What is it about this sign that divides the cycling community?
The controversy over cyclists failing to stop at stop signs has been swirling around the Austin cycling community the last few days, and we have certainly entered the fray and stirred the pot a bit ourselves. Things kind of came to a head with a Monday evening story by KVUE that many thought was pretty unfair. I called KVUE out on what I saw as sensationalism over good journalism.
In response, KVUE did a followup story Tuesday evening that should have been the story to start with. Rather than inflammatory comments from a cherry picked “cyclist on the street”, this time KVUE interviewed APD about the law, quantified their survey of a Shoal Creek intersection, and interviewed someone (yours truly) about a possible solution to the problem.
So clearly we have a problem. The KVUE story reported that 61 % of the 64 riders they taped failed to stop or make a rolling stop at the intersection in question. The comments section of KVUE lit up in response to the story with 137 responses, mostly incredibly passionate and often irate statements from both sides.
The response from the cycling community has fallen into two categories: those that feel obeying the signs isn’t necessary, essentially a harmless offense, and those who think you should just follow the law and stop giving cyclists a bad reputation. This back and forth creates kind of a conversational gridlock in the cycling community, and it appears the only solution offered is to continue doing what we are doing and expecting different results.
Background on the problem
The issue of failing to follow traffic signs and signals has been an ongoing issue on our city streets. I’ll attempt to answer “why can’t they just follow the law?”
I believe this issue stems from a couple of problems. First, bicycling law simply is not really covered in driver’s education plus since you don’t have to be licensed to ride a bike, there are people who ride who don’t have a license (yes, there really are adults in Texas who do not have a driver’s license.) In fact, City staff found ignorance of cycling law to be enough of an issue with Austin police that part of the Master Bike Plan recently passed included training for the entire APD on bicycle law. So you have people including the police ignorant of the law and people who see other cyclists treating stop signs as yields and most just follow along. This law has been inconsistently enforced in the past, and in fact I see cyclists fail to completely stop quiet frequently in front of police without ticketing. Of course, based on recent reports this may be changing.
Secondly, there is an issue inherent in this form of transportation. Since you are using your own power to move the vehicle and it takes much more energy to get the bike moving from a complete stop than from a slow coast, most cyclists try to avoid a complete stop as much as possible. I realize that that is not justification for failing to stop, but it is part of the reality.
Possible solutions: Real Education Programs or the Idaho Way?
As I mentioned in an earlier post, just ticketing people when there happens to be police around who are so inclined is a haphazard way of making our streets safer. By itself it’s not very effective, and it does create some hostility in the community to the police. Currently, there are no fewer than a half dozen billboards in this town educating the public about seat belt laws. If seat belt laws which are repeatedly covered in driver’s education and defensive driving classes need this kind of advertising, than bicycle laws need it all the more.
Again, the cycling community has multiple ways to reach people about this not limited to e-mail lists, club communication, and websites like ours. Those things don’t cost anything, but we could do better. How about asking all the bike shops to put a brochure in the bag when customers make a purchase? Almost every event I participate in gives you a bag of goodies, coupons, and advertisements for other races at package pickup. How about a brochure on bike laws in the participant bag as well? Heck, just stand out at a high traffic cycling interaction or the hike and bike trail and give out warnings with more info on the law. This requires some work, but it will actually yield better responses and more compliance than just occasional ticketing.
Another possible solution I mentioned in the KVUE story is the Idaho Stop law. In Idaho, cyclists can treat stop signs as yield signs and stop lights as stop signs. This is not cart blanche to run intersections or to fail to properly yield right of way. In fact, the Idaho law and a similar law under consideration in Oregon actually increases the fines for failing to yield.
Some people in various threads have dismissed this as unsafe as well, but provide no empirical evidence to back up this assertion. In fact the only evidence we really have is that the Idaho law works since it’s been on the books for 27 years with no elevated accidents or fatalities. Traffic laws are not written in stone, and we need to have the flexibility to try different options. They just might be better.
