RSS
Home
Peevish motorist asks if cyclist's rights have gone too far
Print
Email
RSS
Subscribe
Absent from the print edition, Chris Woodyard's column in USA Today asks:
Two-wheel troublemaking: Have motorists let bicyclists' 'rights' go too far?
...bikers' have become enboldened to take over the road. That is, instead of riding to the right or on the shoulder, some are now riding in the center of the lane. Two incidents underscore how the they are putting themselves in danger, both from from who hit them by accident and in a case in Los Angeles, by a motorist who is alleged to have tried to make them crash on purpose:
In the first case, a driver on the way to work struck a St. Mary's County, Md., bicyclist earlier this month and killed him, police told the Washington Post. The driver, a 20-year-old in her Honda Accord, told police she never saw the biker. But the accident may never have happened had the 47-year-old bicyclist had not been riding in the dead center of the lane, a major contributor to the accident.
In the second case, a Los Angeles doctor is on trial for allegedly slamming on the brakes on his car to cause two bikers to run into him. They did, suffering bloody injuries. The doctor, Charles Christopher Thompson, was allegedly peeved over having to slow down for three bikers blocking his path, refusing to pull to the right and flipping him off as he passed.
When last I checked, motorists didn't have any power to grant rights to other road users like cyclists, pedestrians, equestrians, and farm equipment operators. There's an obscure, somewhat quaint set of laws called the motor vehicle code. Chris, you may have heard of it somewhere, like maybe driver's education classes back in high school. Think hard and try to remember.
That woman in Maryland hit someone directly in front of her! Should we believe she'd exercise greater care for someone off to the side?
And the doctor in California used his vehicle as a weapon to assault those cyclists. Would it be less acceptable if he'd clubbed them with a baseball bat or shot them with a 45? C'mon, Chris, when is it OK to kill people for the crime of riding a bicycle? Inquiring minds want to know.
Your main complaint is that cyclists ride right in the middle of the lane. That's the safest place to be in a normal lane. Motorists have to wait until it's safe to pass. They can't 'squeeze by' inches from a cyclist's handlebars. But then again, you're only giving lip service to safety, Chris. What you really want is the ability to drive as fast as possible whenever possible, and those pesky cyclists just get in the way.
Here's an offer, Chris. You may be a safe driver but you've demonstrated you know next to nothing about safe bicycling. If you promise to write about the experience, I'll pay the tuition for a Smart Cycling course from the League of American Bicyclists. Contact Jeff Peel at LAB again and he should be able to point you in the right direction.
Related Articles:
Add a Comment
