News 12 at 11, April 28, 2007

AUGUSTA, Ga. --- Starting Thursday, if you're caught jaywalking on 15th Street, it will cost you $140.

It's a common site on 15th street. Jaywalking. And it's taking place on one of the busiest streets in Augusta. The speed limit is 35 mph and 25 mph on Laney Walker Blvd. Since the accident a month ago, that left an MCG student dead. MCG Police Officers are patrolling the crosswalks at 15th and Laney Walker Blvd and 15th and Harper from 7-9 in the morning and 3:30-5:30 in the afternoon. They're there to help people get across the streets. But the officers still see a lot of jaywalking.

"That incident right there will cost you 140 dollars," Major Eugene Maxwell said.

"The only problem with that is, he's not out there all day, and someone almost ran me over yesterday using that crosswalk," Eric Fiebiger said.

We even saw one woman caught in the middle of 15th Street, with lines of traffic on both sides.

"I used to use that crosswalk. And I've seen a lot of people almost get hit and I've almost been hit here. But I've never had any trouble right here. If you pay attention and if you time it, there's no close calls out here," Mark Fiebiger said.

Officers are at the crosswalks to make sure people wait to cross the intersection until the pedestrian sign gives them the go. The officers are also making sure people don't get run over in the crosswalk.

"We don't want to see anybody else get run over. We don't ever want that to happen again," Major Maxwell said.

Major Eugene Maxwell said the jaywalking has gotten better, but it's still not where it needs to be. He said just like cars have to wait, so do pedestrians.

"But I've seen some really strange stuff out here. And we just want to raise the awareness, make sure they understand, we're not trying to punish them. We want to make sure they do the right thing. We want them to go home. We don't ever want to have any more accidents, tragedies like we had a month ago," Major Maxwell said.

Major Maxwell said they just want everyone to take a little more time to get where they're going safely.

Starting this Thursday, officers will be writing citations for jaywalking and also for people who come to the crosswalk who don't wait for the signal to tell them to cross. Fines will start at 140 dollars. They'll also be using laser radar guns to catch speeders.