It may feel good to just say “follow the law,” but it obviously isn’t working. Most cyclists just don’t come to a complete stop at stop signs. We can just keep doing the same thing and expect different results, or we can try something new. The goal should be safer streets, not punishing people who offend you. Let’s keep the goal on the overall community good.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
I think you make the same hand-wave you accuse others of doing by insisting that the Idaho law must be working. What do they have, about the population of Austin spread across an entire state? Fewer cyclists state-wide than we have in a few blocks, I bet.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 2:36 pm
Just because we have a large population, doesn’t mean it won’t work. We don’t know because we don’t even entertain the possibility. You dismiss the law because you THINK it won’t work, not because you have any evidence it won’t. I’m willing to be more open minded, and try other options when something isn’t working. It may not work in the end, but on the other hand it may make things better. We won’t know until we try.
Mike, let’s hear a real solution that isn’t just more of the same.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 3:10 pm
We’ve never tried to enforce the law against law-breaking cyclists; and those cyclists who obey the law have never seriously tried to convince the rest (I found myself alone out on that limb too many times to believe otherwise).
Idaho is an empty state with relatively little in the way of transportational cycling. What may work out in the country is unlikely to work at crowded intersections in urban areas. It’s a lot less likely to work, in other words, than actual enforcement.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
Idaho’s population is sparse, but the vast majority of commuter cyclists are in the Boise area which has a population of approximately 200k, 600k metro. That’s not as high as Austin (740k, 1.65million metro), but Austin isn’t exactly New York City either. Remember Oregon is considering a law similar to Idaho’s and the population of Portland is very much on par with Austin’s (575k, 2.16 million metro). Given just that information, I don’t think it’s credible to dismiss Elliot’s suggestion out of hand. As a matter of fact, the main point of his post was that making objections without thinking everything through don’t solve any problems.
The real questions are: (i) Can we come up with a solution in the near term that makes everyone more aware of the law (cyclists and motorists), and (ii) Does making an effort to change the law make more sense than keeping it as it is? I think these are open questions that would ultimately lead to a much better situation that we have right now. We can all be snarky and short with each other, or we can work to fix the problem.
I would very much support taking a serious look at the details existing Idaho law and how it’s enforced, quantifying safety concerns, and seeing how it could be implemented in a place like Austin (which is admittedly different).
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
I really don’t understand what the problem is. The law states that bicyclists have to follow a certain set of regulations. If bicyclists don’t like it they should get those laws changed. In the meantime follow them as they stand or face the consequences. Police ignorance or lax enforcement does not invalidate legislation, and ignorance on the part of the offender isn’t really much of an excuse.
I’m a bicyclist and agree that changes in the law would be beneficial (i.e. the Idaho law) but flaunting the law won’t make anything better.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 4:04 pm
I suppose that it is self evident that we have a de facto idaho stop system for bicycle commuters in austin (yielding, rather than “stopping”), though perhaps some do not see it as clearly as i do. Thus, supposing that this is more unsafe than our current system is absurd, because it IS our current system, though the letter of the law says otherwise.
Approaching intersections at 10-15mph provides plenty of time to evaluate 90% of intersections. The benefits may include diverting bicycle traffic on to smaller (stop sign ridden) streets, away from the automobiles we, apparently, annoy. This is why i am surprised that motorists do not support an idaho stop law more than cyclists.
An idaho stop law is the only solution beyond the status quo. However, passing this legislation beyond the city level i do not believe is possible. Still, there is nothing wrong with the status quo, except that once a year we may have to pay a fine or two. Obviously, i support changing the law, but with our current governor in place, you must pardon my cynicism.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 4:29 pm
elliott, Matt, M1EK, Mike: APD meeting on the state of cycling in Austin 07/01/09 Bike Resolution Project: 715 East 8th St. Austin, tx 4th floor Compstat room. Hope to see you there.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
Christian,
Suppose instead of taking a certified driver’s ed class to get your license, you learned to drive a car a bit every weekend from your dad. At some point, dad decided you were ready to drive by yourself and gave you the keys. Your only knowledge of the law is whatever your dad told you and what you inferred from watching other people all of whom were taught by their moms or dads. How would you drive?
