I regularly see more motorists run red lights in a given day than I have seen cyclists run red lights in a decade. Cycling is sufficiently common in my area to state outright that, proportionally speaking, more motorists run red lights than cyclists.

The same thing can be said for cyclists weaving in and out of traffic, and for good reason: if traffic is moving, it's a good way to kill yourself; if traffic is not moving, there is no need for it. (There is usually enough space on the right to pass. If there isn't enough space on the right to pass, it is unsafe.)

I have seen more motorists barrel the wrong way down a one way street, in reverse, than I have seen cyclists riding down one way streets the wrong way. Proportionally speaking, more cyclists may be breaking the law. In terms of safety, what motorists are doing is far more dangerous.

As for stop signs: other cyclists tend to get the hint when I stop at them on my bike. :) The ones who don't stop tend to do the same as motorists, by doing a "rolling stop". Doing anything less would be a good way to get killed.

So no, I don't agree that cyclists do not follow traffic laws as a general rule. In many cases, motorists are worse. I am not going to pretend that cyclists are better for altruistic reasons. The reality is that cyclists are much more vulnerable than motorists. Cars are made to handle collisions, bikes are not. Motorists pay more attention to cars than bikes, in the most part because other cars are more dangerous to them.

Drivers generally don't follow traffic laws. They text on their phone while they drive. They routinely go over the speed limit. They go through red lights. They go into or park in bike lanes. They tailgate other drivers. They don't signal before turning or changing lanes.

Drivers generally follow the rules. It's considered bad form when they don't, and they're occasionally ticketed. This doesn't apply to bikers. No one even expects them to follow the rules.

I'm not anti-bike. I bike a bit and I got hit by a car last year. Some crackhead turned left across the opposite lane right into me.

I'm just reporting what I see -- bikers do not generally follow the rules, and I find this interesting. Maybe they're being rational. Or maybe they're not. Either way it's interesting.

I know more people who have gotten tickets for running stop signs on their bikes than in cars (even though getting hit by a car at 10mph is much more dangerous to a pedestrian than a bike!). Hopefully Newsom listens to reason and gives up veto-ing commense sense traffic laws next cycle

> Drivers generally follow the rules.

No, they don't. They break the rules all the goddamn time. Have you ever been on an American freeway? Most people are going above the speed limit, myself included.

Do you think most drivers give the legally required amount of space in front of their car while driving, especially on the freeway? It's not even close. Do people signal for the legally required amount of time before changing lanes? Again, not close for most drivers.

> I'm just reporting what I see

What you're actually experiencing is that you implicitly accept the status quo of certain rules being ignored for driving, because driving itself is more common (both for you and in general). But biking is different, it's more obscure, so the rule breaking stands out more.

This is very typical of cultures anywhere that driving is more common than biking, which is...well, most places really.

I bike for 90% of my traveling. The examples you give for when cars break the rules vs what bikes do is telling. Yes, everyone breaks the rules, but cars (mostly) do it in safe and predictable manners. Most urban cyclists(including me tbh) break rules in very unsafe ways. Bikes routinely completely ignore stop signs even when there are cars waiting. The ignore red lights which cars never do. They swerve around in traffic, they ride on the sidewalk. Many refuse to use lights when biking at night. Urban biking behavior in the US is on average much more reckless than driving behavior.

Cars are more dangerous due to size and speed but if we’re just talking about who acts more recklessly and ignores more rules it’s easily bikes, at least in Chicago.

> Yes, everyone breaks the rules, but cars (mostly) do it in safe and predictable manners.

???

How is texting while driving safe? How is going over the speed limit safe? How is driving too close to other cars to stop in time safe?

Going over the speed limit is not even close to as reckless as completely ignoring stoplights which I see bikes do every day. I see bikers texting weekly even though you need 2 hands to confidently steer a bicycle. Drivers texting is dangerous because theyre controlling heavy machinery, but at least you only need one hand to steer a car in an emergency. A significant portion of bicyclists seem to have a death wish which I can only say for maybe 10% of drivers at most.

> Going over the speed limit is not even close to as reckless as completely ignoring stoplights which I see bikes do every day.

True, it's not even close because going over the speed limit in a car is a lot more dangerous to others.

