By Alec Regimbal
Source SFGate, San Francisco
Why did the chicken cross the road? In San Francisco, it's to catch motorists breaking the law.
On Monday morning, San Francisco police Lt. Jonathan Ozol wore a flamboyant, inflatable chicken costume as he attempted to navigate a crosswalk on Alemany Boulevard near the intersection of Rousseau Street. The purpose of the exercise was to issue tickets to drivers who flouted state law by not yielding to a pedestrian like Ozol as he attempted to cross. Quite a few drivers failed that test.
The ostentatious costume, according to police Capt. Amy Hurwitz, serves two purposes.
"I don't want them to get run over," she told me. "But the costume is so bright, it's like, how can you miss it?"
Hurwitz said Monday's exercise is one of five that the San Francisco Police Department has conducted over the last six months as San Francisco tries to achieve vision zero. The intersections and costumes often change, but the mission is the same: To ensure drivers are paying extra attention as they approach a crosswalk.
State law requires drivers to stop for pedestrians who are entering a crosswalk. Ozol said that failing to do so can result in a citation that could cost the driver a hefty fine of as much as $400.
Monday's exercise, which I watched, went as such: Ozol would attempt to enter the crosswalk, and if a driver didn't yield and allow him to cross, he would wave at two other officers parked nearby. From there, one of the two officers — one on a motorcycle, and the other in a standard squad car — would follow the flagged driver and pull them over.
Ozol made sure to give drivers ample time to see him, usually entering the crosswalk when an oncoming motorist was about 200 feet away. Of the costume's purpose, Ozol echoed Hurwitz's outlook.
"If you don't see someone in a giant chicken costume, then we really have a problem," he said.
The chicken exercise does not come unwarranted. In February, a 76-year-old man was struck and killed by a driver at the very crosswalk that police were monitoring on Monday. It's easy to see how. I had been at the scene for just a few minutes before a driver failed to yield to Ozol and was subsequently pulled over. Ozol told me that the driver was the eighth to be caught so far, and they'd only been there for 30 minutes.
Over the next hour, police pulled over so many drivers that I eventually lost count. Hurwitz guessed that the previous five exercises — other costumes include a unicorn and "Sesame Street's" Big Bird — resulted in 30 to 40 citations each. But Ozol believes the exercises are having the desired effect.
He said, anecdotally at least, that drivers seem to have become more aware. The exercise has been featured in police newsletters, and in fact, after police performed the exercise at the same crosswalk previously, someone with a sense of humor put up a "chicken crossing" sign nearby.
"It's having an impact," Ozol said. "Drivers seem more aware, more cognizant. Certainly when they see the chicken."
He also emphasized that the exercises aren't about making money for the department or meeting some sort of quota, estimating that 30% to 40% of those pulled over aren't cited. Rather, Ozol said, it's about making San Francisco safer for pedestrians.
"One more person that yields, that's one more person that's safe," he said.
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