Results for pedestrian
On this page:
 
Dictionary:

pedestrian

  (pə-dĕs'trē-ən) pronunciation
n.

A person traveling on foot; a walker.

adj.
  1. Of, relating to, or made for pedestrians: a pedestrian bridge.
  2. Going or performed on foot: a pedestrian journey.
  3. Undistinguished; ordinary: pedestrian prose. See synonyms at dull.

[From Latin pedester, pedestr-, going on foot, from pedes, a pedestrian, from pēs, ped-, foot.]

pedestrianism pe·des'tri·an·ism n.
 
 
Antonyms: pedestrian

adj

Definition: everyday, dull
Antonyms: different, exceptional, exciting, extraordinary, inspired, interesting

n

Definition: hiker
Antonyms: driver


 
Devil's Dictionary: pedestrian
A cynical view of the world by Ambrose Bierce


n.

The variable (an audible) part of the roadway for an automobile.


 
Word Tutor: pedestrian
pronunciation

IN BRIEF: Commonplace; trite; unremarkable. Also: One who journeys on foot.

pronunciation After all, what is a pedestrian? He is a man who has two cars--one being driven by his wife, the other by one of his children. — Robert Bradbury

 
Wikipedia: pedestrian
A pedestrian at the intersection of Alinga Street and Northbourne Avenue, Canberra, Australia.
Enlarge
A pedestrian at the intersection of Alinga Street and Northbourne Avenue, Canberra, Australia.

A pedestrian is a person travelling on foot, whether walking or running. In modern times, the term mostly refers to someone walking on a road or footpath, but this was not the case historically.

History

Walking is the primary means of human locomotion. The first humans walked out of Africa about 60,000 years ago. [citation needed] They walked across India to reach Australia. They walked across Asia to reach the Americas. They walked from the Fertile Crescent into Europe.

During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, pedestrianism was a popular spectator sport just as equestrianism still is. One of the most famous pedestrians of the day was Captain Robert Barclay Allardice, known as "The Celebrated Pedestrian", of Stonehaven. His most impressive feat was to walk 1 mile every hour for 1000 hours, which he achieved between the 1st of June and the 12th of July, 1809. This feat captured the imagination of the public, and around 10,000 people came to watch over the course of the event. During the rest of the nineteenth century, attempts to repeat this particular athletic challenge were made by many pedestrians including the renowned Ada Anderson who developed it further and walked a quarter-mile in each quarter-hour over the 1,000 hours.

Since the nineteenth century, interest in pedestrianism has dropped. Although it is still an Olympic sport, it fails to catch public attention in the way that it used to. However, pedestrians are still carrying out major walking feats such as the popular Land's End to John o' Groats walk, in the United Kingdom, or traversal of North America from coast to coast. The first person to walk around the world was Dave Kunst who started his walk travelling east from Waseca, Minnesota on June the 20th, 1970 and completed his journey on October the 5th, 1974 when he re-entered the town from the west. These feats are often tied to charitable fundraising and have been achieved by celebrities such as Sir Jimmy Savile or Ian Botham as well as by people not otherwise in the public eye.

Health and Environment

Regular walking is very important for both a person's health and the natural environment. Obesity and related medical problems can be effectively prevented and/or cured by moving on foot on a daily basis. The widespread habit of taking the car for short trips significantly contributes to both obesity and climate change, owing to vehicle emissions, as internal combustion engines are extremely inefficient and highly polluting during their first minutes of operation (engine cold start). General availability of public transportation encourages walking, as it won't, in most cases, take one directly to one's destination.


Roads

The pedestrian Bauman Street in Kazan.
Enlarge
The pedestrian Bauman Street in Kazan.

Nowadays, roads often have a designated footpath attached especially for pedestrian traffic, called the sidewalk in American English and the pavement in British English. There are also footpaths not associated with a road which are used purely by pedestrians, particularly ramblers, hikers or hill-walkers and there are roads not associated with a footpath. Such footpaths in mountainous or forested areas are called trails. On some of the latter, pedestrians share the road with horses and vehicles whilst on others they are forbidden from using the road altogether. Also some shopping streets are for pedestrians only. Some roads have special pedestrian crossings. A bridge solely for pedestrians is a footbridge.

Pedestrianisation

Colorful pedestrian Light Tunnel at Detroit's DTW airport.
Enlarge
Colorful pedestrian Light Tunnel at Detroit's DTW airport.