Replace the words drive and car with ride and bike and you have the current system of how the vast majority of bike riders have come to understand bicycle laws. Most people aren’t “flaunting the law”, they just don’t know better. Telling people to “just follow the law” as you suggest with this education system is a setup for failure. Let’s stop being simplistic and come up with real solutions.
CBB, thanks for the heads up. I’ll be out of town, but will pass this along to Marcus to cover.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 4:52 pm
Elliott, that’s actually how I learned how to drive – I didn’t have to take a class at all; only a joke written exam.
People DO know they’re supposed to stop at stop signs and red lights. They just don’t WANT to.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
> The KVUE story reported that 61 % of the 64 riders
> they taped failed to stop or make a rolling stop at
> the intersection in question.
I don’t doubt these findings. However, if they really wanted to
be balanced, they’d also report the corresponding figures for cars
during their study.
I would imagine that few cars run the stop sign without even slowing, but most roll through the intersection without slowing when yielding to other traffic is not required.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
Mike,
I fear for our streets!
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 5:13 pm
… er, `but most roll through the intersection without STOPPING when yielding to other traffic is not required.’
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 5:25 pm
Doug,
I think the premise of the story, that cyclists tend to run stop signs, is fair. I’m not sure mentioning cars is relevant to the story. A lot more of us run stop signs than cars in my totally unscientific experience. I will say the consequences for bikes versus cars (except for the rider) are totally different.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 6:27 pm
I’ll just throw out some observations that I think are “facts”!
The stop sign issue is a big public relations problem for cyclists.
The stop sign “problem” does not appear to cause significant accidents. (they filmed a whole day’s worth with no accidents.)
Now, would high rates of compliance with stop signs result in more favorable treatment from motorists?
Given that there will never be 100% compliance (motorists are not 100% compliant with law either), will the “us vs them” effect still result in significant negative perceptions of cyclists?
Is the negative perception of cyclists due to things like stop sign issues, or simply the fact that to them we are just another irritation and problem to surmount in getting from point A to point B, whether we obey the law or not.
I submit that a high degree of stop sign compliance would help, a little, but that mainly “they”
are going to be irritated and hateful simply because we are there. Motorists are irritated whenever *anything* interferes with their progress (I should know, I drive too!), and without massive infrastructure improvements, that is unavoidable.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 6:38 pm
I’ve recently been reading about several Idaho cyclists who have been killed in accidents that may have been a result of the “Idaho law”. Apparently there have been two or three fatalities recently and people locally seem to think it reflects on a lack of effectiveness on the law there.
That said, I personally think it’s a great idea. I would love to have my small transgressions be legalized.
As far as education, how about this: You know when you get a traffic ticket, you take that 6-hour course to get out of it? How about devoting 1/2 to 1 hour of all those courses to bicycle traffic law and bike safety (from the driver’s point of view)?
Further, if a cyclist gets a ticket, or a driver gets a ticket involving an interaction with a cyclist, he would take a special class where the majority of the time would be spent on bike traffic law, vehicular cycling, and bicycle accident avoidance. If drivers understood what is and is not legal for bicycles to do, and what to expect from disciplined vehicular cyclists, I think the roads would be much safer for all.
The people getting the education would be those who need it- people who’ve broken the traffic law. Those who play nice don’t need to be bothered, but those who mess up would pay for their own cycling-related education.
I think if they adopted the Idaho law in Texas, used its passage as an opportunity for education via public service announcements, vigorously enforced cycling-related law, and made the offenders take cycling-related traffic school, the result would be a clear improvement in cyclist safety.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
Just another thought. Perhaps the city could do a trial of the Idaho law at selected intersections, placing “bicycles yield” signs there. This would be similar to the way some right turn only lanes have “except bicycles” signs.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 6:59 pm
Of course cars are relevant to the story. Perhaps not to the story that KVUE wants to tell, but they’re relevant to the story of who breaks the law and how.
