Hit by car, was I in the right?

[Helmet Head]

These confuse the hell out of everybody. The fact that people need to be taught these signals from a manual means that most drivers don't know what they mean. I just point the direction I'm going. May not be legal, but certainly seems to be more effective.
Oh, please. The left turn and slow/brake sign are intuitively obvious. The only non-intuitive one is the right signal with the left arm, so, you use your right arm to signal right.

By the way, the slow/stop arm signal is great for getting tailgaters to back off.

[genec]

I have a feeling the motorist was frustrated by a "slow biker" in front and was attempting to pass the cyclist. Since there was no signal given (or at least a proper signal) the motorist had no idea (even if they were paying attention) of the cyclist's intent.

I have seen motorists choose to pass cyclists in a similar manner, using very poor judgement, (and excessive power) even though the cyclist was properly destination positioned.

The motorist may have been using the logic of "might makes right" and assumed they would just "zip" right past the cyclist.

Somehow some unthinking motorists have this notion that "bikes must get out of the way" in spite of a cyclist being properly destination positioned just as an auto might be in similar circumstances.

[nova]

Oh, please. The left turn and slow/brake sign are intuitively obvious. The only non-intuitive one is the right signal with the left arm, so, you use your right arm to signal right.

By the way, the slow/stop arm signal is great for getting tailgaters to back off.

Its not intuitivly obvious left turn is right arm for right turn is but slow/stop and left arm up for right turn is not obvious by any means.

Now if your a driver and happened to get the question right on your writen test youll always remember it infact youll remember any of them. I quit useing that slow signal for the most part when i damn near rolled out in to the path of a car. Its next to useless on a bike when aproaching a stop. Its pretty obvious that your going to stop and all it serve to do is limit your ability to handle your bike and to stop your bike.

Not saying its not useful i use it often when riding and allowign some one to pass me closer than normal. I watch and make sure they know what im trying to get accross then let them pass.

[recursive]

Oh, please. The left turn and slow/brake sign are intuitively obvious. The only non-intuitive one is the right signal with the left arm, so, you use your right arm to signal right.

By the way, the slow/stop arm signal is great for getting tailgaters to back off.

Oh, thank you.

Congratulations. You have just described the same set of signals that I did.

[roughrider504]

roughrider504, at 14, you know more about bikes than most of the old farts in my circles. I bow down. 'Twould be a shame if you stopped biking. Ride on!
Why thank you bbonnn :) I am only taking a break for about a week, while i make a frame up build replacement for the Raleigh. How many 14 year olds can do that alone? ;) That bike just scares me now :o But I will keep it to remember.

Ok to sum up what happened, well what I remembered. The camaro was passing me and I didnt not see or hear it, and turned into its path. If he would of just stayed in the correct lane, he wouldnt of hit me. :mad:

[Helmet Head]

These confuse the hell out of everybody. The fact that people need to be taught these signals from a manual means that most drivers don't know what they mean. I just point the direction I'm going. May not be legal, but certainly seems to be more effective.

Oh, please. The left turn and slow/brake sign are intuitively obvious. The only non-intuitive one is the right signal with the left arm, so, you use your right arm to signal right.

By the way, the slow/stop arm signal is great for getting tailgaters to back off.

Oh, thank you.

Congratulations. You have just described the same set of signals that I did.

So, what is your position?


These signals "confuse the hell out of everybody"
The left and stop signals are intuitively obvious, and so is the right signal if you use the right arm.

[nova]

Why thank you bbonnn :) I am only taking a break for about a week, while i make a frame up build replacement for the Raleigh. How many 14 year olds can do that alone? ;) That bike just scares me now :o But I will keep it to remember.

Ok to sum up what happened, well what I remembered. The camaro was passing me and I didnt not see or hear it, and turned into its path. If he would of just stayed in the correct lane, he wouldnt of hit me. :mad:


Hehehe me for one well im 34 almost 35 now but i was doing that sort of thing from the time i was 10 or 11 when you dont got cash to spend to have bikes built or buy new ones you make do.

One thing you might enjoy if you got the off road hills to do it is hill crawling. Basically find your selg the smallest front sprocket you can and the biggest rear you can find then go out in the woods and find the biggest steepest beast of a hill you can and climb that sucker. We called it hill crawling cause you just crawled up the hill at a very slow speed. It was loads of fun. I had a perfect crawler 32 fron 32 rear gearing on a old murry mtb single peice crank replaced the front forks with bmx forks and bmx rim. Had short cranks from some little 16 inch bike so i wouldnt hit the ground.

