As the number of pedestrian fatalities mounts on O'ahu, a new University of Hawai'i study found that more than half of drivers are not obeying the state's two-year-old crosswalk law.

Almost 57 percent of the drivers observed last spring either did not stop for pedestrians in a crosswalk or started moving again while the pedestrian was still on the driver's side of the road, according to the study.

"Proportionally more drivers than pedestrians are violating the law. Proportionally, they are the ones creating more dangerous situations," said Karl Kim, a UH urban and regional planning professor who headed the $30,000 study funded by the state Transportation Department's Safe Communities Program.

Pedestrians were not without fault, however. About 29 percent of the pedestrians observed in the study also violated traffic laws, either by jaywalking or crossing against a red or blinking no-walk signal, the study showed.

Pedestrian accidents are occuring with disturbing frequency on O'ahu this year. In the first two months of the year, nine pedestrians have died, compared with three at the same time last year.

A 92-year-old man who was struck Friday in a marked crosswalk in front of St. Theresa School on School Street remained in critical condition yesterday, police said. The man was hit about 8:15 a.m. and taken to The Queen's Medical Center. The 80-year-old driver of the car was not injured.

Minutes earlier, a 47-year-old woman was hit while trying to cross Farrington Highway, and was in serious condition.

Hawai'i has one of the highest rates of pedestrian accidents in the country.

The UH study concludes that if officials want to reduce the number of pedestrian accidents they should put more emphasis on changing the behavior of drivers, since they commit proportionately more violations than pedestrians.

"It is clear that more education and enforcement should be directed to drivers," Kim said.

The report also says pedestrians should be targeted for enforcement campaigns, especially in commercial or hotel districts.

"Giving citations to tourists and workers scurrying to their jobs may be an unpopular, yet necessary, strategy to increase compliance," Kim said.

"In addition to tourists, a more focused effort might be directed toward office workers, students and senior citizens as well as others at risk of injury and death from pedestrian accidents," he said in the report.

TROUBLE SPOTS

The study also found that there are differences in terms of age, gender, type of intersection, land use and other factors when it comes to how Honolulu residents are responding to the law, which requires drivers to stop whenever a pedestrian is on their half of the roadway.

For instance, male drivers making a left-hand turn in commercial or hotel districts had the highest odds of violating the law.

Most frequently, drivers failed to stop; stopped, then started again; or blocked a crosswalk.

"These are potentially the most dangerous driver actions," the report said.

Pedestrians who violated the laws tended to be older men using a crosswalk in the morning or midday around hotels or business districts, according to the observations.

Traffic safety officials said yesterday that the study, first presented at a national meeting of transportation researchers in Washington in January, will provide a wealth of information and help determine the best ways to cut down on accidents.

"All you have to do is get in your car on the way home from work, and you'll see all these things happening," said Bruce Bottorff, associate state director of AARP-Hawai'i, which has been pushing for more traffic safety measures. "This will give us more information to back up our own observations."

Honolulu police said they were eager to see the data, which could be used to target specific areas for education or enforcement campaigns. Police last month launched an initiative to warn and ticket drivers and pedestrians who violate the crosswalk or other pedestrian laws. Police used their own data gathered by district offices to help determine target areas for the campaign, spokeswoman Michelle Yu said.

STREET TALK

Honolulu residents interviewed at Ala Moana Center said drivers and pedestrians share the blame.

"A lot of times, the drivers will just go, they don't really watch out," said Dustin Kaiahua, a 20-year-old salesman from Kailua who catches the bus.

Kaiahua added, however, that he also sees pedestrians jaywalking.

Brett Collins, a 26-year-old Kapolei resident who began catching the bus a month ago when his car broke down, said he believes pedestrians disobey the laws more than drivers do.

"I see a lot of people crossing the street not in a marked crosswalk ... more than I see drivers going through a red light or not letting people pass," he said.

Wayne Maenaka, a 61-year-old retired phone technician and driver from McCully, said drivers and pedestrians equally disobey crosswalk laws.

"To me it's half and half a lot of times," he said. "People just cross any time they want to. ... Sometimes, too, in my opinion the drivers nowadays are kind of bad. I see a lot of them turning without even stopping."

BEWARE MEN ON FOOT

Kim and fellow researchers I. Made Brunner and Eric Yamashita looked at old Honolulu traffic accident data, roadway traffic volumes and residential population densities to help select representative sites across the island that included those with and without traffic signals and with and without crosswalks.

Then observers spent one hour at each location recording the behavior of both drivers and pedestrians as well as their characteristics, such as gender, age, and type of vehicle.

By far, adult males, including senior citizens, were the most likely pedestrian violators, usually by not being in a crosswalk.

When it came to drivers, though, the violators included a much broader spectrum of age groups, types of cars and violations.

"Interestingly, while the problem of pedestrian violations was greatest in the hotel and resort districts, the driver violations tended to be most frequent in mixed-use and commercial districts," the report said.

Bottorff and Kim said another approach should include engineering solutions, such as longer walk times at traffic signals and traffic-calming devices, such as curb bulb-outs and speed tables.

"There are so many good ideas in traffic calming, ways to slow everybody down," Kim said. "There are all kinds of other things we can be doing."

Reach Mike Leidemann at mleidemann@honoluluadvertiser.com and Lynda Arakawa at larakawa@honoluluadvertiser.com.