On Sep 21, 10:13*pm, SMS wrote:
This afternoon we pushed the button to activate the light on minor cross
street of a four lane road. The light changed, the traffic stopped, or
so we thought, and we proceed across. About half way across, a Toyota
Corolla blew through the red light at high speed, about 12 feet in front
of me. If I had been two seconds or so faster it'd have been the end.

So I was thinking that it really was much more dangerous to cross on the
green, trusting that the cross traffic would stop, than to simply wait
for a break in traffic and run the red light.

An idiot running a red light endangered your safety so you conclude
that you'd be safer if *you* run red lights? I don't see how that
conclusion follows. A more logical course of action would be to
recognize that the brain dead are among us and continue to exercise
reasonable caution at intersections even when your light turns green.

This is a map of the location in Cupertino:
"http://i34.tinypic.com/2n9etqs.jpg" and it's a heavily used crossing by
high school students.

I think the driver was focusing on the next traffic light, a few hundred
feet south, though the left lane of southbound traffic stopped and you'd
think she'd have wondered about why the traffic in the left lane wasn't
moving.

Given that you said "the light changed and traffic stopped", I think
it is much more likely they weren't focusing on anything connected
with driving, period.

Regards,
Bob Hunt