Spain Wants to Crack Down on Drunk Walkers

"In a crackdown on dangerous walking, Spain’s Directorate General of Traffic plans to introduce breathalyser tests for pedestrians. They also suggest introducing an off-road speed limit for joggers," reports Feargus O'Sullivan. "The proposals, buried among other road safety suggestions, would give pedestrians responsibilities akin to drivers," adds O'Sullivan.

O'Sullivan does not hold back on the snark in responding to the idea, imagining, for example, the laws that might follow the drunk walking ban's precedent (cited for leaving the house without your glasses, perhaps?).

O'Sullivan also notes an example of academic inquiry that backs up the idea that drunk pedestrians are more likely to take risks than sober ones. "But it’s still quite a leap from what is effectively a hunch – that legal curbs on drunks crossing the street could actually improve road safety – to the specific change that Spain’s Directorate of Traffic is proposing. If the plan goes ahead, pedestrians would be reclassified, just like drivers, as 'users of the road'."

And that's a classification that doesn't sit well with O'Sullivan: "At the risk of stating the obvious, pedestrians are not as closely controlled as drivers because they are not, for the most part, encased within a motor-propelled steel-and-glass bone-cruncher."

O'Sullivan's more editorial style follows an initial report of the proposed policy by Ashifa Kassam.