There is a tiny little pedestrian crossing in the city. There are no traffic lights, just a crossing; and there is an endless stream of people crossing. I use that crossing twice a day. One day last month, I crossed the road and was apparently too slow for the driver of a cane toad-like sports utility vehicle who nosed his vehicle onto the crossing and tooted me. Guess he was desperate to join the queue of motorists inching along Parramatta Road in the city.

I walk somewhere between six and 11 kilometres a day. Where I live, it's quicker to walk than it is to take public transport but it carries a far greater risk. This year in NSW, 29 pedestrians have already been killed, more than one a week; and nearly double where we were same time last year. So far, it's 11 in Queensland and 32 in Victoria.

Pedestrians are second-class citizens in NSW. Credit:Jessica Hromas

The vast majority of these deaths are avoidable – last week in NSW, a vehicle went around another car which was stopped at a pedestrian crossing and hit a woman who was crossing. She is still in hospital.

In Australia, the rise of the entitled motorist is ceaseless; and only one group has managed to stem that entitlement in any measurable way. Cyclists are the beneficiaries of the campaign to force motorists to keep a metre's distance from any bicycle. There is no outstanding, memorable campaign – equivalent to campaigns such the A Metre Matters project conducted by the Amy Gillett Foundation – to save pedestrians, although they are at greater risk on our roads than cyclists, far greater.