When I was 11, my aunts took my brother and I to Hawaii. We stayed on Molokai (wonderful beaches, big waves!) and visited Honolulu, which I was much less charmed with as I got gum on the side of my nice suede sandals and the beaches were not as clean as on Molokai. But the cool thing that Honolulu did have was criss-cross crosswalks. These were crosswalks where all traffic would stop and the pedestrians could cross any which way, including diagonally! This delighted my brother and I to no end.
Guess what? Coming soon to this very intersection in my own town will be a criss-cross crosswalk. Although apparently the official term is “pedestrian scramble.” Which I think is not nearly as good of a term and someone in the paper observed “sounds like a term for what a cannibal would eat for brunch.”
Anyway, coming soon! Very exciting!
I think there’s one of these in Venice, although I’ve never stepped foot in it. “Pedestrian scramble” sounds rather, um, dangerous to me. I prefer criss-cross crosswalk.
This is just begging to have a flash mob dance sequence occur! Ooh. The anticipation! (As an aside, I can’t believe how far behind I am in reading that I can’t even figure out if I am going in the correct direction! And I do like the new format.)