There are motorists who act completely inappropriately towards bikers, and there are bikers who act in a manner that is equally unbefitting. Both are a big problem, and the one doesn't justify the other.
Personally, as a non-car-owning biker, it really upsets me when I see fellow cyclists acting like dicks. It makes it that much harder for us to be taken seriously.
> it really upsets me when I see fellow cyclists
> acting like dicks
In general, I find it really odd that people in cars think that cyclists need to watch out for cars and not the other way around. The person driving the car is the one holding the deadlier weapon, why are they not held to a higher sense of responsibility?
As an anecdote, one of my friends was hit by a car, and ended up in the hospital. She had the right of way, but that didn't stop the lady that was driving the car from calling her up to complain about the fact that her insurance was going to be more expensive after the accident.
Let that sink in. Someone driving a car, disobeyed the law, and put someone in the hospital, then called up that person to complain about their insurance increasing. I'll bet you that the driver wouldn't have called up to complain if the person she hit had been in a car rather than on a bicycle.
But isn't it even odder that cyclists think the same thing about pedestrians? My encounters with the "dick cyclist" has always been when I was walking. Isn't this similar to what cyclists think about the "dick driver"?
It seems whenever people are in a position of "power" they become pushy, impatient, and careless towards people in a "lesser" position, e.g. drivers towards bikers and bikers towards pedestrians.
The problem between car drivers and bike riders, is that there are a lot of drivers that view the position of the person in the car as the 'normal' position, and the position of the cyclist as the 'abnormal' position.
Take the article that the OP is in response to. It is written along the lines of:
I drive a car, and do not drive bicycle. I therefore
have little vested interest in infrastructure relating
to bicycles and a strong vested interest in infrastructure
related to cars. Therefore I see infrastructure related
to bicycles as 'stealing' time/space/resources away
from the infrastructure related to cars.A driver who hits a cyclist or pedestrian risks a dent in the hood at the worst. So while the "dick cyclist" is annoying, the position of power isn't comparable.
They are. There are insurance requirements for driving, licensing, etc. I'm unaware of any legal restrictions on bicyling on public roads (apart from staying off certain restricted access roads, typically interstates).
We can argue about whether these requirements are adequate, but it's absurd to suggest that they don't exist.
> I'll bet you that the driver wouldn't have called up to complain if the person she hit had been in a car rather than on a bicycle.
I'll bet you that they would have, because I've seen it happen.
Why are you so certain that it wouldn't have happened?
> We can argue about whether these requirements are
> adequate, but it's absurd to suggest that they don't
> exist.
A reasonable analogy would be hunters and guns. Hunters are required to get both a hunting license and a gun license (barring bow hunters, etc). If someone is wandering around in the forest during hunting season, who is the person that should be more aware of their surroundings. We can argue that both people should be, but the hunter is the person with the deadly weapon.
I've actually wondered why there aren't insurance and licensing requirements. I would be happy paying my fair share of infrastructure maintenance as a cyclist, especially if it helped give a voice and build safer roads for bicyclists.
There are big debates about whether bicycle (rider?) licensing would be effective, but my two concerns are:
1) Added cost gives no incentive to car drivers to start commuting by bike, which would have at least some effect on congestion, pollution and health.
2) How do you enforce it?
There needs to be a big improvement in driver education, and responsible cycling needs to be promoted from a young age. Cutting reds and not signalling is behavioural issue that won't be magically fixed by registration/licensing.
Maybe not directly, but the funds generated from licensing and penalties could go towards education programs, tax rebates for those who start commuting by bike, improving safety for cyclists, etc. My guess is that there's a network effect to be had. Once you hit a certain density or,(ugh) critical mass of cyclists on the road you get a point where it is safe and socially-accepted enough that it will become commonplace, and everybody wins.
2) How do you enforce it?
I don't know, I have no experience in the machinations of government. However, I'm confident that if you tell state and municipal governments that they could generate revenue off of it, they will find a way.
Bikes are a problem? Right. Cars kill over 1.4 million people a year, and injure over 50 million people. Anybody arguing about problem cyclists really need a reality check.
I don't care anywhere near as much about dick cyclists who may get themselves killed, compared to problem car drivers who will get me killed.
When I'm driving, I hate cyclists, and when I'm cycling I hate drivers. Both groups are filled with complete freaking idiots who shouldn't be allowed onto the roads under any circumstances.
