Nashville is now officially the 2nd least pedestrian friendly city in the U.S.A., and there’s nothing funny about it. Annually more than 4500 pedestrians are killed and more than 70,000 injured. It’s not always the fault of the driver – but often enough the driver shares at least some of the blame.  Children are at the greatest risk, but anyone can be a victim when drivers are inattentive. The most common circumstances for pedestrian injuries are:  people/children crossing the street in mid-block, vehicles turning into the path of someone who is crossing the street, a pedestrian stepping into the street from behind a parked vehicle, and vehicles backing up without looking.

Although conditions for driving are worse at other times of year, it’s the summer when we are all at more risk of being in an car wreck. The principle reason? Teenagers. Although we are entitled to assume all drivers will follow the rules of the road and obey traffic signals, being paranoid is probably the best policy during the “high teen driving months”.