To the point: Bompeln paralyze the brain

Do you know what a bompel is? No, not Bommel, Bömmel, Pommel or Pömpel - bompel. A bompel is a ground traffic light, a small strip of flashing lights, similar to the guidance system that leads to the emergency exit when nothing more works on the plane.

Such lights are recently embedded in the ground in front of the head of streetcar stops and flash: when a streetcar approaches the stop, while it is stopping and when it departs again. When the vehicle is gone, the lights go out.

Why the blinking? Because of the smartphone zombies, also called smombies. When walking, more and more people have their heads and eyes not on the landscape, their fellow human beings and everything that happens on the street, but on their cell phones or iPods. The phenomenon unites all generations. In Germany, one in six road users stares at his or her smartphone instead of paying attention to traffic and traffic signals - and in Switzerland, the figure is certainly even higher. At least judging by the angry tinkling of streetcar drivers, which has become the classic soundtrack of a city stroll. The risk of accidents while staring at a cell phone is immense.

Eyes on the display, ears plugged, smombies run into streetcars and seriously injure themselves. There have also already been deaths in Germany. And the smartphone breaks down, too. That's stupid. That's why Augsburg is now testing bompelns at two streetcar stops that are considered particularly dangerous for smombies (see photo below).

Now I ask myself this: If you develop extra traffic lights for notorious jaywalkers, wouldn't you also have to build barriers for those who always just run a red? If a car comes, the barrier lowers - no matter what the light signal tells the motorist. And the drivers who write a text message at the red light should be informed quickly by cell phone that the light signal is now green and that it is time to move on. Before the drivers behind them honk their horns.

Seriously, of course it's tragic when people get in front of or under a streetcar. But anyone who switches off their brain has always lived dangerously. Why is the cell phone forbidden at the wheel, at the handlebars too, and not while running?

I don't think it's particularly sensible, not to say moronic, to take the thinking out of smombies and virtually impose on them that they really don't need to lift their heads anymore. As a mother of two, I know only too well that one only learns from one's mistakes. Sometimes it just has to really hurt - or at least become very critical - until people realize that certain behavior can be life-threatening.

How I would love to wrap my sons in absorbent cotton and push them across the crosswalk in an armored car instead of letting them think, look and walk for themselves. That alone would be a mistake.

Bompeln are also a mistake. After all, at a certain age and level of experience, people should know that it is unhealthy to run in front of a streetcar - even without having to experience it firsthand. Anticipation can be a very useful survival technique.

And apart from that, I don't shy away from invoking evolutionary forces when it comes to the smartphone-obsessed species: Whenever a smombie with a coffee mug in his hand runs into me, I tend to wish for a bit of natural selection.

If that's too radical for you, I have another suggestion: Why do smartphone junkies have to be protected from streetcar death by light organs embedded in the floor? (After all, two LED strips for one stop cost the taxpayer around 10,000 euros). A warning text message would probably be enough, after all, the eyes are already resting on the display. Or: Every train now has a quiet compartment in which mobile reception is simply prevented. Couldn't we simply disrupt cell phone reception and all other functions in cities at critical points so that people look up again instead of swiping and typing? It just doesn't work right now. Period. We would quickly get used to it.

Who knows, you might spot a cool advertising poster when you lift your head. Or a smile on the face opposite. Unfortunately, you won't be able to take a selfie together.
 

Anne-Friederike Heinrich, Editor-in-Chief Werbewoche

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