Traffic Lights Disregarded by China's Pedestrians
By wchung | 02 Aug, 2025

China’s pedestrians simply don’t trust traffic signal lights when crossing the street, according to an informal study conducted by a reporter for China Central Television.

Pedestrians cross the street when they are joined by others so as to form a group. Even when a light turns green to give them the right to cross, most wait until they are joined by others, according to the observations of a reporter who watched a particular intersection for a full hour.

Conversely, even when the light is red for them, China’s pedestrians will cross as long as they are joined by other pedestrians going in the same direction. In fact, if they see that a light is about to turn red, they rush into the crosswalk as long as they have company in the infraction.

During that one hour the CCTV reporter captured on video 600 instances of crossing against a red light.

This peculiar behavior has been named “the Chinese way of crossing a street.”

The behavior appears to stem from a collective refusal to trust of drivers to stop for red lights, as well as a kind of group psychology in which the collective will of assembled pedestrians is seen as overriding traffic laws.