Best bike insurance is education

September 15, 11:35 AMInsurance Industry ExaminerDanny Workman

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Accidents involving bicycles and motor vehicles can be tragic and prohibitively expensive.

Because many cyclists have little or no insurance, auto insurance policies often end up responsible for hefty payouts.

In the Canadian city of Sault Ste. Marie, a startled 17-year-old cyclist without helmet or a bike light swerved off the road one night. He crashed into the back of a snowmobile trailer parked on the road side. An arbitrator ruled in late August that the auto insurance of the parked vehicle had to pay because the car and its trailer had to have been operated to end up parked on the road. That cycling mishap spin somehow satisfied Ontario’s legal definition of a traffic accident. The insurance company for the parked car and trailer has to pay for the cyclist’s injuries.

While automobile drivers are not expected to be legal experts on local traffic laws, it is prudent to be aware of the rules of the road as they apply to bicycles and motorized vehicles.

Consider the following excerpts from the online Toronto Star traffic quiz. Let us know if rules in your state are different from the answers below.

True or false bicycle traffic quiz 

1. Adult cyclists are never allowed to ride on city sidewalks.

True. Bylaws may vary by municipality, but in Toronto adults are not permitted to ride on sidewalks. In addition, police can charge adult cyclists with careless or reckless behavior.

2. When a bike and car are both waiting at an intersection, the car always goes first.

False. If the bicyclist was first to arrive at the intersection, the bike has right away. Bicycles are treated like any other vehicle; whoever arrives at the intersection the earliest goes first. For that reason, bicycles should never be positioned to the right of cars at intersections. A cyclist trailing a car at an intersection should stay behind the vehicle or move to the left, and wait his or her turn to move forward. The same rule applies to a motorist trailing a bike; it all depends on who arrives first at the intersection.

3. Bicycles are not allowed to occupy traffic lanes.

False. Under the Ontario HighwayTraffic Act, bicycles are considered vehicles and therefore can occupy entire traffic lanes when doing so is the safest course of action. If bicycles are unable to keep pace with cars in a left lane and can safely ride in the far right lane, cyclists must move to that right lane to let cars pass.

4. Cars can cross the solid white line into the bike lane when there are no cyclists in the lane or when motorists are dropping off passengers at the curb.

False. Lines may become dotted at intersections where car drivers can carefully move over to the right to turn, provided that there are no cyclists in harm’s way. But motorists must never cross the solid line.

Both cyclists and motorists should be thoroughly trained in the rules of the road. Recently, Ontario’s former Attorney General was involved in a road rage incident with a bike courier which has resulted in a manslaughter charge against one of the province's top politicians. While the facts of that case are still to be proven in a court of law, it is clear that no amount of insurance will resolve this issue amicably.

Better traffic education for both motorists and cyclists would be a far more effective outcome.