In Barcelona, where I used to live, you never have to think about cars if you are a pedestrian. There are two kinds of crosswalks. Those with traffic lights and those without and they're marked differently. In both cases, you never have to look if there's a car coming. If it's green, you simply cross. At the crosswalks without a traffic light, the drivers must slow down and anticipate your decision while they see you near the first sidewalk about to cross. They have to let you go first and then wait until you are standing on the next sidewalk across the street before they go, regardless if there's space for them after you moved ahead. You never have to think about it, if your foot goes on the crosswalk, it's certain that cars around, buses, everything will have stopped even before that. That said, when the cars light is green they go full speed because they also know that there is zero possibility for a pedestrian to jaywalk (and get pretty mad if you try to, even for very small road with very small distance between the sidewalks and good visibility, everybody waits). That system works amazingly well for both pedestrians and cars because it's the most efficient and safe and I'm surprised it's not everywhere.