Pedestrians to get fined for jaywalking
«The traffic police’s philosophy at this moment is to inculcate in citizens the certainty that they will be arrested and suffer the penalties if they don’t obey traffic regulations,» said traffic police chief Adamidis. To achieve this, a number of measures have been implemented: using loudspeakers to warn drivers, night patrols and road blocks by ordinary patrol cars. At the same time, great emphasis has been put on policing the traffic restriction zone and bus lanes. In the first two weeks of September and the first week of October, traffic police officers recorded 1,748 instances of running red lights and 4,315 cases of exceeding the speed limit. During the same period, 1,746 drivers were caught entering the restricted traffic zone illegally, and 343 had ignored the ban on cars in bus lanes. Adamidis told Kathimerini that in the near future, traffic police will start to implement measures that apply to pedestrians, as the number of people injured or killed by passing cars when jaywalking is considered far too large. «At first, we will launch an extensive information campaign to citizens informing them of their obligation to abide by traffic regulations. At the same time, we will increase warnings to pedestrians. Later, we will start giving violators tickets,» he concluded. Attempts will also be made to implement measures that will restrict demonstrations to a few lanes, in order to prevent roads from being entirely blocked.