When a motorist is upset that cyclists `never’ obey the law, it usually comes with the implication that motorists always do, and they’ll downgrade that to `usually’ when pressed. But motorists disobey the law often too — they roll through stop signs when there’s nobody to yield to quite often. They rarely run red lights that have been red for a while, but they often run red lights that just turned red. And they think little of going 10 mph over the speed limit.
Drivers of both classes of vehicles are quite willing to break certain laws, as long as that violation isn’t likely to lead to an accident or a ticket. Sure, the laws likely to be broken are somewhat different — but there’s a lot of overlap too, so if you’re going to count the cyclists running stop signs, you should at least count the motorists who do it too.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 7:22 pm
The `Idaho stop law’ should not be responsible for any accidents. If there’s an accident, that indicates that somebody broke the law.
Even the `Idaho stop law’ requires you to yield when it’s time to yield. If there’s a vehicle to hit, you yield. Now, perhaps somebody made a mistake and failed to yield when they should have, but that’s not the fault of the law — mistakes can be made with any arrangement.
Though perhaps the `97% of the cyclists observed broke the law’ observation should be interpreted differently — rather than saying `they’re all scofflaws and should be fined’, one should instead think `you know, if 97% of them break the law, and bad things don’t happen as a result of this, perhaps the law is the thing that’s wrong’. Which leads one right into the Idaho stop law …
Personally, I’d like to see the law changed so that going through a stop sign when you don’t need to yield is permitted at a low rate of speed for bikes and cars — make it 3 mph or so. Both groups could benefit from that.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 7:35 pm
Doug, great point. Mild speeding is a great comparison to yielding at stop signs. They are both common, (mostly) harmless, and typically ignored by law enforcement. While reckless driving should not be acceptable, nor should reckless cycling. Here, a strictly enforced (recklessly) running stop sign policy by the police must be acceptable to cyclists, and perhaps warnings (or looking the other way) at those who clearly yield could be acceptable as well (if that isn’t what is currently happening, though i suppose it probably already is except on campus where the police have much more strict priorities). I seriously doubt Art wants all this extra paperwork…
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 7:57 pm
Here is a really nice article, written by a cyclist in GB, very balanced article.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2006/jun/04/features.magazine6
blurb: “At red lights all over Britain, cyclists are on a collision course with angry motorists and terrorised pedestrians. But why has the pedal pusher gone from eco-friendly outrider to scowling road hazard? Will Storr joins the action groups planning to unseat the ‘psycho cyclists’”
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 10:26 pm
1. Have Texas observe and study Idaho bicycle law
2. Scale population numbers/cyclists/density, etc so you can get an estimated factor
3. Texas report findings
Allow me the cyclist to treat stop signs as yield signs. Just like the Idaho law is written, the cyclist must make decisions when approaching the stop sign to: yield, stop or go through.
I could care less what a motorist thinks. I am a person on a 20lb human powered machine. They, are in a 3000lb+ machine with 150+ hp motor. We’re not the same by any means regardless of how it’s debated.
I may be wrong, but cyclists have higher odds of being killed by motorists cutting in front of them than by a cyclist running a stop sign.
on Jun 24th, 2009 at 11:20 pm
This is a link to a talk show where the Idaho law is discussed. About 45% of the way in, a researcher actually talks about studies done on the law’s effects. Some very interesting angles, like increased predictability of cyclist behavior…
http://cdn4.libsyn.com/portlandtransport/kboobike_20090204.mp3?nvb=20090625034416&nva=20090626035416&t=04f9ee4956a09c288efff
I hope the link works!
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 1:03 am
If the civil rights movement had cyclists’ leadership, blacks would have reserved seating at the back of the bus.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 7:41 am
I understand your frustration, Michael, but all successful movements both Mensheviks and Bolsheviks. Sometimes you need the Mensheviks and sometimes you need the Bolsheviks. We’ve got both.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 8:52 am
Doug and others, the key is that when cyclists run stop signs and red lights, they may, in fact, lead motorists to think it’s also OK to do it (after all, if it’s safe for them, why not for me?). Is that the world you want to bike in?