My friends use to joke that I could climb up the side of a building on that junker. With full sized forks and front rim i would climb up the cliff down the road from me useing the rock ledges. Basicallyly id pull the front wheel up and to the side towards the clif then the back ride a foot or 2 so i could make the next one.

On the other side of the tracks theres a hill that is maybe 10 degrees from being strait up Unclimbable even with the small front forks and rims unless you had ropes to keep you from floping over. I dont recomend trying it its dangerous as all hell. But big long steep hills that theres realy no way to climb them normaly can be tremendous fun.

[recursive]

So, what is your position?


These signals "confuse the hell out of everybody"
The left and stop signals are intuitively obvious, and so is the right signal if you use the right arm.


False dichotomy. The right signal is one of the signals.

[Helmet Head]

Fine, recursive, please let us know which of "these signals confuse the hell out of everybody".

a) the left signal
b) the right signal with the left arm
c) the stop signal
d) all of them

[recursive]

Fine, recursive, please let us know which of "these signals confuse the hell out of everybody".

a) the left signal
b) the right signal with the left arm
c) the stop signal
d) all of them

I would suspect b) mostly.

[steveknight]

I know I took half of his bumper clean off. A Green camaro, customised.

My raleigh is 20-30 steel, and I will pick up a used frame from Plan B in new orleans for now.

good job on his car (G) I was passing a parked car when this fool in a freshly painted 57 chevy right hooks me. I stoped before I got hit but I almost wish I could have taken out that paint job.

[genec]

What makes the most sense is to just point, in a simple gesture with your arm fully extended, to the direction you want to go.

To show "stop or slow" simply open your left hand facing back and with your left arm down low and wide enough out to be seen. Imagine the same gesture you would make to signal "stop" to someone walking right at you... the simple open hand facing them. Now imagine that open hand, using your left hand and open and held down, as if to gesture stop to someone behind you.

It's that easy.

[flipped4bikes]

I was in a Defensive Driving course recently. The instructor was getting peppered with questions about traffic situations. What came up a lot was incidents involving turning vehicles. As long as the driver making the turn is in the proper lane, if a driver hits a vehicle ahead of him making a turn (not a u-turn), he is at fault. Even if the turning vehicle is signalling a left turn, and goes right instead.

Bottom line, a driver is required to have reasonable control of his vehicle at all times. Period.

The driver who hit you is at fault. Period.

[maximusvt]

So the driver was not trying to turn left, he was trying to pass you, but when he saw that you were turning he kept going left to try to avoid you and in doing so crossed the opposite curb, crossed the road on your left and hit you from the side?

That's what it looks like from your diagram but I know it's hard to reconstruct what happened at an accident that you were involved in. But I don't think it's cut-and-dry enough to say that the driver is at fault for sure. It sounded like there's a good chance you weren't aware of him coming up on your left, and you should have been. If he were going to pass you on the left, that's his right (at least where I live, it's legal to cross a double yellow line to pass a vehicle) and since you didn't signal, he couldn't have known you were going to turn left.

But hell, you're young and you're still alive, and now you know you've gotta be more aware when it comes to riding on the road because cars sure won't look out for you. Hope you're not too intimidated to get back out there.

[slowandsteady]

For a right turn, I use the legal signal with my left hand, and also point/gesture with my index finger to the right. I figure it is a good compromise between being legal and intuitive enough that most people will understand what I am trying to do.

[jfmckenna]

The road is about a mile long, flat. I looked, I made very sure there was no car close, which I always do. I did not see the camaro.

When the horn first sounded, and the tires locked up, the car was still not close to me. That shows the speed it was going. It took me out when I was on the street I was turning onto.

The scary part is, I do now own a helmet now, and I could of been easily killed. Scares me.
My guess is that if the guy driving had enough time to hit the horn then he could have probably avoided hitting you. Hitting the horn is the equlivant of yelling, "Get off the road ***hole".

Did I miss something or did this guy hit and run? Or did he stop and you all talked about it and went on? What do your parents/gardians think of all this. This really ought to be reported to the police regardless.

I hope you don't get discouraged from riding bikes from this incedent...

[joejack951]

That's what it looks like from your diagram but I know it's hard to reconstruct what happened at an accident that you were involved in. But I don't think it's cut-and-dry enough to say that the driver is at fault for sure. It sounded like there's a good chance you weren't aware of him coming up on your left, and you should have been. If he were going to pass you on the left, that's his right (at least where I live, it's legal to cross a double yellow line to pass a vehicle) and since you didn't signal, he couldn't have known you were going to turn left.

It may be legal to cross a double yellow to pass but it is illegal to pass someone through an intersection on the opposite side of the road (not that this discourages anyone from doing it). The OP could be considered not at fault regardless of his actions based simply on this law.

