeping their road-adjacent edge of the property clear to walk on. Residents need to stop backing onto the road from their driveways--that is illegal in many jurisdictions. Hosting a general road/pedestrian safety session at a local school might be useful to refresh knowledge. People can put up those neon "Children at play" signs, but they're easily ignored. Fixing the structural issues means lobbying the local/regional politicians to install more lighting, add sidewalks/shoulders, reduced speed signs, etc.
no subject
Similar to the advice about "sticking to the edge of the road" - while that's certainly more convenient for drivers, I don't really see evidence that it's safer for pedestrians. Especially since many roads like this will often have people parking along the shoulder, so "the edge of the road" is going to be heavily obstructed, uneven, and not have great visbility. You should walk in such a way that drivers can easily see you and avoid you, so that you have time to see and avoid drivers, and you aren't obstructing traffic unnecessarily. Often that means staying at the edge of the road - especially a road with good shoulders, good visibility, heavy traffic, high speed limit, no blind drives.
But often it's safer for everybody for pedestrians to be away from the edge if it's a road with slower traffic and there's no other traffic on the road. Such as in this example, where the pedestrians being away from the edge of the road would have given the driver backing out much more of an opportunity to see them and stop, and they would have more time after seeing him start backing out to dodge.
(also, unless every lane of traffic including right turns has a stoplight, it's substantially safer to cross mid-block than at an intersection. Even if there's a marked pedestrian crossing.)
no subject
no subject
no subject
It is unquestionable that the street and neighborhood need better infrastructure, including lights, sidewalks, and perhaps speed bumps. It is also unquestionable that until/unless that happens, playing in the street is a terrible idea. Adding flags to the kids' bikes is a good stopgap measure, as is talking to neighbors about safer driving habits, but getting the neighbors on board wouldn't do anything about non-local people speeding through.
Tangentially, it is damn hard to back into a driveway on a busy street with poor visibility, especially if one is coming home in the dark -- and any solution that starts with "if people would just" is not likely to get you very far.
no subject
Also they may have been heading to/from the park. We only have LW's word on the mom being unwilling to go.
...those said, it's dangerous for the mom to put all the responsibility on drivers -- "they should pay attention", while true, is little comfort if something does happen. Flags, reflectors, lights. Teaching her kids good methods.
Personally I'd need way more info before answering ... how busy traffic is, what time of day the kids are out, etc. But also LW can't fix them, just make good adaptations for themselves.
no subject
If they can't drive well enough to back in, they can put a bulb in their drive to allow them space for a turn.
If LW is genuinely concerned about speeding and safety, then talking to the local government and DPW about signs, striping, and other measures should be her next step, rather than hassling her neighbor.
LW should stop having opinions about how other people and their children dare to go for walks. There is a strong whiff of "how dare they walk where I want to drive instead of driving their children everywhere" here and it's not appropriate.
no subject
And yes, there should be streetlights and sidewalks, but I very much doubt these young children are playing in the road after dark. And they don't have any way to get to this five blocks away park other than going along the dangerous street, so asking them to teleport out of the way so they don't inconvenience any all-important drivers is a non-starter.
If, God forbid, a tragedy did happen, it wouldn't be due to the mom's behaviour, which is entirely reasonable, or the children's behaviour of existing in public. It will be caused by idiots like LW and C&F who aren't willing to accept the slightest inconvenience to avoid killing other people.
no subject
Backup cameras WILL NOT do anything to alert you about kids if you're in a newer vehicle, because the bumpers are too tall. The toddler zoomed out behind LW's husband: the cameras only register movement in their 'line of sight', and most children under four will be too small to register to an American SUV or truck. A smaller car, you can probably be okay with a child over three, a bicycle would probably be tall enough. Cameras ARE NOT foolproof, they WILL NOT register anything shorter than the bumper they are affixed to, this fact + reliance on cameras has resulted in the deaths of animals and children and will continue to. American vehicles are too large to be safe.
A lot of comments mention backup cameras, which is why I bring this point up.
no subject
no subject