Tuesday Night Bike Ride for families? Is there one? Why not?
A friend of mine just called me to ask if there are any easy, safe, fun bike rides he can do with his young daughter. He was wondering if the TNBR might be a good option, but apparently he went to my blog and read the recent posts about it and thought he should call first before heading over there.
I had to tell him that generally speaking, probably no. I do remember a time when people would bring their young kids on the TNBR, but that was back when the routes were a little more carefully chosen and the ride started earlier. Most parents would probably prefer not to guide their nine-year-old down Sixth Street at 9:30 PM on a bicycle.
Why isn’t there a ride in Tucson that would accommodate my friend and his daughter? It seems like there should be one. Right now the best I can think of is the annual Ciclovia and the BICAS bike-in movie rides.
–Erik Ryberg
Tucson bicycle collision near-real-time twitter feed
Check this out: Collin F, computer programmer and frequent TNBR participant, has created some kind of robot that downloads Tucson police information on some kind of RSS feed, searches it for its relevance to bicycles, and then puts the resulting report on twitter. It’s quite interesting.
He is also working on a map that shows the location of bicycle collisions, which will ultimately lead to some pretty good information about where the dangerous areas are.
I think the City should be paying him to do this, but he’s doing it for free.
–Erik Ryberg
Obviously this has something to do with bicycles
Gallup poll reveals Denmark to be happiest country in the world.
EBR
Last Night’s Tuesday Night Bike Ride, and the cops
I predicted that there might be more police presence on last night’s ride owing to a particularly vocal person who had been injured by the ride the previous week (his dog was also hurt) along with the safety money the Tucson Police Department has recently received for the purpose of ticketing cyclists.
It isn’t clear that either of those things were the cause, but in any event, there were an awful lot of police around last night — I lost track of how many squad cars I saw, some of them chasing cyclists, some angling them into the curb, some barking contradictory messages through their loudspeakers, and some just driving around.
Mike over at tucsonvelo.com has a full report. I’ll just say that as obnoxious as it at times was, the police actually showed a lot of restraint compared to what they did two years ago, when they raced menacingly and repeatedly through the crowd on motorcycles and followed the ride with a paddy-wagon.
It appears that they do want to find a way to make this thing work instead of just destroy it (no doubt, the political capital required to destroy it is daunting) because they have evidently contacted Perimeter Bicycling Association of America to help them “assure the safety” of the riders. I’m not sure how well that is going to go over, (I hope the designated PGAA route leaders keep their expectations low as to being liked, appreciated, or followed) but hopefully there will be some way to temper this ride’s more hazardous elements and make it an enjoyable and safe outing for all.
I will say I was struck by the bizarre route and the lack of interest among the ride leaders in waiting up for those stuck at red lights behind. The route included Congress west of the I-10, Grande, and 6th Street — some of the worst streets in Tucson for riding a bicycle. Over time the ride became extremely strung out because of so many people left behind at red lights. I wish the leaders would wait at lights so all can cross as a group, as in the “old days” of the ride.
–Erik Ryberg
A visit from Kickstand Magazine’s publisher
Brad Evans, the publisher of Kickstand Magazine, is in town and stopped by yesterday to chat about cycling in Tucson. The magazine, subtitled “The Owner’s Manual of the Freewheeling Life” focuses on city cycling and urban cycling life. The new edition is available at bike shops around town. It’s extremely well done.
Brad tells me they have weekly community bike rides in Denver (which he often leads) with over 2,000 cyclists! Whoa!
I’m heading to the TNBR tonight. I’m feeling a little sheepish about writing that post earlier this week after not having been on one of these rides in several months. (I am also going in case there is a lot of police presence — maybe having a lawyer hanging around will help.)
Erik Ryberg
Doored
I wrote below about a man who got doored on University. He was riding down the street when a woman opened her car door into his path.
The story is pretty bad. He was not wearing a helmet, and he fell hard. He does not remember what happened, but the witnesses recall him bleeding from his ears and being unresponsive. They do not like to recall the scene.
He was in a coma for some weeks. During that time he lost his apartment and all his belongings, and of course his medical bills were astronomical. When he awoke he had the usual brain-injury problems — very bad memory, difficulty with motor-skills, and so forth. As he was uninsured, he was discharged from the hospital as soon as possible, and with no money and nowhere to go, he was left destitute. He had only recently moved to Tucson and had not yet established connections here when he was hit, and he literally found himself on the street. I don’t like to think about what it must be like to be living outside in Tucson in July while recovering from a brain injury.
Luckily we got him a settlement very quickly and he will be getting back on his feet soon.
The moral I take from this story is: try to wear a helmet more. And work on getting bike routes out of the door zone.
–Erik Ryberg
Tuesday Night Bike Ride — More enforcement on the way?
I got a call today from a woman whose husband apparently got run over by the Tuesday Night Bike Ride. He was riding his bike with the family dog running alongside when the TNBR came, according to her, upon them way too quickly. He was knocked from his bike and injured, and his dog was also run over and suffered a broken leg.
She says the riders did not stop and told him he should have gotten out of the way.
I’m not sure what to think about it all. She said the police would be coming over to interview her husband, and I would guess this will result in some more police presence on the ride in the immediate future.
I haven’t been on the TNBR in nearly a year. It got way too aggro for me and at one point I got yelled at by someone for refusing to run a red light while he “corked” Broadway. He gave me a lecture about not knowing what I was doing and not understanding how the TNBR works. I ignored him.
