Advocacy & Safety - Hit by Car?

:eek:Tired of being treated like when a cycalist gets hit its no different than a dog or rabbit. St.louis is starting a program and wants to expand to other cities.
A bike that has been painted white and beat up is being placed at locations were cars have struck cycalists, St.louis, Minn, and DC are going to try and do a mass put out in the spring
http://www.pbase.com/terbo/brokenbikes
Brokenbikesbrokenlives@hotmail.com

Great idea! However, it may be a difficult commute for me trying to get around all of the white bikes...

This project has made more impact with 15 bikes than with all the share the road signs u can throw, dont have to cover every accident site maybe just a few here a few there whatever, allways a smart ass out there

Haha,

You are right, this would probably be very effective, much more than any stickers or road signs. Maybe white for hits and black for deaths. Motorists need sobering signs of how dangerous they really are.

all im saying is i did fifteen bikes put them up on a sunday night, next day all every one was talking about. and its been spreading ive gotten letters from alaska to NY. 15 bikes got me 10minutes of covarge on the local news and at 2dollars a bike what the hell cant beat that price
brokenbikesbrokenlives@hotmail.com if any one would like to spread the word that be great.

We did something similar here with one cyclist who was very involved with the cycling community.

The local environmental/active living group put a bike up near the accident where a cyclist was killed back in 2001 with flowers on the bike.

Not saying that THIS cyclist deserved more than any other, it was just all over the news and it hit the cycling community hard.

Digger

What a great and inspirational story, perhaps an answer to those who are distraught over the disrespect for bicylists looking for an appropriate way to respond and express their feelings.

What a great idea! Way to go!!

:( 140 hits and no one has taken up the idea how sorry is that

I love the idea. It sure beats the heck out of the "share the roads" signs.

I hope it picks up in other cities.

I'll propose this to the local traffic safety committee and see what happens...

Cool idea.I just whis it would stop raining here. Aint it summer??

Cool idea.I just whis it would stop raining here. Aint it summer??

It was only 27 degrees C here today. That's more like winter than summer to me - not that I am complaining one bit. Still, you can send us the rain if you ever tire of it.

Yeah ok ill send it over soon just need to put it in an enveolpe!! ;)
Marie

It will be much easier to send if you first dehydrate it.

It will be much easier to send if you first dehydrate it.
You can do that to water??Anyway its stopped raining now so we can go riding.
Marie

It will be much easier to send if you first dehydrate it.

Yeah, but it kind of defeats the purpose. In anycase, we don't just need rain here, we need a flood.

:( 140 hits and no one has taken up the idea how sorry is that
gee fella,Rome wan't built in a day! FWIW, there has been some discussion about taking your idea to the streets here in PO. I bet we aren't the only ones.Its a great idea, and probably easier to do than "shadow people",etc.And more visible,too.

just would think that if its gotten 300 hits more would be interested?

just would think that if its gotten 300 hits more would be interested?

Hit counts don't really mean all that much. How many of those 300 are revisits from the same people?

When I don't ride much during hours of 4 pm to 10 PM,
downtown in the city where I live, I tend to think
that if we could just get more bicycle paths, people
would be 1000% safer, especially those roller skating,
in-line skating, biking and walking.

However, havign ridden downtown in the past 2 weeks
again, during 4 PM traffic, and afterwards, it really
feels like a warzone, with no police at any given
time, handing out tickets for U-turns in the middle of
busy streets, taxi's driving like their playing an arcade
game, weaving in and out of traffic, people after
people (in Montreal, Canada) double parking where it's
illegal to even stay there 30 seconds, never mind 8 or 10
minutes ....

It really is reminiscent of of the move "Escape from
New York", from John Carpenter, with Kurt Russell ...

I encourage all steps to make more and more paths
for bicycles - the only real solution for total bike safety -
more public transportation, less individualistic transportation
that is also very polluting (cars, etc) ....and also, perhaps
more motorcycles are needed.

In fact, driving a motorbicke is as dangerous if not more, than
a road bike, or a MTB bike downtown ....

A system needs to be put into place, to make people shy
away from dangerous, wreckless, 4-wheel transportation,
to begin more and more, using 2-wheel vehicles, as well
as public subways, buses, tramways, and such.

Bravo for helping those who protect the environment, by
using their own legs, to power their transportation...and
with this initiative, to help protect them.

I encourage all steps to make more and more paths
for bicycles - the only real solution for total bike safety -

Actually, that's exactly what we don't need. A series of meaningless paths that go absolutely nowhere and increase one's chances of crashing. Heck, we have paths around here too, and most people simply ignore them because the road is generally a far more civil and orderly place. The focus should be on law-enforcement and improving the roads we all have. Aparthied didn't work in South Africa, and it won't work anywhere else.

Chris L -

Actually, bicycle paths are a lot like highways ... they
segregate the dangerous traffic, from the pedestrians
and 2-wheeled vehicles.

Indeed, if we were to follow your logic, that "segregation
of traffic" doesn't work, there would be no highways,
superhighways, and no bicycle paths, and 18 wheel
trucks would travel in the same neighborhoods as grade
schools, high schools and suburban steets, mixing people
with long-haul vehicles, and pedestrians.

