I'm voting to close this question because it's not about travel.

travel safety includes transportation safety. Is safety not about travel?

Apart from the 'walking across a road', there's no travel content here. It might be on topic to give general advice (Find a marked pedestrian crossing), but if you're looking for an answer on your specific situation it's likely to be opinion-based and thus off-topic.

My post is about general advice with the example to explain details, and is travel content.

It appears that on the north side of the intersection, i.e. in front of the southbound McLean traffic, there is a pedestrian signal. You should definitely have crossed there. If you push the button and wait for the green "walk" signal, you are guaranteed a standard amount of time to cross (based on a fairly slow walking speed), during which time all cross traffic will have red signals.

@NateEldredge Thanks. See my two edits.

I am not quite sure what kind of answer you are looking for. Do you want advice on how to notice the presence of a pedestrian signal (not sure what to say except "look"), or an explanation of how they work, or why it is a good idea to use them, or what?

@NateEldredge Under my subconsciousness, (1) I assumed it is always allowed to cross right in front of traffics at all directions, unless there is a sign telling do not cross here. (2) Also, I paid more attention to the traffic lights hanging in middle of the road, than the pedestrian signals on the sides. So I normally crossed street where I could see the traffic lights.

My first reaction was that in the US, with the exception of downtown areas, pedestrians are deemed not to exist. But as @NateEldredge pointed out, there are pedestrian signs on the northern and eastern sides of the intersection (Google Street View history tells us they have been installed sometime between October 2014 and October 2016). They may not be terribly obvious (there's no marking on the ground to symbolise a pedestrian crossing), but they're quite visible. I don't think there are buttons for the (smaller) eastern crossing, but there are buttons for the main northern crossing.

Also, given the layout of the intersection, cars only stop on the main road to let cars from the "turn" cross back. In that case, on the northern side you are guaranteed no traffic, while on the southern side you have always either traffic from the North or from the East. Not the best place to cross the road, most definitely not the whole road at once.

@Arthur'sPass Do you mean that only users who can travel to different places with nontrivial expenses are qualified to post?

@PatriciaShanahan - agreed. As a UK citizen, born and bred, I had a big surprise in Berlin, not knowing you can't just cross any road you like where you like, provided it's safe. Rome was a nightmare for crossing roads, too - I wish someone had told me the rules (or I'd thought to ask) before I went to either. We all tend to assume our experience in the little things is universal when it really, really isn't.

Concentrate on your cell phone, step out into the path of traffic, and hope for the best.

@Mark If you've got a cell phone with you, you might as well use it to call a cab to get to the other side.

The laws for pedestrians vary from state to state. Do you want an answer specifically for New Jersey, or general advice for crossing streets that will work in the vast majority of US states? Note that the overriding concern is that you are a lot more squishy than any vehicle. Thus, you should be sure to maintain situational awareness and be ready to get out of the way of a car, if it doesn't look like it's going to avoid you. Regardless of what the laws are, you probably would probably prefer to just be frustrated at some driver, rather than have your next of kin suing them for wrongful death.

@Makyen Both...

You're not alone. I asked, almost exactly 4 years ago, about crossing the road in Mongolia. How to cross a road by foot in a country that drives on the “other” side of the road

Am i the only one thinking One step at a time?

Relevant: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaywalking#United_States

Rules can be state dependent as well. mwl-law.com/…