Phone-only sidewalks are the latest attempt at keeping the preoccupied pedestrians from banging into people or cutting folks off as they walk down the city street. China opened its first phone-only sidewalk in the city of Chongqing segregating the different types of walkers that have emerged thanks to technology today.
The new sidewalk division will separate those who talk, text and surf through the social media sites on their phones from the people who just want to get from point A to point B without any dangerous distractions, reports Inventor Spot on Sept. 15. The origin of this sidewalk for talkers emerged as a side effect from an experiment done in the U.S. this summer.
The Chinese got the idea from a National Geographic behavioral study that was done in Washington D.C. over the summer, but the study's idea may have been misconstrued by the folks in China. What sounds like something that was devised for safety and convenience for those who aren't on their phones while walking, was originally merely a prop in this social experiment.
The cell-phone-only lane in DC was constructed for one day while the statistics of human behavior were monitored. After the day was done, the lane was gone and even the large words detailing the cell-phone-only lane stenciled on the pavement were washed away, reports USA Today.
Apparently the people in this city in China thought the idea would save a lot of angst by giving the distracted walkers a space of their own. They can bump into one another under this new strategy.
The results of the experiment in DC's city-sanctioned behavioral study will be revealed in the National Geographic upcoming series, 'Mind Over Masses.' In the DC phone-only lane, the goal was to monitor the interactions that this lane evoked. In China this lane is offered as progress, but people who are so distracted by their cell phones will have to look up and notice the stenciling on the pavement, so it may not be something they will even read.
In a recent picture of the cell-phone-only lane in China, people are walking in the street and the only one who is walking in the phone lane is a child without a phone. What will keep the distracted walker in that lane when it is so close to the lane for those without phones?
As far as the city in China is concerned 'Smartphone users are expected to comply.' Only time will tell if this is progress or an added problem.
China creates walking lanes for cell phone users
