I was walking down a cobblestone path in the middle of University Avenue on Wednesday morning when I heard the loud bell of a train. I turned and saw the snub nose of a light-rail car bearing down. I had somehow bumbled into the path of the Green Line.

Until now, I’d assumed that the people who have been hit by light rail in the Twin Cities were wearing ear buds and spacing out. I figured they were the kind of people who strolled straight down the rails and on the shoulders of busy streets, who crossed against red lights and took chances. Now I wonder if they were just like me, a bit confused and in a very wrong place at the wrong time.

I’m a regular bus commuter and no stranger to public transit, but I’d ridden light rail only once before. I decided at the last minute to catch it to work in downtown St. Paul. I was by Raymond Avenue dropping off a kid at summer camp, so I parked my car on a side street and walked down to University Avenue, where I could see the Raymond Avenue Station to my left halfway down the block. The pedestrian light turned green, and I walked across University’s westbound traffic lane. I figured there would be a sidewalk running up the middle of the street from the intersection to the station. Makes sense, right?

When I got to the median, there was a sign that said don’t walk here, but it seemed to imply the rails, and who would be stupid enough to walk on the rails? I turned left onto a wide strip of cobblestones running alongside them. I figured that must be the start of a walkway.

Hmm, I thought as I started walking, these cobblestones have a sort of rustic and European charm. But, sheesh, I can’t believe Metro Transit has let all these weeds grow up between them. Someone should get down here and clean it up … And, this would be impossible for someone in a wheelchair. … And … gosh … this is kind of close to the rail. Maybe I’m supposed to be walking on the other side of these weeds … or are they prairie flowers? By now, it’s dawning on me that, just maybe, this isn’t a sidewalk for people. It was one of those times when you’re so convinced of something that it takes a while for mounting evidence to convince you otherwise.

Like a train horn. I jumped over the prairie strip to the cobblestones closer to the street and farther from the rails just in time to avoid the blue and yellow light rail cars as they sped silently past, inches from where I’d been walking.

I watched the train slide into Raymond station. A pair of Metro Transit police rushed to the end of the platform and began yelling at me. I stepped over the low metal railing that separated the cobblestones from the smooth concrete platform. My heart was racing. I had learned my lesson.

The transit cops laid into me. Did I know that I was trespassing? “… a misdemeanor offense… could give you a ticket … you could have been hit by that train … the driver can’t brake … two people have been killed …”

I was irritated at their scolding, but took some deep breaths and relaxed my shoulders and realized that, of course, they were just doing their job. I confessed my complete stupidity.

They told me about the two people who have been hit and killed on the Green Line. They told me about a woman who was standing between train lines who was knocked by one train toward another oncoming train and who survived only because the fast-thinking driver of the oncoming train sped up so she fell into the side of the train rather than into its path. I later looked up the statistics. Eight pedestrians have been struck since testing began in January 2014 on the Green Line between downtown Minneapolis and St. Paul.

“In your defense, that intersection isn’t well designed,” one cop finally conceded, as he mellowed in the face of my contrite confession. “People get confused.”

I’m contemplating my first-ever neighborhood activism. I’d like to see a barrier at the far end of that cobblestone strip so other well-intentioned, law-abiding idiots like me don’t walk down it. The design makes it far too easy for absent-minded people to stray into danger. Truthfully, right now I’m thinking of my 15-year-old son, who does wear earbuds.

Maja Beckstrom can be reached at 651-228-5295.