Mild speeding is, from direct personal experience, far less serious an offense than running stop signs or red lights. The reason cyclists focus on mild speeding is because it’s a law that cyclists find it difficult to break for obvious reasons, so it makes ‘us’ look better than ‘them’ – but it’s a cheap and empty victory; it means precisely nothing, unless you’re foolish enough to believe that somebody who blasts through stop signs and red lights wouldn’t also speed if they could.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 9:15 am
M1EK, that’s already the world I bike and drive in. It’s not such a bad place.
Now, if a motorist (or cyclist, for that matter) rolls through a stop sign and I collide with them, I certainly won’t be happy about it. But it won’t be because they (or I) looked to see that there was no traffic that might need yielding to first and went through when it was safe to do so at a low rate of speed.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 11:42 am
M1EK, your comparison between stop signs and speeding is poor and not worth correcting.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Dave, speeding is directly responsible for far fewer collisions than failure to yield right-of-way. Speeding is trumped up as a ‘contributing cause’ whenever an accident occurred when the speed limit was exceeded, but this is highly bogus – in most of those cases, the same exact accident would have occurred at the speed limit.
Right-of-way devices, in other words, are far more important than the speed limit – the only reason you see so many cyclists pretending otherwise is that in most cases, cyclists are incapable of exceeding the speed limit on a given roadway.
I don’t know precisely what mental pathology it is that allows so many to ignore what responsible adults who both bicycle-commuted and drove are telling them; but it runs deep – it’s responsible for me leaving the austin-bikes list (after the moderator wouldn’t allow me to defend against a vile, baseless, personal attack thrown out by one of said anarchists). One would think the experience of those who biked to work half the time and drove the other half would be sought as a bridge rather than dismissed, but that’s not been the case.
However, every single coworker I’ve ever had – almost all of whom drive – almost all of whom are more representative of the median voter than am I or especially you – have it ingrained in their head that “cyclists don’t obey the law” – and they’re RIGHT; and that matters a hell of a lot. Eventually, blowback happens – as it did when one or two UTC colleagues voted against bike facilities because, paraphrasing from memory, “why should we spend any more money on them when they just do whatever the hell they want anyways?”
But let’s just ignore all that and pretend that we’re victims. That’ll work.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 12:49 pm
Very well. You are setting up an argument pitting speeding against failure to yield right of way at stop signs. I don’t think anybody has advocated (in this discussion) ignoring right of way law. Most have advocated adherence to right of way, and allowing bikes to roll thru stop signs if right of way is not violated.
Blowing thru stop signs and stop lights is a subjective term. I would assume it means traveling fast enough that a proper evaluation of conditions cannot be done in order to ensure right of way concerns.
Regarding bike facilities, consider that more bike facilities might make their driving experience better if bikes have better alternatives, allowing bikes to get places with fewer and easier interactions with motorists.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
Dave, you don’t have to convince ME; you have to convince suburban drivers who see cyclists blowing stop signs and red lights because they feel like it. There’s really only a couple foreseeable endpoints of that process – drivers start blowing stop signs too; or drivers vote to push cyclists onto the sidewalk (“you don’t want to obey the rules of the road? Fine, here you go”).
And your ‘subjective’ argument is tiresome and disingenuous, just like Doug’s. Anything that clearly doesn’t indicate an intention to stop (even if the wheels don’t rock back in the car’s case or the foot doesn’t go down in the bike’s case, modulo track-stands) is ‘blowing the stop’.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 3:21 pm
I don’t see the problem with the subjective issue. It seems to work with yield signs, are those useless?
I’m not sure I understand your parenthetical comment. I think you are saying that if the car’s wheels (actually the body) doesn’t jerk back, and the foot doesn’t go down, then you’re blowing the stop? If not, then aren’t you just back at the subjective evaluation of the situation again? “Clearly” is a subjective term.
Regarding your first comment, there will always be some cyclists who blow the signs. There are cars who do it too. I think that it will always happen more frequently with bikes than with cars, even in the ideal world. I think the “us-them” mentality will serve the reinforce the negative perceptions anyway.