Seriously, the reason sidewalks exist, is that the population
has long ago decided that sidewalks were a simple way to
make pedestrians safer, by placing people and dogs apart
(or, in your words, segregated) from the main street traffic.

If people were to follow your suggestion, and walk in the middle
of the street, with traffic in the middle too at 55 km/hr or
faster, traffic deaths would multiply by a factor of 100,000%,
in the space of less than a year.

Likewise, if 18 wheel long haul trucks were to travel on the same
streets as bikes, people and small cars, the streets would be
damaged from the weight carried by those vehicles, and traffic
signals would become unmanageable for drivers carrying loads
2,000 miles away, from constantly stopping for a stop sign,
every 2 minutes.

This is why highways exist: separate long-haul traffic from
local, neighborhood traffic, or in your words, "segregate", that
traffic.

Finally, as shown in the positive results of sidewalks and highways,
both obtaining positive results from "segregation", in the case
of bicycles, by taking that 2 wheel traffic, pedestrianas, roller
bladers and skate boarders off the streets and onto their own mini-strip
of their own, the number of collisions and traffic deaths would drop
dramatically, as has happened identically with using sidewalks and
highways, to separate dangerous traffic from human-powered traffic.

It speaks for itself ... I guess many people object to paths, because
it pigeon-holes where bikes can go, and people fear tax increases to
pay for the infrastructure.

Consider President Bush authorized $401 billion more last week for
Iraq rebuilding .... some of that good money could be used back home.

Seriously, the reason sidewalks exist, is that the population
has long ago decided that sidewalks were a simple way to
make pedestrians safer, by placing people and dogs apart
(or, in your words, segregated) from the main street traffic.

If people were to follow your suggestion, and walk in the middle
of the street, with traffic in the middle too at 55 km/hr or
faster, traffic deaths would multiply by a factor of 100,000%,
in the space of less than a year..

Not at all. There is a perfectly valid reason for separating vehicles from pedestrians. My issue is the question of which group bicycles belong to. Is it a vehicle to be utilised as a legitimate mode of transport, or is it a toy to be carred to and from the start of a stretch of pathway once a week? The way most bikepaths I've seen have been designed tends to send out the latter message. That's all fine and well if you don't intend using your bike as transport, but as someone who does just that, I simply don't think bikepaths are worth the time or the money.



Likewise, if 18 wheel long haul trucks were to travel on the same
streets as bikes, people and small cars, the streets would be
damaged from the weight carried by those vehicles, and traffic
signals would become unmanageable for drivers carrying loads
2,000 miles away, from constantly stopping for a stop sign,
every 2 minutes.

This happens anyway in just about every urban area on Earth. Simply building massive 8-lane highways doesn't seem to stop the trucks from using the smaller roads in the real world -- and are you advocating banning small cars from these highways? It surely must be considered under such a principle given that the weight differential between an "18 wheeler" and a small car is far greater than the weight differential between an average car and a bicycle.

If someone really wants to get those massive loads away from the people, and from point A to point B without delays, I would suggest the rail system is a far more efficient method of achieving this end. In any case, I don't consider trucks of that size to be particularly dangerous because their cumbersome nature makes them extremely predictable beasts. The much smaller pick-up trucks worry me far more.



Finally, as shown in the positive results of sidewalks and highways,
both obtaining positive results from "segregation", in the case
of bicycles, by taking that 2 wheel traffic, pedestrianas, roller
bladers and skate boarders off the streets and onto their own mini-strip
of their own, the number of collisions and traffic deaths would drop
dramatically, as has happened identically with using sidewalks and
highways, to separate dangerous traffic from human-powered traffic.

Actually, cyclist accidents and injuries tend to occur far more often on bikepaths than on roads. The only difference is that they tend to get more media coverage if their happens to be a car involved, hence this perception that "cycling in traffic is dangerous". As someone who does it everyday, my conclusion is quite the opposite. In fact, I consider riding in that traffic to be safer than driving in it. If riding among cars and trucks was really as dangerous as some have made it out to be, I simply would not have accumulated over 100,000km experience in doing it.



I guess many people object to paths, because
it pigeon-holes where bikes can go, and people fear tax increases to
pay for the infrastructure.

You can add the following to the list:

*Bikepaths are not going to get me to work on time
*Bikepaths are dangerous
*Bikepaths have a tendency to go absolutely nowhere
*Bikepaths, in ending in the middle of nowhere, have a tendency to dump cyclists into dangerous positions in traffic situations that could be avoided by simply remaining on the road.

The fact of the matter is, building a "separate but equal" second transportation network is simply never going to happen in the real world. Around here they would have to rip up multi-million dollar apartment blocks to simply create the space to build it - something that just isn't going to happen.

Chris L -

I take it you would take a stroll, on the circuit
where the NASCAR Indy 500 unfolds every year, right ?

'nuf said!

:-p

I take it you would take a stroll, on the circuit
where the NASCAR Indy 500 unfolds every year, right ?

I actually commute on the circuit where the Surfers Paradise Indy race unfolds every year. :p

Or maybe build sand castles on the freeway ...