Originally Posted by
Miele Man
When a light turns green I wait a second or two before entering the intersection - just in case a red-light runner is there too. A number of times that extra second or two has saved me because indeed there was a red-light runner there.
You know those detective series like "Murder She Wrote"? Didn't it ever strike you as strange that one person would see so much murder up close? I mean... you go on vacation to relax, and the total stranger in the next room is killed in grisly fashion... you visit a foreign city to attend a Private Detective conference and the convention organizer winds up dead the night before they are due to present their latest paper on Forensic Psychology...
I slow for most intersections, and also stop for far more in Portland than I ever did in NYC. The intersections I am confident about and plan to run I do not slow down for! What would be the point? To an observer, it might look like I blew through without slowing down... because I did. It was as planned as anything else I will do that day. For those intersections with bad sight lines or traffic light patterns that are unfamiliar I will follow the letter of the law. It works well this balance of caution and recklessness, you should try it. Bike messengers do not get paid to watch the hair on their arms grow at long interval traffic intersections. They hustle because they must. You aren't paying them, why are you bothered?
I have not seen a car run a red light here in a while. Weeks. Where do you live that drivers are so criminal? Toronto? Surely not. The vast majority of drivers and cyclists alike are quite law abiding and conservative. It really pings my BS detector when posters like you rant about the rampant scofflaw culture that you (incorrectly) perceive as being the case. BS!!! Total BS. You cannot use the limited area served by bike messengers in NYC, Chicago, D.C. and Philly, (and Toronto... who knew...) as being indicative of the conduct of the mass of vehicular cyclists. But many do. A driver sees a cyclist saunter through a dead intersection and its a whole culture of lawlessness that must be corralled.
You will join us and exercise your right as a cyclist not to squander the inherent advantages given to you by God of low mass, low impact and extremely small footprint. There is much more likelihood of you being converted to the Dark Side, than that any current scofflaw will become a letter of the law goody goody. I suppose though an accident might bring about a sea change in behavior... until then, however... Banzai!!