View Full Version : Utah police actually doing something to make cycling safer...
"officers are pumping the pedals, looking for law- breakers." (http://tv.ksl.com/index.php?nid=39&sid=211433)
There's a video clip from the news story also. The article kind of trails off at the end...
I wish police would do something like that around here. They're already stretched thin just trying to keep the cagers from killing each other with their multiton mangling machines of mass destruction, though.
It's a positive article, until you hit the end "Sometimes, bicyclists are just as often at fault". Ummmmmm... no statistics, no data, nothing to back up the statement? Typical reporting, always looking for the negative angle. :rolleyes: It nearly just about ruined the whole piece for me. Just nearly.
Koffee
zonatandem
06-11-05, 04:03 PM
Same rule in the state of Arizona.
Currently spending 3 months in CacheValley, riding our tandem and racing bike.
We find most UT drivers to be polite, although some are rather inattentive
Had a close call with woman trying to to turn in front of us as we were going through a green light yesterday in Logan. She never missed a beat sucking on her cigarette and giving us a quizical/surprised look. Perhaps on a tandem bicycle we are twice as "invisible" as a single cyclist???
Statistically, inattentive and distracted motorists are arguably our greatest safety problem. Some of them are as dangerous as drunk or aggressive drivers. Too many people are too busy multitasking to do a proper job of piloting a lethal weapon in public. Education and stricter accountability are the only solutions I can think of.
It's a positive article, until you hit the end "Sometimes, bicyclists are just as often at fault". Ummmmmm... no statistics, no data, nothing to back up the statement? Typical reporting, always looking for the negative angle. :rolleyes: It nearly just about ruined the whole piece for me. Just nearly.
Yeah. The good news was clouded by the typical crap journalism we see so much these days. I think they just kind of threw that story up without going to the trouble of the proofreading/revision process. Still, the basic idea is one I'd like to see more of:
1) Bike cop poses as Joe/Jane Cyclist and waits for bad driver
2) Cop calls in to other cop in car
3) Bad driver gets a costly lesson in the form of a fine (hopefully) and others will have something to think about the next time they consider doing X to a cyclist.
I hope the bike cops stay safe out there while doing this.
I like that law about minimum passing clearance too.
DieselDan
06-12-05, 06:28 PM
Yeah. The good news was clouded by the typical crap journalism we see so much these days. I think they just kind of threw that story up without going to the trouble of the proofreading/revision process. Still, the basic idea is one I'd like to see more of:
1) Bike cop poses as Joe/Jane Cyclist and waits for bad driver
2) Cop calls in to other cop in car
3) Bad driver gets a costly lesson in the form of a fine (hopefully) and others will have something to think about the next time they consider doing X to a cyclist.
I hope the bike cops stay safe out there while doing this.
I like that law about minimum passing clearance too.
Sounds like entrapment to me. I'm sick of cops interfering with life as it is. Now to have cops act like decoys on bikes to write tickets? Sounds like the cagers will go open season on cyclists then.
Persuading someone to break a law when they would not otherwise break a law is entrapment. Merely providing someone with an opportunity to break a law is not entrapment.
noisebeam
06-13-05, 02:18 PM
Persuading someone to break a law when they would not otherwise break a law is entrapment. Merely providing someone with an opportunity to break a law is not entrapment.
Exactly. It is no different than having police patrol roads in cars looking for traffic violations.
I think use of the word 'decoy' is mis-leading or not a good choice - they are not really a decoy, just a police officer riding a bike in a legal manner.
I find that much less than half of all drivers give me 3ft or more passing clearance. 2ft is faily normal, 1ft on occasion and less than 1ft at least once a week.
Al
Sounds like entrapment to me. I'm sick of cops interfering with life as it is. Now to have cops act like decoys on bikes to write tickets? Sounds like the cagers will go open season on cyclists then.
Are you for real? This is the best thing I've ever heard since they had cop decoys posing as pedestrians.
