• My rules for urban pedestrians:

    1: If the pavement is 2-people wide, don't walk in the middle of it. Leave a gap on one side for people to overtake or to walk past you in the opposite direction.

    2: Walk along the pavement, don't walk on some random diagonal which slowly moves you from one side of the pavement to the other. This leads me to think that I can overtake you on one side and then suddenly there's not enough space to get by.

    3: Don't suddenly stop to get your phone out/look in a shop/tie your shoelace without checking that no-one behind you is going to walk into you.

    4: Don't walk 4 abreast towards me in the expectation that I will step into the gutter/traffic just so that you can carry on your conversation with your friends.

    5: If you have the choice, walk on the left. That way, the person who may have to step into the traffic is facing the oncoming traffic and can see whether it is safe to do so.

    6: If you are standing waiting for a bus/friend/epiphany/whatever take a second to think about where people seem to want to walk and then stand somewhere else. Particularly if you are a member of a group consider that you (as a group) can block the entire pavement!

    7: You may love your wheelybag, to everyone else it is a device specifically designed to trip them over and/or whack them in the shins.

    8: Don't stop at the top of an escalator to get your bearings or adjust your grip on your wheelybag or I will walk into/over you to avoid getting trampled by the people behind me.

    9: If you don't know where you're going, take a moment before stepping out of the door to find out or step to the side of the pavement to look at your map. Sightseeing's lovely, but 5:30pm on a Tuesday at the busiest intersection in the city is probably not the best time and place to do it.

    10: (The Golden Rule) There is always someone who wants to walk faster than you, consider how you might be holding them up.

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