NOLENSVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) — A teenager who was hit by a car while riding his bike home has used his experience to caution others.
He teamed up with Nolensville police to create a public service announcement.
"We as a town started looking at things that we could do to educate the public about safer practices when approaching a crosswalk as a vehicle and when moving through a crosswalk as a pedestrian or as a bicyclist," Nolensville officer Christina Sabol said.
The City of Nolensville's public information officer, Brandi Najam, told News 2 that it's a collective effort that would best keep Nolensville safe.
"This is how we will keep Nolensville safe," Najam said. "It's not one person. It's everybody collectively working together and I think that message is not just important here, but it's important across the state of Tennessee."
The PSA features 13-year-old Drake Morse. He was hit by a car while leaving school and admitted that he did not push the crosswalk button.
"We certainly recommend that bicyclists get off of their bike when entering a crosswalk, walk the bike across and if there is a pedestrian warning signal, they could activate that," Sabol said.
Sabol had some more advice for pedestrians or others that use crosswalks.
"Make sure that if there are other vehicles in the surrounding area, you make eye contact with them — you see that they're slowing and preparing to stop before you enter the crosswalk," Sabol said.
Morse is okay but his bike is mangled. Police added that all drivers have a responsibility to slow down and stay off their phone as well.
"Our town is really passionate about safety and taking care of each other and I think we just have a really big opportunity here to prevent incidents like this from happening in the future," Sabol added.