Delaware Vehicle Code (should be the same as UVC):Further limitations on driving to left of center of roadway.

(a) No vehicle shall be driven on the left side of the roadway under the following conditions:

(1) When approaching or upon a curve or the crest of a grade in the highway where the driver's view is obstructed within such distance as to create a hazard in the event another vehicle might approach from the opposite direction;

(2) When approaching within 100 feet of or traversing any intersection or railroad grade crossing, unless otherwise indicated by official traffic-control devices;

(3) When the view is obstructed upon approaching within 100 feet of any bridge, viaduct or tunnel.

[roughrider504]

Did I miss something or did this guy hit and run? Or did he stop and you all talked about it and went on? What do your parents/gardians think of all this. This really ought to be reported to the police regardless.

I hope you don't get discouraged from riding bikes from this incedent...

He stopped and got out of his car and just looked at me lying on the ground. No, "let me help you up". At this point I was mad. I jumped up and saw my bike was rideable, and got on it and left. Even though blood was streaming down my arm and leg, I made it home.

My parents said i should of gotten the information. They said also for me not to ride at the busy times [12:00 + 4-5:00.] I was hit a 4:30pm.

And why report to the police, there not going to do anything. They have murders to investigate. "Hey Bob, this kid got hit by a car, what should we do? Give him a cookie Bob."

[recursive]

And why report to the police, there not going to do anything. They have murders to investigate. "Hey Bob, this kid got hit by a car, what should we do? Give him a cookie Bob."
Don't you want a cookie? Seriously though, there are lots of cases (I've done it) of people not making police reports because they thought nothing would happen, only to find out later, that if only they'd made the report, they would have recourse. If the worst case is that nothing happens, I would say make the report.

[Old Dirt Hill]

The more i think about it, the more it becomes like this. I cant remember the impact or anything, and that is a good thing. It seems that he was passing me, in my one blindspot by my shoulder, and I didnt see him and turned. His front tires slid [I guess] and couldnt avoid me. If he would of given me a couple seconds to turn, he wouldnt of hit me. Where is he going, a fire? :rolleyes: Red:me Green:camaro
http://img113.imageshack.us/img113/9158/hitli1.png (http://imageshack.us)
I'm sorry, but I'm completely confused by this diagram. I still have no idea what really happened.

Glad to hear you're alright.

[roughrider504]

http://img473.imageshack.us/img473/3379/crashbk7.png (http://imageshack.us)

I redid it to the best of my memory allowed. I am having a hard time remembering it all.

[maximusvt]

It may be legal to cross a double yellow to pass but it is illegal to pass someone through an intersection on the opposite side of the road (not that this discourages anyone from doing it).
You're right, I forgot about that.

[Helmet Head]

In the latest diagram it appears you did not start moving left until you were in the intersection. Until then, you were riding along the right edge. Is that correct?

Is it possible that it appeared to the Camaro driver that you were going straight, and he was planning on passing you on the left, when, suddenly (perhaps after a moment or two where he was distracted and did not notice you starting to merge left right away), you were in front of him turning left across his path?
I can see why, then, he would honk and hit the brakes, and steer left to try to avoid you, including entering the oncoming lane. When you continued turning left, in his path, all he could do was continue turning left too.

[Helmet Head]

When you heard the honking and tires screeching, did you slow down and/or alter your course at all in order to avoid a collision?

[nova]

In the latest diagram it appears you did not start moving left until you were in the intersection. Until then, you were riding along the right edge. Is that correct?

Is it possible that it appeared to the Camaro driver that you were going straight, and he was planning on passing you on the left, when, suddenly (perhaps after a moment or two where he was distracted and did not notice you starting to merge left right away), you were in front of him turning left across his path?
I can see why, then, he would honk and hit the brakes, and steer left to try to avoid you, including entering the oncoming lane. When you continued turning left, in his path, all he could do was continue turning left too.


Sheesh man its a hand drawn diagram. Its not like this is a police reconstruction with experts determining the travel of the vehicals involved. Its called not to scale not 100% accurate and to best of memory.

[Helmet Head]

Not to scale is one thing. But not showing any movement left from the right side for a left turn until clearly in the intersection is another. And it's important to clarify whether that's what actually happened, because if it is, that's way, way too late.

Also, if he's not sure whether he started merging left before or in the intersection, that indicates he does not recognize the importance/value of merging left well before the intersection, and presents an opportunity to explain why. But why do that before we establish this is the case?

[roughrider504]

I was in the middle of the lane. Sorry my paint skills are real bad.