A recent increase in accidents has been partially attributed to smartphone users crossing the street while distracted. To avoid such situations, the German city of Augsburg has installed floor traffic lights to warn smartphone fans.
A Deadly Distraction
One of the most common bad habits among pedestrians is walking while staring at their phone, paying no attention to their surroundings. This leads distracted people to bump into lampposts, other people, or worse, crossing streets or train tracks when the light is red. The latter is especially common in German cities, where several accidents have been reported, including one last March when a 15-year-old girl in Munich was hit by a tram while looking at her smartphone without paying attention to the vehicle. She was dragged by the train and died.
A High-Tech Solution
To prevent such accidents, the German city of Augsburg has installed floor traffic lights to warn smartphone fans. Two tram crossings have been equipped with these LED lights that flash green to advance safely and red to stop immediately. In the video, Tobias Harms, responsible for city administration, comments that when they realized the regular traffic light is not in the line of sight of many pedestrians these days, they decided to include an additional set of lights; the more lights they have installed, the more likely people are to notice their presence.
Reactions and the Future
On the other hand, residents of the city express satisfaction with the innovation, while others cannot help feeling a sense of unease about what this says about modern society. “It terrifies me that users are so addicted to their smartphones that they need to install lights on the ground to warn them that a tram is approaching,” one concerned citizen says in the video. This invention could be put into practice in the United States, where a recent increase in injuries and deaths has been partially attributed to smartphone users crossing the street while distracted.