Efforts are underway by pedestrian advocacy groups to restore pedestrian access to new developments, especially to counteract newer developments where 20 to 30 percent do not include sidewalks. Some activists advocate large auto-free zones where pedestrians only or pedestrians and some non motorised vehicles are allowed. Many urbanists have extolled the virtues of pedestrian streets in urban areas. Many urban streets in the USA lack street lighting (lamp poles), based on the reasoning that cars have headlights to illuminate their own way. An exception is New York City, the only locality in the United States where more than half of all households do not own a car (the figure is even higher in Manhattan, over 75%; nationally, the rate is 8% [1]). This policy severely restricts or effectively prohibits pedestrian traffic and contributes to excessive car use on short distance trips.

In contrast pedestrian traffic is officially encouraged in some parts of the European Union and construction or separation of dedicated walking routes receives a high priority in most large European city centres, often in conjunction with public transport enhancements. In Copenhagen the world's longest pedestrian shopping area, the Strøget, has been developed over the last 40 years principally due to the work of Danish architect Jan Gehl.

The promotion of walking has been linked to the rebuilding of social capital.

Other uses

The word pedestrian is also used as an adjective having a figurative meaning of "unimaginative" or "ordinary." This is by implied contrast of a walker with an equestrian (horse rider). E.g. ‘’She wrote pages and pages of pedestrian prose’’.

See also

External links

Commons-logo.svg
Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

 
Translations: Translations for: Pedestrian

Dansk (Danish)
n. - fodgænger
adj. - fod-, snusfornuftig, uinspireret

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    fodgængerovergang
  • pedestrian precinct    fodgængerområde

Nederlands (Dutch)
voetganger, alledaags/ saai

Français (French)
n. - piéton
adj. - terre à terre

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    passage pour piéton
  • pedestrian precinct    zone piétonne

Deutsch (German)
n. - Fußgänger
adj. - zu Fuß gehend, prosaisch, langweilig

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    Fußgängerüberweg
  • pedestrian precinct    Fußgängerzone

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - πεζός, πεζοπόρος, διαβάτης, (επίθ.) μονότονος, πεζός

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    (Βρετ.) διάβαση πεζών
  • pedestrian precinct    πεζόδρομος

Italiano (Italian)
pedone

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    passaggio pedonale
  • pedestrian precinct    zona pedonale

Português (Portuguese)
n. - pedestre, andarilho (m)

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    cruzamento de pedestres
  • pedestrian precinct    área de pedestres

Русский (Russian)
пешеход, пешеходный, обыденный

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    пешеходный переход
  • pedestrian precinct    пешеходная зона

Español (Spanish)
n. - peatón, caminante
adj. - pedestre

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    paso de peatones
  • pedestrian precinct    zona peatonal

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - fotgängare

中文(简体) (Chinese (Simplified))
行人, 步行者, 徒步的, 通俗的, 呆板的

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    人行横道
  • pedestrian precinct    行人专用区

中文(繁體) (Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 行人, 步行者
adj. - 徒步的, 通俗的, 呆板的

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    行人穿越道
  • pedestrian precinct    行人專用區

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 보행자, 도보 경주자
adj. - 도보의, 평범한

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 歩行者
adj. - 歩行の, 歩行者のための, 平凡な, 想像力に乏しい, 徒歩の, 散文的な

idioms:

  • pedestrian crossing    横断歩道
  • pedestrian precinct    歩行者天国の区域

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) مبتذل, ماش, راجل, مشي, ذو علاقه بالمشي‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮הולך רגל‬
adj. - ‮קשור בהליכה ברגל, חסר-מעוף, משעמם, מתחרה בהליכה למרחק‬


 
 

Join the WikiAnswers Q&A community. Post a question or answer questions about "pedestrian" at WikiAnswers.

 

Copyrights:

Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Thesaurus. Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary Copyright © 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Answers Corporation Antonyms. © 1999-2008 by Answers Corporation. All rights reserved.  Read more
Devil's Dictionary. Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce, 1911  Read more
Word Tutor. Copyright © 2004-present by eSpindle Learning, a 501(c) nonprofit organization. All rights reserved.
eSpindle provides personalized spelling and vocabulary tutoring online; free trial Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Pedestrian" Read more
Translations. Copyright © 2007, WizCom Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved.  Read more

Search for answers directly from your browser with the FREE Answers.com Toolbar!  
Click here to download now. 

Get Answers your way! Check out all our free tools and products.

On this page:   E-mail   print Print  Link  

 

Keep Reading

Mentioned In: