I encountered an unusual close encounter on the MUP tonight. As I was cruising along with my flamethrower belching out watts of blue light I barely saw a figure clad in black shuffle out of the bushes on the right side of the trail. I let out every "hey, whoa, look out, watch it, ... . " I could squeeze into the few seconds before I passed by and heard a muffled grumble from the dark figure.

Otherwise, I must say that the flamethrower seems to provide very effective notice to pedestrians and joggers at night. They either hug the side of the trail or step off it completely when the blue light comes from behind.

We have the American River Bike Trail in the Sacramento area which is now over 35 miles long. There are lots of peds on that trail. When I ride on it which is infrequent, I usually call out "passing on your left". I say it slow and deliberate and pretty loud. I was taught this by a number of the local cyclists for passing another bicycle and it works effectively with peds too. Since the first word is "passing" they are alerted that someone or something is about to overtake them.
Regarding MUP trails perhaps consider getting involved in a local advocacy group...you might be able to influence the rules of the trail and end up getting it signed for peds walking facing traffic. After all that is the recommendation for most streets too isn't it...walking facing traffic?

Here's an example of a court case (long post, but I've edited out most of the legalese), decided last week by an appeals court in Chicago against a cyclist suing for serious injuries. It involved an oncoming bike/multiple pedestrian accident on a denominated bike path that is also used by pedestrians, rollerbladers, joggers, etc. It is pretty clear that the pedestrians took up the entire paved portion by walking in one line across the path. In short, though the testimony was conflicting as to what happened (I personally don't believe the pedestrians claim that the biker did not look at them), the court found as a matter of law that the pedestrians had no duty to the bike rider. Note the mention of the rider having to move her head (poor fitting helmet?), listening to a walkman, and failure of anybody--despite awareness of each other--to call out:

In their depositions, Rogers and the five defendants agreed Saturday, June 19, 1999, was clear and sunny. The path on which Rogers was riding was straight, and there was nothing to block the vision of any of the parties. The path was about seven feet wide and paved with a gravel shoulder on either side. There were no lines demarcating lanes on the path. The path was used by bicyclists, rollerbladers, and pedestrians. The defendants were walking north on the path...

The defendants agreed they were walking in a straight line across the path... According to Rogers, she was on her way back from a 20-mile bicycle ride from South Evanston to Highland Park. She saw the defendants when she was about a block and a half away. They were walking in a straight line on the paved part of the path. [Note: IIRC, the “shoulders” are probably each less than a foot wide here.] They were not doing anything that made her feel nervous or concerned. She was listening to the radio on her walkman with the volume set at a low level so she could hear noises around her. She wore a bicycle helmet fitted over her brow bone, requiring her to look up and down at times.

Rogers looked down briefly then looked up again at the defendants. Two of the defendants were walking on the right side of the path where she was riding. She tried to read their body language in order to decide whether to get off her bike or go around them. She did not recall whether she gave any verbal warning of her approach, although all the defendants said Rogers did not say anything before the collision, nor did they speak to her.

As Rogers got closer to the defendants, they appeared to be absorbed in their conversation. She did not make eye contact with them. She decided to go around the defendants by swerving onto the gravel shoulder on her right. She testified that there was plenty of room to go around them. As she turned, she slowed her bicycle from about 6 to 8 miles an hour to about 4 to 6 miles an hour. She then collided with Reagan on the west side of the path when she hit him with her arm. She had no recollection of how she fell off her bicycle and no memory of what happened directly afterward. When she came to, she was somewhere on the bike path, and Patterson was holding her hand. A young man was telling her he was sorry... her right arm [ ] bone was shattered. She also had a hairline fracture of her pelvis.

Kravitt testified there were a lot of bicyclists, walkers, and rollerbladers on the path that day. ... He saw Rogers as she came onto the path about two to three blocks away from them. She was moving quite quickly, faster than 15 to 20 miles an hour. Her head was down, and her helmet was loosely fitted and covering her eyes. She was hunched over and looked very tired. Kravitt said Rogers did not notice them until her handle bar hit Reagan's shoulder and she fell off her bike. Rogers did not swerve onto the shoulder before the collision. There was plenty of room for her to pass them on the path. If the path were divided into five lanes, "lane one" and part of "lane two" on the west side of the path were completely empty. After the collision, Rogers' helmet and walkman were on the ground, and Kravitt could hear music from the headphones. ...

Cline testified that Rogers was biking about 15 to 20 miles an hour. He never saw her slow down. Her head was down with her hands on the handlebars. When he first saw her, she was between "lane one" and the shoulder. Cline said there was access for people to pass on both sides of the path. Rogers veered to her right when she was about a foot away. Reagan's shoulder hit the handlebar, and Rogers flew off the bike and hit her head on the concrete path. Right before she got in the ambulance, Rogers apologized and said it was her fault.

Reagan testified he saw Rogers when she was far away down the trail. The next time he saw her was a second before impact. ... He never saw her on the gravel. He doubted Rogers even saw him because her head was down, and she made no move to avoid him. In the second before impact, she was leaning over the handlebar with her head facing down. Her left shoulder hit his left shoulder, and he swung around.

...Reagan told her he was sorry. He said it because she was in pain. After the incident, he gave a statement to the police that he heard Rogers say she "didn't see them coming and her headphones were on loud." ...

Rogers contends the court erred in finding no duty of care existed between the defendants and Rogers as a user of the bicycle path. ...

"A duty of care arises when the parties stand in such a relationship to one another that the law imposes upon defendant an obligation of reasonable conduct for the benefit of plaintiff." ... Whether defendant owes plaintiff a duty of care is a question of law to be determined by the court. ... Relevant factors include: the foreseeability of injury, the likelihood of injury, the magnitude of the burden of guarding against the injury, the consequences of placing that burden on the defendant, and the possible seriousness of the injury.

Rogers contends defendants' joint conduct blocked her path of travel and her attempt to avoid collision, causing her to collide with Reagan and fall from her bicycle. She says a trier of fact should decide whether their conduct was negligent.

In their responses, defendants contend they had no duty to Rogers because the foreseeability of injury to a third person merely from walking down a bike path was so slight as to be nonexistent. The evidence showed other users of the path were able to pass the defendants without incident. Furthermore, imposing a duty on users of the bike path to act as a caretaker for other users would be impractical and burdensome.

The evidence indicates neither defendants nor Rogers said anything to each other as Rogers approached. Rogers decided to turn her bicycle onto the gravel shoulder in order to pass the defendants. In doing so, she came into contact with Reagan and fell off her bicycle. Rogers admitted she thought she had enough room to go around and did not think the defendants had a malicious intent to make any purposeful contact with her.

We cannot say the circumstances in this case establish a duty of care owed the plaintiff by any of these four defendants. Arguably, it was foreseeable that an oncoming bicyclist would have to go around five people who were blocking the path. But that is not the same as saying they should have reasonably foreseen the plaintiff's injury. The evidence shows both the plaintiff and the defendants thought the plaintiff had room to go around, and neither of the parties verbally signaled the other. There were no signs of danger. ... Although there are differences in the parties' accounts of the incident, we find none of these inconsistencies is so material as to preclude summary judgment.

This whole thread shows just how crap MUPs are unless you're a leisure rider who wants to pootle along enjoying the view. How to avoid hitting peds? Ride on the damn road.

That court case sounds like EVERYONE was being stupid. Yes, the peds have the right of way, but if someone on a bicycle is bearing down on you at the alleged 15-20 mph it seems kind of stupid not to get out of the way.

To expand on my earlier post and agree with andygates, if you want to go fast get on the road. Most MUPs I have seen have posted speedlimits of as low as 8 mph. I ride on one for the last couple of miles of my commute home. It has no posted speed right now though it used to be 15 mph. They have redone the path and have not put the signs back up I suppose. The path is straight, and I can see well into the distance. If there is no one walking I go as fast as I want to. On nice days when there are peds I noodle. Yes, it can be aggrevating when 3-4 peds take up the whole path. If they don't respond to my call I will go off the path to go around. If the path had a gravel shoulder as the one in the court case did, I would, frankly, get off my bike and walk around the peds. I would not endanger them or myself by trying to squeeze by. Nor would I say anything to them. People like that are either oblivious, stupid, or jerks. Nothing you can say will have any effect other than to make them more determined not to get out of the way of the next cyclist that comes along.

Besides, I'm enjoying myself. They're enjoying themselves. Why be a buzzkill? It's part of my basic cycling philosophy "If I was in a hurry I wouldn't be riding a bike."

When you consider all the tactics described in this thread, and I have tried nearly all of them, this first sentence is really painfully, unchangingly true. My only hope is that enough bikes will turn the tide of annoying behavior towards bikes, on and off the road.

The second part, I am sorry Rain, in certain contexts, I take issue with. (In terms of Sunday Bike Path riding, what you say makes sense.) In my bike path situation, there is an MUP next to the BIKE PATH, next to NY's Westside highway. A bike can make better time than a car at rush hour, except when people are walking their dogs on twenty foot leashes and people and kids are spread across both lanes of the path. Which often happens. When in traffic I find myself saying under my breath to aggressive drivers, "If you were in a hurry you wouldn't be in a car, you'd be on a bike"

On our MUP's, cyclists are required to yield, but pedestrians are required to be single file when others are present. "Required" is a relative term. The "rules" have no force of law. They are just the etiquette suggested by the guy who controls the signs and the web page.

Under both state and city law here, all laws that apply to cyclists apply only to regular roads and to paths "exclusively" reserved for cyclists. By definition, a MUP is not "exclusively" reserved for cyclists, so it is basically a lawless place.

Under Columbus's rules/suggestions/etiquitte, both the cyclist and the pedestrians would have been at fault. The cyclist for failing to yield. The pedestrians for failing to walk single file.

There is one exception, when one of out bike paths reaches the suburbs, the signs say that pedestrians are supposed to yield to cyclists. So if the accident happened there, it would be the pedestrians' fault. I kind of like that.

I yell "Hello" when I am close enough to be heard, in a tone of voice that is obnoxiously cheerful. People stop, and look to see who's crazy, which is just perfect. they are stopped, so i can go around, and they are looking, so I am not worried about scaring them the way I would be if some one just whizzed by me. I got a rear view mirror because I am so easily startled by all those bikers who fly by without a peep.

Oh, and I have one of those obnoxious air horns [love it!] for when it is a car doing something illegal. But, I don't use it one peds.

Hone your ramming skills.

I ride our city's bike path system (or MUP as you call it) every day for about 20K. All users - Peds and Bikers - travel on the right (this IS North America) and pass on the left. The law requires all bikes to have a bell. If there is plenty of room (very low chance of collision) I just pass silently. If there is any chance of collision because of mutliple Peds or not much room, a ring of the bell does the trick.

For me it's a judgement call. I don't want to startle the Ped into doing something unexpected. Also, most bells sound kind "rude" as in "GET OUT OF MY WAY!" rather than nicely announcing your presence.

I've "touched" two Peds. One was a group of young cool dudes all over the path going in the same direction as me. I passed, at speed, as close as I could and I felt my panier just nick one guy's pants. I heard him gasp...then I was gone.

Another was a woman walking in the opposite direction but in my lane, we made eye contact but her body language indicated she wasn't going to move over - which would force me off the path into some pretty rough terrain. I got pissed and accelerated right at her. As I passed I was close enough that our sleeves touched. Beeyotch.

But don't get the wrong impression. 99.99% of the Peds I meet on the paths are no problem at all and stay in the right-hand lane.

Experience tells me to just aim for them. Because no matter how far I go to avoid them, they always move into my line anyway.

If the pedestrian in question is behaving predictably, and there is enough space to pass with a couple feet of clearance, then I don't say anything before breezing past. Alerting them only creates a chance that they will change what they are doing, which is unnecessary, and potentially dangerous. If there is not enough space to do this, I slow down yell "On your left", and wait behind them until it is safe to proceed.

On the road pedestrians are supposed to walk on the left facing traffic. (In the USA) In my particular state there are bike paths that have posted signs that tell the pedestrians to do the same thing. I think it is rare though, this is actually a BIKE path and was made before the "multi use path" was common.

It does no good at all. :rolleyes: If anything it confuses people. :rolleyes:

My state has Posted "rules" not laws, that tell pedestrians to walk on the left. And on the state bike map it says that bikes have the right of way. A "rule" not a law. I wonder if that really means a thing in a court?

How about a thread on "Best method to ensure hitting pedestrians?" . . .

