Beware Protection Gaps

A cursory glance around this shopping area gave me an initial impression of safety—until I took a closer look.

Some sections have bollards. Great. Other sections have a stone planter barrier. Great again.

But—hey, wait a minute. Why the big gap right in front of the nice glass entry to this store pictured above?

And how come this other store (photo below) has nothing at all in front? The brick pillars are spaced so far apart as to be virtually useless as vehicle barriers—which I'm guessing was not their intended purpose anyway.

Those invitingly wide windows and glass doors are sitting ducks—as are any people standing behind them. The products displayed in the windows wouldn't fare well were a vehicle to crash through them, either.

Worse yet, vehicles approaching this T-intersection (above) are pointed straight at those gaps. At least there's a stop sign. But Heaven forbid a driver mistakenly hits his gas pedal instead of his brakes.

Other sections of this large shopping center have more bollards, as in the photo below. When standing up close and personal with those bollards, however, the space between them looked wide enough to leave me feeling uncomfortably vulnerable.

The developer of this shopping center obviously uses some helpful safety features. Unfortunately, the gaps in those safety features leave a lot of people at risk.

Photos by Mark Wright