I've been hit by cyclists more than once. (And OK, I hit a pedestrian when I was riding a bike back when I was a teenager too.)
Walking in L.A. I experience near-misses with cyclists riding illegally on the sidewalk about as often as I experience near-misses from people running red lights when I'm in a car.
I also think its not unusual for people in this thread to be able to drive, and thus the need to portray how bikers are seen largely unnecessary (in my view). Drivers are the majority, and even keen cyclists will probably be drivers too.
As an occasional cyclist, I get particularly annoyed with bad cyclists when I'm driving, as I feel they bring me down with them by association.
You both make some valid points; I don't use 'bias' to imply you are wrong. Rather, bias affects the process by which you examine and evaluate your points.
That of course is not what the law says, and many people (especially drivers and people who don't like bicycles) will disagree. However, it's a cultural norm which, when ignored, leads to far more frustrating four-way encounters. e.g. "law-abiding" cyclist approaches stop sign at the same time a car on the right has already arrived. Car, expecting cyclist to enter intersection (because that's what every other cyclist does) waits. Other cars approach intersection. Cyclist, wanting to abide by the law, slows so that first car can proceed through the intersection. Car waits, expecting cyclist to go through. Other cars wait. Law-abiding cyclist comes to complete stop. Well-meaning (but wrong) car motions cyclist to proceed, ceding right of way. Other cars seethe. Precious seconds wasted.
Sometimes as a cyclist it's better to just run that stop sign and save everybody the hassle. As a cyclist in SF, that's what I do, if there isn't already a car stopped at the intersection and/or very clearly arriving there before me. If there's a car starting to cross in front of me, I go behind it. If I'm coming up behind a car who has the right away as they proceed into the intersection, I'm going to piggyback through the intersection with them rather than stopping myself. I feel I'm abiding the spirit of right-of-way if not the letter of the traffic laws.
Also I notice that most drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians don't understand right of way to begin with, to the point of making weird and dangerous decisions: drivers stopping midway through an intersection trying to be "nice" to some pedestrian or cyclist whose turn it might not be. Dont do it! Take right of way when you have it. Pedestrians doing the same to motion cars through intersections even as they are in the middle of a crosswalk. Ack!
And no the conserving momentum thing is not BS. It's inherent to that mode of transportation. Watch how cyclists navigate stop signs some time. Even when they're more or less obeying the law, very few are coming to a complete stop. Starting and stopping a bike takes much more physical effort than it does a car. Combine that with the vast differences in kinetic energy between them, and I am so much more sympathetic to the cyclist cruising through the stop sign than the car who does the same (and again, actually take note sometime -- cars are as bad about not stopping at stop signs as bikes are).
Finally, as a car owner and driver, to other drivers: get over yourselves! You don't need to be in such a hurry. So what if a pedestrian crosses your path or a bike cruises through a stop sign? You have thousands of pounds of heavy machinery at your command. Be happy about that, pat yourself on the back,etc. You've already got a lot to be pleased with. If you need to stop more quickly than you would have liked, all you have to do is press down on that lever on the floor and you're back up to speed. Life is too short to get your blood pressure up about this sort of stuff. And if it does really get to you, maybe you should gasp park it and go for a walk.
Likewise next time you see a car cut in front of your bike, just let it roll and don't let the rage get to you.
> Since you want to be reckless and ignore safety
> rules, others would have less regard for your safety.
No to the extreme exaggeration 'if you even step an inch over the line, I will run you over.' It's more like 'if you run a red light or stop sign, I might accidentally run you over.'
Do you have an example of "someone using <vehicle> did <unsafe thing>" where it wouldn't be considered way more egregious if someone did it in a car than a bike?
I think it's possible you have a flawed perception because everyone accepts that it's absolutely not ok with cars, while tons of people argue that the same things are ok for bikes, then there is significantly more people complaining about bikes because most people that run red lights don't go around talking about how they know better than the law.
Speeding, for one.
Talking on the phone or texting while driving, for another.
These things are responsible for countless preventable deaths on the roadways, and yet they're completely tolerated by most drivers.
Except text messaging, perhaps. In that case, it's always the asshole on their cell phone in the _other_ car doing something stupid. Of course, you never notice the dozens of times that _you're_ the asshole, because you're trying to fire off that quick text.
> most people that run red lights don't go around
> talking about how they know better than the law.
There is large area between running a red light at 90mph without even batting an eye, and coming to an almost (but technically not complete) stop before continuing through an intersection with a stop sign.
