San Francisco finally catching up to Boise . . . in some ways
Uncategorized June 18th, 2008
I recently posted about the enlightened bike laws in Idaho, which permit bicyclists to regard stop signs as yield signs, and red lights as “flashing reds,” which is to say they can proceed through after stopping if there is no cross traffic.
Now reader Richard M. has pointed me to an article that shows San Francisco may be following Idaho’s lead.
Richard’s main point was to show me this quote, though, from the article:
Capt. Greg Corrales, chief of the San Francisco Police Department’s Traffic Company, said bicyclists have a sense of entitlement and have long ignored existing traffic laws, especially at stop signs. As a result, he said his office repeatedly cites bicyclists. More importantly, he said, the rate of bicyclist fatalities is higher than it should be because they rarely abide by basic traffic rules.
Yikes! You think that guy might be a wee bit biased when he’s studying an accident scene?
Thanks for the article Richard!
–Erik Ryberg
June 19th, 2008 at 10:28 am
Just on my way from the bus stop to my office today, I saw four out of four bicyclists blow through a stop sign at a busy intersection. One was even in University kit and looked like he might be a training athlete, and should know better. I suspect that the oft cited “improved commute time in the city” for bicycles comes from ignoring stop signs, going the wrong way on one way streets, and riding on the sidewalk.
June 19th, 2008 at 3:28 pm
And today I saw a man riding no-handed, carrying a small cooler, against traffic. But I do not ride that way.
Comments from law enforcement that make sweeping attacks on bicyclists as a class of people are different from observations that not all bicyclists follow the law. When I am lying on the pavement I don’t want the police investigators making any assumptions about what got me there. I want them to study the scene, follow the truth where it leads and accept the evidence that is before them.
I know they often do not do this because I read police reports that are filled with bias against bicyclists.
–Erik Ryberg
June 19th, 2008 at 6:07 pm
I agree completely: that sort of bias has no place in the mind of an officer of the law. However, cyclists make it all to easy to hold that bias with their apparent total contempt of traffic law. That cop spends a lot more time looking at traffic than we do. How do you suppose his bias was formed? Probably by watching your buddy with the cooler ride down the wrong side of the street.
I am a frequent pedestrian. Imagine my horror when I read the following garbage on a popular bicycling Usenet newsgroup by an otherwise respected contributor:
The rules of the road are there for a reason. If brainless pedestrians
endanger cyclists by wandering out into traffic, too bad if they get
injured for their stupidity. I do not plan on being victimized by one again.
No one bothered to rebut this moron or even point out the irony that some drivers feel the very same way about him.
It gets worse. It seems a lot of cyclists celebrate high gas prices because they think it’s going to force a lot of people out of their comfortable air conditioned cars and out on to the hot streets. O RLY? People are starving because energy and thus food prices are so high. It’s not just some amusing inconvenience that’s going to convince the sheep that your way is the right way.
What is this Critical Mass business? How do cyclists think most of the electorate feels about that kind of junk? Frankly, I’d feel the same way about a bunch of fools driving their cars 5MPH across the 14th Street Bridge. The only difference is that the drivers would actually be arrested. It seems more like an excuse for a bunch of cyclist-bullies to flex their muscles then actually accomplish anything.
I’ve been looking in to getting a bicycle for practical reasons, hence the Usenet research and my discovery of this blog, but I don’t know that I want to be associated with such a group of elitist snobs. The only viable commuting route for me goes right past two or three quarries. I want the dump truck drivers to have positive opinions of me, but it’s hard to do that when seemingly every other cyclist on the road has a flagrant disregard for the law. I want a safer way to get to work, but how can that happen when the movers and shakers and the people who elect them won’t lift a finger to help cyclists because of the way cyclists act in public?
Clearly, not all cyclists are like this. Unfortunately, too much of the cyclist community seems to be made up of jerks like the pedestrian-hating poster, the guy with the cooler, and the guy commenting on a later blog entry who apparently makes illegal U-turns for smoothies.
Don’t get me wrong, I think bicycles are important for our future. I think petroleum-based fuels need to be conserved for important things like agriculture, freight, and defense. I also think cyclists hurt their own cause by focusing too much on the attitude and riding recklessly.