The MUP along the beach in Newport Beach (the "boardwalk") has a speed limit of 8 mph. The only bike I ride there is the one with the iron oxide finish . . . . and I'm usually doing more like 4 mph. Hmmm . . . maybe lawless isn't so bad? :fight: I won't even start to talk about my experiences on that trail. It sure seems like there should be a big difference in the use (and therefore customs of use) between a beach boardwalk and a MUP along a river that runs for 30 miles . . . http://www.nearfield.com/~dan/sports/bike/river/sa/ (note: I do encounter cormorants and pelicans everyday . . . . I've never encountered japanese actors)

Two more things . . .

I encountered the jogger again yesterday evening that I described in my first post. I gave him substantial notice and he hugged the right side of the trail. (Good thing too! I was establishing a new record time with the aid of the Santa Ana winds at my back!! ;) ) Hopefully we all learn from close calls whether we experience them ourselves or hear about them.

Aside from the homeless guy I described above I had to deal with a 2 cycle powered scooter on the trail. :mad: I think there are rules against those! Thoughts of honing my ramming skills danced in my head . . . . at least he had a headlight . . . . cough . . cough . . . . 2 stroke exhaust is murder on the lungs.

Let's all just do whatever we want regardless of everyone else. Puts us in "good" company with the rest of the American public. I'll be the one slowing down to allow you do do whatever you want then proceeding happily on my way. Life has enough stress without me adding my own.

In this case, I would have to side with the pedestrians. To my way of thinking, both parties may have behaved irresponsibly, but the cyclist is travelling fast enough to make the speed of the pedestrians nearly irrelevent, they are virtually standing still. The cyclist must bear responsibility for the accident. I find it amusing that she even tried to sue the pedestrians in this case. Seems like no one is willing to assume responsibility for their actions anymore.

Very accurate, in a crowd it's like the red sea parting. I think they suspect a cop or a motorcycle?

Maybe it's the Laize Fair attitude here, but I agree with you 100%. I dont understand this whole all-or-nothing people have here. I go on and off the bike path (if available and if safe) the road, the shouldler. If it's available, safe, and legal - use it if you want to - but don't tell me I shouldn't because you (not you raymond) have some sort of hangup that all bike paths/lanes are the spawn of hell.

Some work, some don't. Use when appropriate I say.

Hell, there's times on some of the crappier residential back streets in New Orleans (home of the some of the worst streets in the US) that I have to hop on the sidewalk or else my bike would be TRASHED. Sometimes I ride if it's clear. I know I probably shouldn't do that though. hehehe

Vincent

Ironic that this case's accident happened on a "rails to trail" path. One reason why it's so popular is there are no streets nearby that run in a relatively straight direction. There are golf links, many meandering streets, restaurants, shopping areas; much of the path bypasses neighborhood and village parks, train stations, and village downtowns--all areas that have good sidewalks for pedestrians. Likely intended at least in part for the path to isolate riders from pedestrians.

This is part of the unbroken route from south side of Chicago near U of Chicago/Museum of Science & Industry along the lakefront to the north suburbs, past the Chicago Botanic Gardens and Ravinia Music Festival, up to Green Bay, WI.

Beautifully put. It's much safer on the road.

Hear! Hear! In Washington State we are required to shout some sort of warning prior to passing a pedestrian on a MUP. My personal experience has been that any sound, of any sort, in English or any other language, is almost guaranteed to cause the pedestrian to leap into the path of the bicycle like some sort of strange, post-industrial lemming.

I now ignore that law, passing swiftly and silently. Undoubtedly, the pedestrians still leap one way or another, but hopefully there is no one drafting me.

And... to be brutally honest... when *I* am a pedestrian, and someone shouts "On your LEFT" three feet behind me, I completely forget which way is left, and, in my sudden burst of panic, throw myself under their wheels. I guess it's just one more little ironic joke the gods play upon us. Fortunately, my fellow cyclists have better reflexes than I do, or -- as a pedestrian -- I would long since have been cut in half by a 700x20 roadie.

I wish it were it so. Jay-walking pedestrians are a problem there, too. In my experience, pedestrians are the most lawless folks on the tranportation grid.

Avoid them? Oh no..... I thought they said, uh, nevermind.