Read ww520 comment, he mentions drivers taking cyclists seriously. This is a typical bias, and the implication is clear. He is a driver, he already takes drivers seriously, because he is one.
Whatever it means to 'take someone seriously', I am hoping he does not mean avoid running of the road.
I take all participants on the road seriously, drivers, bikers, and pedestrians. I pay special attention to bikers to slow down, to get around them, or to yield to them when making turn since they are in a slower vehicle. I myself bike from time to time.
What I don't agree is the prevalent bikers mentality of ok'ing blowing redlight and stop sign, and the hypocrisy coming from the bikers to justify doing it.
Traffic laws are there so that participants of the road can share it SAFELY.
Simply by choosing to ride a bike, a cyclist makes the roads so much safer (comparatively) for everyone else, they could cycle backwards through the streets while blindfolded and it would _still_ likely be a net benefit to the safety of others on the road (nothing claimed about the cyclist him- or her-self).
And this is before you consider the notion that the vast majority of drivers speed (speed limits are seen as the _lower_ limit by many), and many tailgate, roll through stoplights, turn and change lanes without signaling, and send text messages while doing all of the above.
The safety numbers are so overwhelmingly in favor of cycling, talking about the "endangerment of others" in this context is, quite frankly, laughable.
Let's take New York, since it wasn't too hard to find relevant data. Data can be found at:
http://www.nydmv.state.ny.us/Statistics/2010NYSAccSummary.pdf
http://www.nydmv.state.ny.us/Statistics/2010BicycleAccSummary.pdf
http://www.nydmv.state.ny.us/Statistics/2010PedestrianAccSummary.pdf
http://gruskinfoundation.org/pdfs/Pedestrian-Cyclist-Accidents_3-1.pdf
On the flip side, we have the comprehensive statistics on pedestrian/cyclist injuries compiled at Hunter University. In 2010, 927 pedestrians were treated for injuries involving cyclists. Of those, 84 received inpatient treatment, indicating a moderate or severe injury. Note that they count zero deaths.
Let's compile what we've got:
Cars : 347 deaths, 4898 moderate or severe injuries, 17,250 minor injuries
Bikes: 0 deaths, 84 moderate or severe injuries, 843 minor injuries
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/369169.stm
Cars : 1,041 deaths, 4898 moderate or severe injuries, 17,250 minor injuries
Bikes: 0 deaths, 84 moderate or severe injuries, 843 minor injuries
At that rate of comparison, cyclists would be expected to have caused 20.8 deaths, 97 moderate or severe injuries, and 345 minor injuries. If it were up to me, I'd opt for the higher number of minor injuries and greatly reduced number of deaths any day.
Please also take note that in this comparison, I was very generous to cars. We didn't add data on injuries and fatalities caused by car-on-car crashes versus bicycle-on-bicycle crashes, which I'm sure we can both agree would have come out far in favor of the cyclists. We also didn't consider non-fatal health effects of car emissions, and we rounded down fatal health effects. We also haven't even begun to talk about the year-over-year decrease in cyclist-related pedestrian fatalities in New York even though cycling participation has been increasing by double digits (as high as 26%) yearly.
And the cars _still_ came out looking bad.
On the flip side, these causalities reinforce the requirement of ALL road participants to follow the traffic laws. If the bikers stop at red and stop sign, don't you think the biker injures would go down?
http://www.metro.co.uk/news/46427-women-cyclists-more-at-risk-of-death
Daily, we put up with drivers who speed, talk on their cell phones, drive while drunk, tailgate, dart between lanes without signaling, roll through stop signs, pollute the air we breathe, burn through our limited reserves of fossil fuels, injure forty million people per year, and kill one and a half million people per year, and you're hung up on the, what, _tens_ of deaths caused by cyclists per year due to running red lights? If that?
While you're at it, why not join the crusade against the grave threat we face from children running with scissors?
Get. A. Fucking. Grip.
> Get. A. Fucking. Grip.
Nice way to live up to the angry biker image. Calm down.
> Nice way to live up to the angry biker image. Calm down.
As a cyclist who doesn't run red lights and stop signs, I haven't noticed any improvement in people's attitudes toward me when I tell them I'm a commuter cyclist. And why should I? I do it to get from A-to-B safely. I'm not some sort of cycling ambassador.
