Originally Posted by TandemGeek

I don't disagree with what you've noted.

But, I will clarify that I was talking more in the general sense of a cyclist's place on the road.

In talking with friends and co-workers who are not cyclists but who will be candid, if it's 3:00pm and they're driving on a road and there's a cyclist riding along the shoulder of the road with a posted speed limit of 45 mph they see the lycra clad rider with a helmet cruising along at 25 mph as a "someone in a silly outfit pretending to be Lance Armstong who shouldn't be on the road" (by the way, that's fairly close to a direct quote from at least three different people whom I know). Change that person to somone who has on jeans, a sweatshirt and perhaps a back pack and they're still, "someone... who shouldn't be on the road".

In fact, it seems the lycra-clad riders draw a bit more scorn than riders in street clothes from my non-cyclist friends and co-workers, perhaps even more from those who do ride bikes but do so only on the local bike trails.

The relevance to this thread is, there's not usually too much distrinction by non-cycling friends and co-workers when a person on a bike is struck down on a public road by a car. The presumption of guilt is immediately placed on the cyclist because "they shouldn't have been on the road in the first place" and, "more likely than not, they pulled out in front of the car." Again, this is based on conversations I've had over the years when the subject comes up, i.e., during casual conversation when they learn my wife and me are cyclists who ride almost exclusively on public roads.