Advocacy & Safety - bad cyclist

Did anyone {locals**see the piece this morning about why people hate bike riders on WGN?
It showed cyclist breaking all the laws. Running red lights,weaving in and out of traffic,running stop signs,flicking the bird,etc. They also stopped a few cyclist and asked them simple questions about safe bike riding.It was embarassing that none new the answers and others stood by stupidly not saying anything.Its a shame that a few can make such an impact on all of us as a group.I've found out that a simple wave at a 4-way stop to let motorist go is a lot more effective than trying to prove a point.New riders should always remember that "when encountering a motorized vehicle,you may be right but dont be dead right."

Ummmm.....I think this should be moved over to the Commuting forum. That said, there are people who operate cars in trucks in the same bad manner.

Did they run a piece on the person who ran a stop sign while on the phone and almost crushed me with her Lincolln Navigator a couple of months back?:twitchy: When I yelled "HEY!!!" to get her attention, I startled her and she gave me the finger! There are plenty of bad bike riders, they mostly hurt themselves. Bad car/truck driver have the potential to do a lot more damage to themselves and others. YMMV

They can portray cyclists however they choose; you can find plenty of examples good or bad.

they did mention that 95% are good people who obey the rules.i know this should be in a different forum but i already posted it.

Cyclists are like other non-majority populations in one respect... we are all judged by the offensive actions of a few. I won't defend reckless and dangerous cyclists. In fact, I'd like to see better enforcement of traffic laws on cyclist. However, take a moment to compare the consequences of reckless driving with the reckless cycling. I am not aware of anyone ever being charged with using their bicycle as a weapon.

I am a cyclist and a driver. I understand the challenges of both forms of transportation. And with that perspective, I abide by a simple tenet I call the rule of the most vulnerable. This rule is simple… yield to the form of transportation that is most vulnerable.

In some ways, the vulnerability of riding a bicycle on the street is analogous to living between the targets at a shooting range. Your survival is very much dependent upon the skill, concentration and experience of the shooters. If the shooters are texting, eating or drunk the consequences can be deadly. Of course most shooters don’t want to hit you, so they would prefer you didn’t hang around on the shooting range. But the consequences of an errant bullet are different for the people living between the targets and those doing the shooting.

take it to foo

[moderator note] thread moved from C&V.

[QUOTE=vincev;7968907]they did mention that 95% are good people who obey the rules.i know this should be in a different forum but i already posted it.[/QUOTE
and 99% of motorcyclelist are nice law abiding citizens. That whare the biker 1% patch comes from.

Local news hit pieces on scapegoats are nothing new. I'm going to keep riding the way I see fit, because no matter how much I adhere to the law, killing a cyclist in this country is still equivalent to killing a dog. As long as It Was An Accident, Officer, remains enough to get away with murder, following the laws will remain, strangely enough, really ****ing low on the priority radar.

My hope is that with gas returning to very high prices in the future, and American car companies still not interested in viable, clean and affordable green personal transportation, the cyclist ranks will go and if the growth is high enough, awareness will increase, and legal decency with it.

vincev: your picture of the two "guys" at the bottom of your post will give me nightmares tonight. creepy!!!

if Indiana is anything like Central Pennsylvania, they could easily make a full length 2 hour movie of automobile drivers breaking the law in a day of filming. With a single camera crew. Eating doughnuts most of the day. With a blind cameraman guessing where the intersections are.

Strange thing is, one of the worst problems in Central Pennsylvania is drivers are too nice, and they improperly yield their right of way. Saw that someone got charged for that recently, granted they caused an accident.

Justifying their position by digging up all the scofflaw footage that they could find. Bah.

-Kurt

Why don't you write the station and ask why they aren't doing the same type of report on scofflaw drivers?

Why don't you write the station and ask why they aren't doing the same type of report on scofflaw drivers?

Because it's bad for ratings. You don't pick on majorities, you pick on minorities.

killing a cyclist in this country is still equivalent to killing a dog.

Depending on how it's done, the dog killer is likely to see far greater punishment...

Mike Vick would be a free man right now if he had only killed a bicyclist