When a car behaves dangerously, that guy is an asshole. When a biker behaves dangerously, bikers are assholes. Let's hold everyone to the same standard, shall we? (relevant xkcd: https://www.xkcd.com/385/)
Sometimes this is true, but often it's not. Often, the person in the car is just jealous and angry that the cyclist breaking rules and getting away with it.
I ran a red light a few months ago, and as I did I heard a guy in a truck yelling angrily "Red light! Red light! Red light!" I ignored him because I've been through this intersection hundreds of times and it's infinitely safer for me to cautiously ride through the light and ride the next 50-100 yards on a clear road than it is to wait for the light and try to stay with the flow of traffic, which faces a simultaneous sharp curve and lane merge. These conditions are ripe for road rage, which can be fatal to cyclists.
If I ever get ticketed there for doing that, I will pay the fine and keep doing it. I don't think that will happen, though, since any time an officer is there I just give him a quick glance and he waves me through.
I do get irritated at cyclists who ride too fast on the sidewalk, though, and blow by pedestrians ringing their bells and such.
Also, cyclists could definitely apply some patience and courtesy (eg don't ride all the way to the front of a line of cars stopped at a stoplight and then take the lane as soon as the light turns green, forcing them all to wait for you.) It's not technically illegal and there aren't really any safety concerns, it's just a dick move. Have a some pity for the motorists. They are trapped in huge boxes of steel and forced to communicate with monotone honks and crude signals.
The fact of the matter is that we live in a pro-car country. California in general is a very pro-car state. The drive in diner was invented in CA. In L.A. your car is your second home and this is true in most of CA, imo.
That said, I prefer a dense city because I am not a car person. I grew up in southern CA and you were, literally, a loser if you didn't have a car. In high school, that was me - no car, just a 10 speed. I consider living in dense cities in the U.S. (did live in NYC for a few years) because I prefer the benefits of non-car transportation.
Back in SF there is the local bike coalition that is lobbying city to build more bike lanes and that imo is really good. I've been riding in this city for a long time and the new bike lanes popping up all over are definitely nice. I see guys in suits and girls in dresses riding in to work all the time; it can be done!
But SF is also compact and hilly. We cyclists compete with cars all the time for space. I am not much of a red light or stop sign runner, but the thing people in cars don't quite grep is that momentum requires energy (or gravity). In a car, it's a tiny fraction of what it is on a bike. So, if no one is around (you can approach an intersection slowed down) you can cruise through with a 99% chance that you will be ok. Lots of people do this all the time.
However, there are plenty that disregard this (people that even blow past me when I'm stopped at an intersection). But, these are people of a similar mindset (I think) of those that speed up to go around me on a small street when I legally have to right to ride where I am and at the speed I do. I can't tell you how many times I've been cut off or 'wronged' by drivers. Far more times than I have gone through a stop sign.
The other thing drivers don't understand is sense of space. They are in a protected steel cage and are 'controlling' thousands of pounds of weight at high speeds. Me, 200 lbs of flesh, rubber, and steel tubes. There are some drivers that I feel are fine and nice people - they let you go first, they smile, they don't race around you just so they can make it to that stop sign a few seconds earlier. But more than not, people in cars - from my experience - just don't give a shit. You're in they're way, wtf, I don't have to deal with this, fuck off - you're not a valuable being.
Same thing goes as a pedestrian, which is my second mode of transportation. I love to walk. When I lived in NYC, I walked that city all the time. I will always walk. And in NYC, the cars are aggressive there, but there are also so many people that there's a different feel to the whole 'critical mass' of peds at a red light with cars coming. Anyone who's lived there knows what I'm talking about.
In SF, it's a different story. We have not yet reached that tipping point in terms of pedestrian density. So when you walk across a cross walk, with the right of way, it's not uncommon to have a car zoom by you before you get out of the middle of the street. Which in my mind, is total bullshit.
Ultimately, I don't feel bad for the cars at all nor do I share their plight. My gf drives a short distance to work (she's pregnant) and when I have to use her car to drop or pick her up, I know what it's like to be on the other side and I make sure I always yield to bikes and peds. I think I'm in a small minority.
Running reds and stop signs by bikes is not the smartest thing to do. But I don't think I'll ever side with car culture here in the U.S. There are just way too many negatives from it now and most people just don't care about you. One thing I'm absolutely waiting for is cars that navigate themselves. When they arrive, then I think I'll support cars again. Until then, I'm 100% on the side of bikes and peds.