Why sensible people resort to jaywalking Prince George's County's dangerous highways - @TBD On Foot | TBD.com

As reported here earlier, 40-year-old Jose Daniel Cubias-Rivera was killed in a hit and run on University Boulevard in Adelphi last month. Apparently there were two drivers involved in the crash -- a Crown Vic taxicab that hit Cubias Rivera and threw him into the next lane over, where he was hit by another car, perhaps a dark-colored Toyota Camry. Both drivers took off.

Hit-and-run crashes aren't easy to solve, and Prince George's County police say they haven't had any breaks in the case. Considering the time that's passed, it's looking increasingly likely that these two drivers won't be held accountable for leaving a homeless man to die in the road.

When a pedestrian is maimed or killed by a car, you'll often read that the victim was "not in a designated crosswalk" at the time of the crash. There's a strong undercurrent of culpability in such a statement. I don't know exactly where Cubias-Rivera was walking when he was hit. But judging from where the on-scene investigation was held the night of the crash, he probably wasn't in the crosswalk.

That is an important detail -- but only because of what it tells us about how this part of Prince George's County was designed.