Drivers, Walkers And the Battle For the Streets

Peter D. Norton, author of "Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in the American City," said "jaywalk" originated in the Midwest, a jay being a simple farm boy overwhelmed by the complexities of the big city. In the hands of automobile promoters, he said, the word became a club.

"The street a hundred years ago was a place where anyone could go if they didn't make a nuisance or get in someone's way," said Norton, a faculty member at the University of Virginia.

But the pejorative term for pedestrians that he found in a 1909 Chicago Tribune had become popular by the 1920s, thanks to auto advocates, who among other tactics got Boy Scouts to hand out cards asking pedestrians, "Did you know you were jaywalking?"

By the end of the decade, Norton said, the once-outlandish idea that pedestrians don't belong in the streets had become mainstream. Who's winning today? "Motorists all the way, with some local exceptions," Norton said.

Is it time to declare that the peace treaty was not an unconditional surrender by pedestrians?

Metro in Emergencies

This was one of many letters questioning or criticizing Metro's efforts during Wednesday's storms to bridge the gap between Orange Line stations after service was cut:

Dear Dr. Gridlock:

How does Metro determine how many shuttles to supply when Metrorail is unavailable? I was one of the hundreds of people stuck at the East Falls Church Station on Wednesday when a power disruption ceased service between East and West Falls Church.

I certainly do not blame Metro for the power issue; there were [tornado warnings], after all. But I waited at East Falls Church for a good 45 minutes before giving up and riding the other way back to Ballston. The mob of people -- it was not a line -- waiting for the shuttle service to West Falls Church had barely inched forward.