Blowing through stoplights on a bike is very stupid, of course, but 99% of the danger is directed towards the cyclist themselves, at least.

Note that the Idaho stop, though, is quite safe.

I feel like this is personal for you and you can't discuss it objectively.

Drivers are...not great. But as a general rule they follow the laws (albeit with frequent lapses). Cyclists do not follow the rules to the point where no one expects them to. It's genuinely weird for me to imagine a cyclist stopping at a stop sign.

Well, if you genuinely find it interesting, I can explain why they don't:

1. Cyclists live and die by inertia. Getting up to speed on a bike requires a lot of effort and every application of brakes erases that spent effort, which feels really bad.

In a car, it doesn't matter — you stop and accelerate with exactly the same trivial effort of pressing a pedal.

So all the grandstanding that cars stop at stop signs (since when, but ok), and cyclists don't is like bragging that you beat a disabled person in a 100m sprint. Good job, I guess.

2. Stop signs and traffic lights are made for cars, because of their speed, how dangerous they are, and how bad their visibility is. Cyclists are like pedestrians in that they do not need traffic lights, they can navigate just fine with just body language.

Telling whether running a red light would be safe in a car is essentially impossible, you're going too fast and can't see much, can't hear anything either. But on a bike you have perfect visibility, there's no box of metal all around you. You can hear quite well too.

Stop signs are an even better example. Literally the only reason for their use instead of yield signs is that the visibility at the intersection is bad enough that you need to stop to be able to yield. But that is only the case because your visibility is so bad in the first place.

Stop signs literally never make sense for bikes — there's no "hood", so your head is basically where the vehicle starts and you can lean forward to make that literally true if really needed, and you've got perfect visibility all around, no blind spots.

Hence why in a lot of places cyclists can legally treat red lights like stop signs and stop signs like yield signs.

Cars don't follow traffic laws. Cars roll through stop signs and run red lights. Cars speed and weave through traffic. They go the wrong way down one-way streets. Since cars are much bigger, this is much more dangerous.

Yet cyclists rarely kill others. Car drivers on the other hand are one of the most prolific unnatural causes of death.

That seems irrelevant, we’re talking about cars.

Also, of course bikers don’t follow car rules. Those rules are nonsensical for cyclists.

In the US, bikes == cars. They are required to follow the same rules. I don’t find them nonsensical.

I used to agree with that (as a pedestrian and driver only), but as I've started cycling, I've begun to realize that many rules of the road, intended for cars, just don't make much sense for bicycles.

Like what? I hear people claim that not stopping at STOP sign is somehow making it safer than stopping but when asked about the mechanism of the safety in such a maneuver they either disappear or proclaim that Idaho where this is allowed is in top half of safest states for cyclists so it must work somehow.

I cycle myself and see no rules that somehow don't make sense for bikes. In fact, since bikes are much less maneuverable and much more vulnerable, they need to obey all the rules that are there to protect the cars from other cars with more vigilance than cars.

I live in California so YMMV depending on the laws where you live and the temperament of drivers.

If I do a "proper" stop at a stop sign (0mph, place foot on ground, fortunately I don't clip in), cars will see me stopping and try to blast thru the stop sign when it isn't their turn. So I end up stopping while the first car goes thru the intersection, and while I'm getting resituated on the pedals a second car enters instead of waiting their turn, making my situation more dangerous.

One nice law we have in California is that the "walk" sign applies to pedestrians and bikes. This gives me a chance to assert myself in the intersection before the car across from me tries to sneak in a left turn. It also protects me from cars trying to turn across the bike lane.

You described cars violating rules, but what is your remedy for that, not to stop? How is it going to help with the cars blowing their stops?

Yes, slow down to 2-5 mph but not coming to a complete stops solves this problem. I usually try to time it so that I slow down alongside a car and we can run the stop sign at the same speed.

If you assert your right to use the road, cars won't try to take advantage of your size/acceleration as much, especially if you have another car run interference for you.

YMMV if you live somewhere where it's common for cars to actually stop at a stop sign.

This sounds like a survivorship bias, you imagine that people who blow stops won't do that if you don't stop but, people who did the same on a bike and were t-boned by a car might not be in a good condition to post about their experience anymore.

