unterhausen

if it is state law, why would a cop stop you for it? I happen to think it's a bad idea, red blinky lights can be plenty bright enough. Maybe there needs to be a standard for them, but even a crappy one is visible from a fairly long distance. I find the buses with strobes to be really difficult to drive around, and the cops now have strobes that are dangerously bright when they stop someone. The other night, I passed a cop parked the wrong way at an accident, that was really hard to deal with.

Shimagnolo

Source: 49 CFR 571.108 - Standard No. 108; Lamps, reflective devices, and associated equipment. | LII / Legal Information Institute

With every motorized vehicle on the road required to have *red* taillamps, using a different color is just introducing dangerous confusion.

Wanderer

I'm a Police Commissioner, and see it at all of our meetings. Even a warning ticket gives them a legal right to stop you and ask questions, and look in your car.

FBinNY 

A few minor points.

1- this is a thread about a proposed state law to mandate white rear lights for bikes.
2- there's no need for a local cop to write a citation for CFR violations, since state laws already regulate bicycles.
3- you cite broken tail light (broken lens. white showing) viloations and claim tickets are frequently issued for this. Are you saying for cars or bicycles?.

I don't know about other states, but around here cops are so happy to see a bicycle lit well enough to be seen at night, that they don't care how it's lit. In the real world, the real safety implications trump any concern about a small possibility of a police stop (for bicycles).

squirtdad

out of curiosity...where? Sounds like a local regulation.

spare_wheel

Or it could be a signal that motorists should wake up and pay attention.

Boo hoo.

squirtdad

OT but for those not old enough to ever have used a darkroom,

Film development requires total darkness as film (negatives) is super sensitive.

The actual exposing and developing and fixing of the print could be done under a "red" light but many of those lights were not red as much as a really dark yellow.

Tri-x Rules

genec

Agreed... used to do all the film work (transfer of film from can to develop canister) in a dark bag, and by feel. Then all the chemistry was poured through light locks. Once the film was developed, then it was time to make prints... and indeed the light was an off color yellow, almost orange color.

Gawd, I can almost smell the hypo... whew.

Wanderer

I see it all the time...... cops picking which reg they want to write the ticket for ---- they use the one that is advantageous to them

FBinNY 

You and I live in very different places. IME cops write straightforward citations for the most obvious infraction. In most cases you can talk the cop down a bit, ie. a speeding ticket for a lower speed, which might result in a smaller fine. If you search the traffic court data bases, I'll bet you'll find a disproportionate number of speeding citations for speeds 1mph lower than the cut, like 64 in 55, or 44 in 35 etc. That can't be coincidence, and reflects a "nice guy" attitude on the part of the person writing the citation.

The reference to a cop writing the ticket for "what is advantageous to them" makes no sense since cops aren't on commission and don't gain advantage based on the nature of the citations (yes, there are quotas, though it's denied or called something more acceptable).

However until fairly recently citations issued to bicyclists for ANY infraction were very rare. Even today, they're still rare in most places, though not as rare, and improper lighting is at the rare end of that spectrum.

So, as I said, we live in very different places, and what you "see all the time" I see rarely, even very rarely.

lostarchitect 

T-Max 4-Evah!

KD5NRH

Some color-safe (and VC-paper-safe) ones were painfully dim yellow/brown, (exact shade depends on the specific film or paper being processed) but BW-only ones could actually be a surprisingly bright pure red. Still dim compared to anything you'd want to read in, but brighter than I would have expected considering the sensitivity of the paper.

For portraits, ok. For landscape and architecture, Delta Pro. Neopan for 120 architecture.

I-Like-To-Bike

A Police Commissioner who cites Federal CFR and DOT rules as the basis for issuing local traffic tickets? Hmmm, sounds pretty strange to me. What kind of "meetings" is this subject always discussed? Are you the Police Commissioner of North Aurora, IL?

Wanderer

Most tickets are issued listing the infraction against CFR.

I-Like-To-Bike

The Code of Federal Regulations? What municipality does that?

jputnam

Possibly. There are something over 200 million currently-licensed drivers in the U.S., however, all of whom have been trained that a white light marks the front of an oncoming vehicle.

If you propose to change that, what's your proposal for retraining the installed user base?

What budget is available to retrain and re-test every driver in the country?

squirtdad

As to idea proposed....dumb, really dumb.

Red in back, white in front. Anything else is going to cause confusion.


Visibility is critical to safety IMHO.

Active: visibility Blinking white up front and red in back at all times. Add a second steady white in the front to see the road.

Passive: for night time, lots of reflective material. add some to moving parts also. For daytime


Just look at cyclists on the road and you can observe this. My drive in today (gray skies 8 am pt) it was easy to see cyclists with lights or fluorescent clothing. Hard to see guys in black cycling tights and darkish tops

genec

That's what I do... I look at what caught my eye... and then try to follow suit with my gear. Interesting flash patterns and really bright lights seem to be the most observable... The PB superflash pattern just stands out. The other thing I have noticed... a high/low pattern. A blinkie on the helmet and one down low... it just says cyclist.

CliffordK

People learn to observe changes quickly.

20 or 30 years ago, the rear bike lights were steady red.
Then the LED blinkies came out, and were quickly adopted by the cycling community as they just seemed to get better visibility, and battery life increased substantially. Perhaps it took some time for all cyclists to adopt the new lights, but car drivers adapted without substantial "training".

About the same time, the Cyclops lights showed up on cars... No special training needed.

I wonder what kind of focus group this politician had. Perhaps someone that was in a traffic accident.

It doesn't appear to have support of the cyclists that will be most impacted. Was it even proposed on a cycling website?

spare_wheel

Call me selfish but when it comes to the proverbial space cadet motorist, I *prefer* confusion and concern. I think the idea of being able to quickly distinguish cars from bikes at a distance based on tail light color would be useful. And finally, there is little question that flashing white lights are more visible (and annoying/concerning) than red lights.

unterhausen

a cop is not going to stop you for something required under state law, that's ridiculous. I'm sure that if this silly law is implemented somewhere they will know about it. And if they don't, that will change quickly. They might stop you for things that violate DOT standards, that's an entirely different matter, and I agree that it happens all the time. For example, the guys that have ground effect lights under their cars.

As far as where white strobe lights are used on school buses, apparently it is widespread One article I found said 42 of 50 states responded to a request for information about strobe usage. 17 states require their use, the other 25 responding states said they were allowed but not required.

prathmann

'Concern' is good, but I disagree about 'confusion' since that would be likely to result in rash and unpredictable actions by the motorist. Such as an abrupt swerve if he thinks he's about to have a head-on collision with an oncoming vehicle/bicycle and that swerve takes out another cyclist or motorist. The current system in the US where most cyclists (at least those with lights) use a red flashing tail light permits easy distinction between bikes and motor vehicles while also making it easy to distinguish between cyclists who are approaching vs. those who are going away.

But, as I stated earlier, this is an initial proposal by a new state assemblyman and has not gone through committee hearings or discussions yet. It is highly unlikely to proceed further without substantial changes - most likely either being killed entirely or modifying it to specify that a red rear light (prob. either steady or flashing) is required in addition to the current red reflector.

CliffordK

How about red, white, and blue tri-color strobe?

Then cars will give you lots of clearance!!!!

spare_wheel

Except that many cyclists keep their lights on solid.

steve0257

What effect would requiring flashing lights have on dynamo lighting? As far as I know, dynamo powered lights don't blink.