June 21st, 2008 at 11:12 pm
Dear Anonymous,
If you are seriously interested in bicycle commuting and not just in stirring up trouble, I have three suggestions:
1. Visit local bike shops until you find a bicycle that meets your needs.
2. Sign up for one of Pima County’s excellent classes for cyclists.
3. Start riding.
Spending all your time looking for cyclists to be disappointed in will get you nowhere, and it is WAY too easy to do. You can be disillusioned by any and all segments of society, but what’s the point? You might as well not be a pedestrian…I’m sure some of them are jerks, too, and motorists kill many more pedestrians each year than they do cyclists. Motorists also kill off 40,000 of each other annually, plus they run stop signs, red lights, etc., and unlike cyclists, they kill other people by their behavior. When cyclists behave stupidly, they are generally endangering only themselves.
The sooner you stop arguing and start riding, the sooner you can be the most responsible and courteous cyclist ever, and then maybe the rest of us will improve by seeing your example.
June 23rd, 2008 at 5:44 pm
Dear Mindy,
I don’t live in Pima County. I used to live in Cochise County, but that was a long, long time ago. I don’t spend all my time looking for disappointing attitudes and behaviors from cyclists, either. I just happened to come across these things while researching a bicycle and by paying closer attention to what the cyclists around me do, both for their safety and for mine.
I’d love to get out there and ride, but there are concrete reasons why a few visits to the local bike shops is insufficient. Obviously, why else would I be spending all this time looking in to every nook and cranny of the cyclist world for an appropriate bike?
I have two points. First, you claim that cyclist stupidity only endangers themselves. This is true in that generally the only physical danger posed is to themselves. However, a reckless cyclist also hurts the people that love her and the person who hit her. Personally, I would not want to be the motor vehicle operator in an accident where a cyclist gets hurt, even if it’s not my fault.
Secondly, you make a comment about me setting an example. No amount of good riding on my part is going to fix the habits of the vast majority of cyclists who have no regard for things like stop signs and lane markers. Cyclists need to call one another out when bad riding is observed. Cyclists need to take a stand for doing the right thing, and that goes beyond stuffy old organizations like the League. From what I can tell, most don’t and choose instead to complain about those gosh darn motorists.
June 24th, 2008 at 11:47 am
The bias is in Corrales targeting bicyclists as “entitled” lawbreakers specifically. Entitlement and lawbreaking is fairly typical of all road users, including motorists.
June 24th, 2008 at 6:00 pm
The problem with the perception that forms this bias, is that the vast majority of folks who bicycle for transportation do follow the rules and just quietly pedal along the less-traveled streets without creating a fuss for anyone. And that’s exactly why they don’t ever get noticed so that they figure in to the equation, the only bicyclists that *anybody* ever sees are the ones behaving stupidly enough to stand out. Just like how 99.9% of the cars on the road are *not* driven by incompetent fools, drunks, and those who are actively trying to kill me, that 0.1% that I have to keep dodging every day are enough to make me form the opinion that they *all* are.
That cop formed his opinion because he is trained to look for violations of the law – folks who are not violating the law barely pass through his consciousness, as a result he sees nothing but lawbreakers among bicyclists.
June 25th, 2008 at 7:01 am
“Sign up for one of Pima County’s excellent classes for cyclists.”
Mindy you are a perfect example of the “elitist snobs” anonymous mentioned.
June 25th, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Lucenut,
You lost me there.
Mindy
June 25th, 2008 at 8:38 pm
Me too. What’s wrong with the Pima County safety classes? Why do they suggest elitism? They are free and tailored to all sorts of people.
http://bikeped.pima.gov/Safety/BikeSafetyClasses4.08.pdf
–EBR
June 26th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
I witnessed an odd near miss on campus last night – I was riding in the bike lane eastbound on University approaching the Campbell intersection, there was another guy on a bike about 30ft in front of me. The bike lane runs along the right hand curb of the road, but about 50ft or so before the intersection, a right turn lane starts to the right side of the bike lane. The other rider was just coasting up on the start of the right turn lane as a car passed me on the left, came up alongside him and suddenly changed lanes through the bike lane – right where the other rider was – into the right turn lane. Fortunately the rider was paying attention, and was able to brake hard and veer right to avoid getting hit; but how does a driver not see somebody right there next to his passenger door as he moves right? One should never attribute to malice what can be explained by mere stupidity, but that almost looked intentional to me.