Anyways, even if you are 100% right and not stopping at stop on a bike will prevent people blowing stop completely (and people who have the right of way will also yield to your bike because they will see you 100%) how is it safer than to stop and proceed when there is no traffic across?

>how is it safer than to stop and proceed when there is no traffic across?

Generally, on a bike you want to be predictable. If you do something weird, like not going when it's your turn, you're increasing your risk. And in many situations if you wait for there to be no cars at a stop sign, you're going to end up holding up cars behind you and be on the receiving end of road rage, or drivers behaving recklessly to get around you. Plus you may be waiting literally hours for all the traffic to dissipate, and I prefer to be home before sunset because riding at night introduces other safety issues.

Anecdotally I've never felt at risk of being t-boned when doing an Idaho stop, but it happens regularly when I do a complete stop (in part because it's unpredictable - drivers don't come to a complete stop at the line so they misbehave and don't know how to respond when they see a cyclist stop).

Beyond my anecdata, there's plenty of more rigorous studies showing the benefits of the Idaho stop.

>Generally, on a bike you want to be predictable. If you do something weird, like not going when it's your turn, you're increasing your risk.

Absolutely agree. As same as going when it's not your turn. But, first and foremost, you should not be going across a moving vehicle. Even another bike. Just falling off your bike can cause pretty serious trauma. Why do this?

>Plus you may be waiting literally hours for all the traffic to dissipate, and I prefer to be home before sunset because riding at night introduces other safety issues.

I don't know where in California you live that nobody stops at the stop signs, but I lived in LA and cars generally stop at those. You literally need to wait few seconds for the cars to to stop and proceed in most cities in the US.

>Anecdotally I've never felt at risk of being t-boned when doing an Idaho stop, but it happens regularly when I do a complete stop (in part because it's unpredictable - drivers don't come to a complete stop at the line so they misbehave and don't know how to respond when they see a cyclist stop).

I know that feeling. Like people riding against traffic feel safer because they see approaching cars yet regularly get t-boned by the cars not expecting anything coming at them against traffic.

>Beyond my anecdata, there's plenty of more rigorous studies showing the benefits of the Idaho stop

Like what? I tried to search again and found this [1] apparently Idaho is not even in top half of the states in cyclist safety.

1. https://bikeleague.org/bfa/states/state-report-cards/

>I don't know where in California you live that nobody stops at the stop signs, but I lived in LA and cars generally stop at those

When did you live in LA? Especially coming out of COVID lockdowns, what you're saying is not consistent with my daily experience. It's relatively uncommon for cars to actually stop (to the point that when Waymo initially rolled out in LA, people would get mad and honk at them for stopping!)

I tried to keep a count on my commute today. I think I saw 3 cars come to a complete stop (and in each case it was because someone was already in the intersection). On the flip side, dozens of cars blew through stop signs (and red lights!). It may get garbled by Youtube compression, but here's a pretty representative clip of 3 drivers running a stop sign back-to-back-to-back: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6z6fFnDzfv8

I lived in West LA and Santa Monica. And, as your clip shows, drivers will blow stop signs regardless if there is a bicycle or not. Imagine you tried to enter that intersection from the cross street on a bike without stopping, obscured by the fence? Even at that speed you'd could receive some heavy damage.

Behavior by cyclists certainly has a bias towards survivorship. Every other vehicle on the road represents a potentially lethal threat at any time.

Inadequate dedicated infrastructure for cyclists leads to behavior like "Idaho stops" that look counterintuitive to drivers, but improves safety for cyclists at intersections.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idaho_stop

You did not read the thread did you? I have asked how is this supposed to improve safety, this is what is this thread about.

Yes, it absolutely helps, because when the cyclist doesn't stop, the driver doesn't get as impatient, and won't try to get around and blow by the cyclist.

I've seen people blowing stops with zero bikes stopped at the intersection, people blow stops regardless if there is a bike present and its state of motion. With bikes not being able to break as fast as cars and not having side airbags you might want to consider what's going to happen when you enter the intersection in front of such a driver before finding that empirically.

Idaho stops are legal for cyclists in some form in a dozen states.

There are tons of cycling specific laws that are separate or different from cars.

I didn't say anything about safety; I said "don't make much sense".

