My Town Monday: Walking in Brighton

Now that the weather is getting nice, one might be inclined to stroll through downtown Brighton. There's some nice shops and restaurants in this downtown area, along with the The Mill Pond, Mill Pond Walkway, and Imagination Station.

If you happen to be strolling along though, you should be aware of how we cross the street.

See, in Brighton, we make cars stop for people. This happens in Ann Arbor too-- except in Ann Arbor, psychotic pedestrians will leap in front of moving cars just to remind drivers that pedestrians have the right of way. I'm not sure if driving or walking is more dangerous in Ann Arbor...

Anyway, in Brighton, the crosswalks have been paved with brick. And to cross, you press the crosswalk button.

There are little yellow lights in the brick crosswalk and those will begin blinking. Once the lights are blinking, you walk into the road. Yup. Cars will stop. If you're the slightest bit polite like I am, you will wait until there is a space between cars. Traffic is already slow on this stretch. A few pedestrians slow things down even more. It's not a bad thing.

I think the idea is to encourage people to park and stroll through the downtown area, rather than just zipping from one errand to the next.

We'll ignore the fact that the downtown area is half empty. There's still a few shops there... I'm sure the new mall a few miles away didn't have any impact on the downtown area. After all, when you go to the new mall, you get chain stores instead of local ones. And you don't have to walk-- you can drive around the parking lot and park close to the store you want.

Or so I hear. I'm still boycotting the new mall.

But I will be heading downtown.

(Though, until it gets warmer, I'll drive there. Thanks. I don't like cold.)

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