DieselDan
06-13-05, 07:01 PM
I'm just sick of the police state this country is becoming. You can't even drive the speed limit, that's now considered hiding from the police. What garbage. Now cops on bikes just to enforce more bull crap traffic laws? Oh yeah, we'll become targets for the road raged masses. They'd be better off running over the pig instead of risking a ticket for "passing too close" or "driving while black". Just to be sure, the cagers will start plowing us all over. I think NWA was right.
Beaufort, SC police must be pretty vicious.
Ivan Hanz
06-16-05, 11:42 AM
The Ohio cops should deputize me. I'll pin on the badge, throw a Remington 870 shotgun in my pannier, and go Beuford T. all over annoying drivers. Instead of a 2x4, I'll dispatch justice with a bike chain welded to a sharpened cassette.
r33tr33t
06-17-05, 09:41 AM
Sounds like entrapment to me. I'm sick of cops interfering with life as it is. Now to have cops act like decoys on bikes to write tickets? Sounds like the cagers will go open season on cyclists then.
Maybe I have anger management problems, but a dude was in a pickup a few feet behind me honking his horn on a dense urban sidestreet the other month. I honked my air zound back several times.
We had a "who can make the louder noise" contest until he drove forward until he was inches behind me. I finally pulled off to the side between some parked cars. As he passes, he shouts out his window "you guys don't own the ****in road!"
If I had a gun I would have shot him, watched the blood oozing from his head, and felt totally justified. He assaulted me with a deadly weapon (a vehicle) . . . this is akin to him pulling a gun on me in a robbery. Under the law I should be entitled to respond with lethal force.
We need more cops posing as cyclists who can respond with lethal force when assaulted with a deadly weapon.It would improve cycling safety immensely. So don't tell me about government interference . . . the government had better interfere on my behalf because one day someone with a bit less cool than me might interfere on their own behalf.
Maybe I have anger management problems, but a dude was in a pickup a few feet behind me honking his horn on a dense urban sidestreet the other month. I honked my air zound back several times.
We had a "who can make the louder noise" contest until he drove forward until he was inches behind me. I finally pulled off to the side between some parked cars. As he passes, he shouts out his window "you guys don't own the ****in road!"
If I had a gun I would have shot him, watched the blood oozing from his head, and felt totally justified. He assaulted me with a deadly weapon (a vehicle) . . . this is akin to him pulling a gun on me in a robbery. Under the law I should be entitled to respond with lethal force.
We need more cops posing as cyclists who can respond with lethal force when assaulted with a deadly weapon.It would improve cycling safety immensely. So don't tell me about government interference . . . the government had better interfere on my behalf because one day someone with a bit less cool than me might interfere on their own behalf.
Yea baby!
Sounds like entrapment to me. I'm sick of cops interfering with life as it is. Now to have cops act like decoys on bikes to write tickets? Sounds like the cagers will go open season on cyclists then.
Well, by posing as a cyclist, you're not encouraging them to commit a crime.
Moistfly
06-17-05, 09:54 PM
Some of you are very violent :o
r33tr33t
06-17-05, 10:20 PM
Damned right I'm violent if someone else is violent towards me and I'm scared ****less with nowhere to go. (For example, on a bike in traffic on an official bike route.)
It is an atrocity producing situation. To be part of an underclass (a cycler) who lives in a world where every driver believes they have the liberty to threaten you with a deadly weapon because they assume you pose no deadly response. They show no respect because they believe they can dis-respect with pleasure and impunity.
Who is insane? The victim who one day decides to refuse the barbarism of might makes right? Or the perpetrator who daily strokes the climax of an inhumane situation, knowing that society will not protect the robbed or punish the robber who denied them a safe life free from outrageous and demoralizing danger?
Shoot him? If I had the chance, I would rip that ****er's head off and piss down his throat laughing, and I would do it for civil society.
The good news was clouded by the typical crap journalism we see so much these days. I think they just kind of threw that story up without going to the trouble of the proofreading/revision process.
They have a disclaimer at the top of the page that it's straight, unedited narration from the story. TV news doesn't usually have the best writing - they tend to rely on the images to tell the story.
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