Fort Lee Not Ticketing For Texting While Walking

Here's what's going on and what's not going on in Fort Lee, New Jersey. After having three pedestrian fatalities last year, Fort Lee understandably wanted to raise awareness and crack down on jaywalking. Police have stopped 575 jaywalkers since the beginning of the year and issued 117 tickets since mid-March alone. The tickets are $85 and are being given to people who don't stay in the crosswalks or who cross against lights, etc.. However, at a press conference it was mentioned that one of the problems has been people getting so absorbed in their smart-devices as they walk that they being to fog over and pay no attention to where they're going. This word of caution got picked up by national media and turned into "Fort Lee has made it illegal to text while walking". Not so. All Fort Lee said was that it could be one reason for the increased jay walking. The jay walking itself, for whatever reason it is occurring, is the thing they are ticketing. If you can text while walking without stupidly wandering into moving traffic, without jaywalking in other words, no Fort Lee police officer is going to give you a ticket. Some might argue they should, but they're not.

When you live here in Jersey and you want to know what's really going on, please remember your best source for correct information is what you're already looking at. It's called www.nj1015.com.

I am curious to hear how you feel about the possibility of being ticketed for texting while walking. Would you support your town outlawing this? Let us know in the poll below.