Later a few of us started leading smaller rides that left at a reasonable hour (the TNBR had started leaving past 9 PM) and word got back to me that “Tucsonbikelawyer was trying to destroy the Tuesday Night Ride” by splitting it up. That’s when I called it quits. It just isn’t any fun to me to be in a pack of people who are running lights on major intersections and choosing routes that don’t avoid such intersections. The TNBR is supposed to be relaxing and fun, and for me it stopped being those things.
When it started, it was nominally “led” by some of the young bike superstars in town, and they selected great routes and, after a few rocky fits and starts, led by example. We had some meetings with the police about ways to avoid unwanted police presence, and after awhile the cops started leaving us alone. (There was one arrest early on and extremely annoying police motorcycle presence. It was awful.)
But over time the people who typically led the ride graduated or left or lost interest, and it became much more unruly. Maybe now it’s different, but the call I got this morning doesn’t suggest that it is.
I hope the TNBR folks realize that the police can make this ride really unpleasant if they want to, and just a tiny bit of good behavior and self-enforcement can go a long way toward preventing that.
I’d like to hear from people who are still doing the TNBR, and if anyone saw this week’s incident.
–Erik Ryberg
WTF? Is the Tucson Police Department finally getting on board with bicycle safety?
Readers of this Website know that I have been very critical of TPD since I started it back in 2007. In fact, the whole reason I did start it was my frustration at TPD officers who were not citing motorists for collisions with cyclists that were demonstrably the fault of the motorist. Over time I also became a critic of their failure to distinguish assaults on cyclists from the several hundred run-of-the-mill assaults that occur every month.
And something that really irked me was their using State safety grant money to pay themselves overtime to stake out likely four-way stops and ticket cyclists who didn’t put a foot down at the stop sign.
So now comes word via www.tucsonvelo.com, first, that TPD will actually be using this year’s safety grant to target wrong-way riders and cyclists riding at night without lights. That is a huge improvement in my opinion.
But now this, also from tucsonvelo:
In addition to the information in the previous story, Skeenes said they are using plain-clothes bicycle officers who are are being followed by an unmarked police car looking for drivers who violate the three-foot law.
Skeenes said bicycle officers often get more room than regular cyclists, but said cars do pass too closely occasionally.
According to Skeenes, the bicycle officers often can not catch up to cars. The unmarked police car allows the vehicles to be caught to cite the driver.
I’ve been pleading for this kind of thing for years now (one example), but never thought it would actually happen.
Seems there’s been a real shift in TPD’s attitude. If they follow through, I salute them. They have historically been the one seemingly insurmountable hurdle in dragging Tucson into the class of truly “bike friendly” communities.
–Erik Ryberg
Tucson Police: Cyclists who get doored aren’t paying enough attention
I spoke today with a man who was doored while riding on University Boulevard. He was badly injured.
I reviewed his police report, and found that the officer noted that the cyclist’s inattention was the cause of the collision. The driver, by contrast, was recorded as having “taken no inappropriate action.”
Carry on.
–Erik Ryberg
Tucson bike advocacy
Back from my trip, I discovered that my readers took over my blog while I was away, particularly in the comments section of the post below on bike boulevards. Tom Thivener wrote a comment regarding something I often hear from local cyclists:
Tucson is probably the only community rated Silver or higher by the League of American Bicyclists that does not have an active bike advocacy organization. How can Tucson become a more liveable community where the bike is seen as a valid mobility tool instead of just as a recreational tool, if no one is working on building consensus on what that vision is? We have some super active individuals in this community who serve on numerous boards and committees, and who volunteer their time encouraging folks to ride, or teach folks how to be more confident riders. But we don’t have a group who has the time to work the many hours needed to define or implement such a vision for better bicycling in Tucson. This is a real weak spot that the League of American Bicyclists have pointed out. Until a group mobilizes and defines their vision, the leadership of this community will continue to focus on other issues.
I have thought about this a lot. I think the problem is that, first, we really do have a lot of people who are doing great work around here. We have Mike M over at tucsonvelo.com, we have BICAS, the BAC, Jean Gorman, the El Tour folks, active involvement by many local bike shops and riding clubs, and then we have folks in the City who are accessible, thoughtful, and hard-working.
Independent advocacy groups tend to flourish where there is a demonstrable bureaucratic vacuum in local government, where some kind of injustice or neglect is undeniably occurring. But here in Tucson’s governmental infrastructure we have people like Tom Thivener, Ann Chanecka, Jennifer Donofrio, Matt Zoll, and lots of others who are quite obviously doing their level best to implement the vision Thivener is talking about. Their very presence (and competence) is one reason we don’t have an independent advocacy group!
But this isn’t to say one wouldn’t help. Such organizations give cover to local bureaucrats who are hoping to make changes but cannot show their superiors that the changes are justified. The problem is, a community has to really want such a group in order for one to form. It doesn’t seem as if Tucson is there yet, and part of the problem is that when Tucson cyclists call up City Hall, one of the people I’ve named above answers the phone, and actually listens.
The one area where this isn’t true, of course, is with law enforcement. I predict that if anything finally mobilizes Tucson bike advocates, it is going to be a failure of law enforcement. Probably a tragic one.
–Erik Ryberg