Yesterday was the first time in a while that I was able to cut out of work early, so I took advantage and went to my local park hoping to throw a kite up to do some static flying. Unfortunately I had packed it poorly on my last outing and had a tangled & twisted mess in my lines. As I had my lines laid out I noticed all these people driving around the park very slowly in creep mode looking shady. And as it got closer to 5PM suddenly kids & families were just randomly showing up walking all over the park and staring at their smart phones. I finally realized they were all playing Pokemon Go! :frog:

As I was working on my lines I thought it was kind of a good thing I couldn't fly because not one of those people were looking were they were going at all. I would have to constantly be checking my area for everyone not paying attention. A few times I had to politely alert people that they were about to walk on my lines. I can't get mad as it is a public park that we all must share. And it is nice seeing teenagers out of the house and families doing things together. But I was just wondering if anyone else has encountered this as well at their flying spots.

I haven't personally been affected by it, but it's pretty big in Aus at the moment with scenes similar to what you describe. I think someone was hit by a car in Melbourne recently while paying too much attention to their phone - pretty sure they won't be the last.

Glad to hear they're not at your spots John. Watch out for Squirtle!

DARWIN at his finest....

Absolutely!
I have two teenagers (18 & 16) and we're managing to get out of the house at least once a week to go for a "pokewalk". (Yes, I have it installed on my 'phone too.)
Really, it's just an excuse to get out of the house for an hour with one or the other of them. But how many teenagers do you know that'll go for a walk with dad?
Once we're clear of the house, the conversation just kinda' rolls: no computer, no netflix - it's great.

There have been a few mishaps on my local beach, people walking into each other etc

Every time I take my kite out in Olympia Washington at Capitol lake. It started immediately after the game came out. I didn't know what was going on, I had been flying my trainer kite for months and only once in a while would I have people trying to walk between me and my kite. Now it's all the time. I'm flying a Beamer 5 meter kite now and I'm on constant lookout for these guys. They are more in tune with their phones than what's going on around them. Unfortunately its up to us to fly safely and I find myself parking it countless times in an outing. People who don't know any better don't realize that getting between a kite and its pilot is dangerous and control lines can be the human equivalent to a cheese slicer.