Defensive Walking: Pedestrian Safety for Adults

Many people spend years practicing defensive driving, anticipating what the other driver might do. Walking also requires thinking ahead about what a driver might do. While the safest walking conditions may require changes to the physical environment – like sidewalks and traffic signals – or help from law enforcement in slowing speeding traffic, there are things that pedestrians can do to make them as safe as possible. Defensive walking is all about identifying situations that carry higher risks of being hit by a car and taking steps to control these situations as much as possible.