Crossing the Street? Check Your Watch First

Crossing the street in Israeli cities can be a risky business – especially between 4:00 and 5:00 in the afternoon. That’s the conclusion of a study by the Or Yarok road safety organization, which decided to study the matter in advance of the imposition of “winter time” over the weekend.

On Motzoei Shabbos, Israelis will move their clocks back one hour, as the annual shift to shorter daylight hours takes hold. Sundown beginning on Sunday will be around 5:00 p.m., with darkness descending ever earlier until the end of December. On the theory that dusk and darkness during rush hour was likely the most dangerous time for pedestrians, Or Yarok commissioned the study – and indeed found that throughout 2018, 1,753 people were killed in road accidents between 4:00 and 5:00 p.m. in Israel’s largest cities.

With that, there were significant differences in some cities. 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. is the worst time to cross the street in Yerushalayim and Haifa, with 121 and 74 people respectively being killed in road accidents last year during that time period. In Tel Aviv, meanwhile, the “danger hour” was between 2 p.m. and 3 p.m., when 119 people were killed, while in Be’er Sheva, 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. is the most dangerous time for pedestrians, with 49 being killed.

Erez Kita, head of Or Yarok, said that “during the most congested periods on the roads both in the morning and the afternoon, with more cars on the road, the danger to pedestrians grows, and there is a greater chance for road accident. During these danger periods police must concentrate their resources on the most crowded and busy streets. A strong display of police force will provide the atmosphere of deterrence we need to reduce the number of accidents.”