Memes

I do that sometimes, but because it's one of those shitty intersections that has separate call buttons for parallel crossings. Where, for example, if the east-west car traffic is stopped and the north crosswalk call button was pressed first and the south button was pressed too late into the process, it will give the pedestrian signal for only the north crosswalk, not the south one, even though the cross traffic is stopped for both. It will make you wait an entire cycle before it lets you cross. This happens all the time because if you want to cross diagonally, what do you instinctively do? You press both call buttons at your starting corner because you're not sure which direction will clear first. But that screws you over on your second crossing because the other parallel side, the one you're no longer on, now gets priority. I watch for protected right/left signals and if there aren't any, I cross anyway because the traffic is fucking stopped and the lights are being stupid.

Not recommending other people do this because obviously it's risky. The protected signals can come on after you've started crossing, and in general drivers might be looking at the pedestrian signal instead of actually scanning for people. But if it's an intersection I'm familiar with, it's not super busy, and I'm in a rush, I'll foolishly take the risk.

I'm thinking of making an entire rant on /c/fuckcars about the shitty crosswalks of the Vancouver BC area and how they go out of their way to inconvenience pedestrians if people are interested.