Fully stopping at a stop sign just isn't necessary for bicycles. And forcing bicycles to stop can create inefficient or even unsafe situations. It takes a bit longer for a bicycle to stop and start again than for a car, and requiring cyclists to fully stop will absolutely destroy throughput at a stop sign. On top of that, cars lining up behind bicycles at a stop sign can get impatient and try to go around the cyclist (I've seen this happen); this actually is a safety issue.

(Now, I've seen cyclists blow through stop signs and traffic lights without even slowing down. I'm not saying that's ok.)

> In fact, since bikes are much less maneuverable and much more vulnerable, they need to obey all the rules that are there to protect the cars from other cars with more vigilance than cars.

I don't think this statement is obviously true. Cars and bicycles are very different types of vehicles, and there's no reason to believe that every car-related safety rule has the same safety-related effect when applied to a bicycle.

No road rule is necessary for anyone, all of them are for safety only.

>It takes a bit longer for a bicycle to stop and start again than for a car, and requiring cyclists to fully stop will absolutely destroy throughput at a stop sign.

Having cyclist colliding with each other or other cars in the intersection will improve throughput? Do you ride a bike or drive at all? Stop signs are not just some Big Government ploy to annoy you. Stop signs allow two traffic streams to cross each other without collisions. Without stop sings and people stopping at them you would get cars colliding all the time.

In Washington State, they're required to follow most car rules when in a lane, but not all (i.e. all stop signs are yield for cyclists). They also have a set of rules allowing for sidewalk usage when mounted; when dismounted, they follow pedestrian rules (obviously).

It's weird to have the same rules when there are several orders of magnitude difference in manueverability, maximum damage possible, and visibility between the two modes. Imagine if pedestrians had to follow all the same rules as cars. Or everyone in an electric wheelchair. It wouldn't make sense.

I think the point is they have to follow the rules of the road because they are allowed in the road. Pedestrians, wheelchairs, etc can go on the sidewalk and be safe from traffic (one hopes).

Though it depends on the state and in my experience there are typically some differences, such as bikes are required to share the lane.

Everyone using the road following the same set of rules makes their actions more predictable and thus safer (in theory)

Bikes are largely supposed to follow the same rules, with a handful of exceptions.

We’re talking about bike lanes, it seemed completely relevant to me?

How is that when car drivers decide the rules are nonsensical it's bad, but when bicycle drivers decide the rules (that, please note, apply to everyone on the street, car or not), it's somehow A-ok?

How come that when people handling uranium decide the rules are nonsensical it's bad, but when people handling bananas decide the rules (that, please note, apply to everyone with radioactive materials), it's somehow A-ok?

When I go to buy banana I always bring my Geiger counter. I also aways get kicked out of the supermarket, I wonder what they're trying to cover up...

Hmm well, we have some "smart traffic lights" where I live that are always red unless a vehicle goes over a metal detecting loop under the road in front of them. Guess how well that works for any vehicle that's not a car.

Rules of the road are generally designed in the same way — for cars. Nobody cares about carving out obvious exceptions for bikes, like the Idaho stop.

Seems like something else worth working on.

You should see scooterists then. Especially those on the scooter sharing networks.

First, in many states cyclists explicitly do not have to stop at stop signs, it’s called an “Idaho stop” and it’s legal in my state. This is much safer for cyclists since most crashes occur in intersections and allowing cyclists to move thru faster is much much safer.

You’re also assuming equity of consequence. Someone not obeying the law on a bike is significantly different than not obeying the law when operating a multi-ton vehicle.

Finally, every single group of people breaks the law. There is no demographic of reasonable size that does not break the law. This argument is silly and pointless. What is your goal with pointing this out? Literally everyone breaks the law, this grandstanding is stupid.

Have you tried driving the speed limit recently? You know, the maximum speed you are legally allowed to drive? Do you always come to a full stop at every stop sign?

As a general rule, the the frequency illusion[1] and the negativity bias[2] are a thing and combined make shallow, single-datapoint arguments like yours instantly invalid.

[1]: "The frequency illusion is a cognitive bias in which a person notices a specific concept, word, or product more frequently after recently becoming aware of it."

[2]: "The negativity bias, is a cognitive bias that human cognition is relatively more affected by a negative affect than an equally potent positive affect."