The Idaho law may help much more than you think. In my own case, I made a decision, a deal with myself. I would always stop and wait for lights, but I would do the yield thing with stop signs. I do run lights if I have waited thru a cycle and my side didn’t turn green. I sort of made peace with my lawlessness. Anyway, many, under pressure from physics, run the stop signs, and it may be that having violated the law, they figure they might as well be in for a pound as a penny, and knowing that few drivers would willfully hit them, they take the right of way too. After all, why break the law and not reap the benefits? (self preservation comes to mind…)
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
m1ek,
you’ve got to do better than “tiresome and disingenuous”. “Blowing” through a stop sign is not a term that is used for, “anything that doesn’t clearly indicate an intention to stop”. Rather, “blowing through” is a term which is used to indicate that the vehichle operator did not bother to assess the situation and probably didn’t even slow down. This term is part of our language and has been for years and years; you don’t get to define it to suit your whim.
Also, you’re off base with your assertion about why automobile speeding is brought into this debate. The issue is brought up PRECISELY BECAUSE it is usually safe…JUST LIKE a cyclist treating a stop as a yield is usually safe. It should be a point of understanding between the two groups. The issue of right-of-way, is certainly more important than the issue of speed, as you point out. But, a car cannot assess issues of right-of-way safely, without stopping in most cases; a bicyclist can.
As for the perception of suburban drivers….my guess is that when they start blowing through stop signs en masse, you will see a “crackdown” by the police that will make the one against cyclists look like child’s-play.
I also don’t understand the constant references to the “rules of the road”. There are many kinds of vehichles that use our roads and there are DIFFERENT rules for all of them. Are you contending that motorists wouldn’t get upset anymore ,if the “rules” allowed cyclists to treat stop signs as yeild signs?
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
There’s just no reasoning with some people. And I note that the “no personal attacks” rule is, big surprise, not enforced against those with whom the enforcee agrees on the point.
The “rules of the road” are, in fact, essentially the same for all vehicles allowed on the road. The same rules that apply to cyclists apply to other slow-moving traffic, for instance.
“blowing through” = distinct from “rolling stop”, which both cars and cyclists do. Again, people are being disingenuous to claim not to know the difference.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
Mike,
Comments sunny made that were deemed as personal attacks have been removed. Comments are not reviewed before posting (though that may change), so I remove them when I see them.
Let’s keep this about the issues people, not personal attacks. Mike is passionate and at times sarcastic, but that is not an excuse to call names. We will delete or edit any comments that are personal attacks on commenters.
Elliott, Editor
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
Elliott,
You might find my first comment “simplistic”; I find it amazing that such a simple thing as traffic law is, yes, flaunted so often. I agree with you that education certainly needs to be improved, however I don’t think the problem is uninformed cyclists so much as those who know exactly what the law is and disregard it. People such as Patrick R-I-L-E-Y and the “Are you trying to prove a point” rider in the original KVUE story, for example, do little more than irritate automobile drivers with a sense of entitlement. As if getting cycling legislation passed at *any* level isn’t already hard enough, they simply make it even harder. As if there aren’t enough cyclists who may not be aware of the law they provide horrific examples for the uninformed. They may be smaller in number than the uninformed riders but the damage they incur is enormous. Cyclists already face an uphill battle as it is.
“There are many kinds of vehicles that use our roads and there are DIFFERENT rules for all of them.”
Unfortunately, people usually forget or don’t realise the above. The differences between an automobile and bicycle rolling through a stop sign are many: average speed, mass of vehicle, danger to others vs. danger to operator, and visibility to name a few. The law should reflect this.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
Elliot, Thanks for raising awareness on this issue in particular and for such a great website covering all things cycling in Austin in general. I read it daily. The debate is healthy and I’m glad that we are all talking about it, but I hope we can somehow come to an agreement within the cycling community on a way to improve our image to the general population so we can be more successful in our endeavors. Given our lack of success on something as simple as the safe passing law, I’m afraid that the rolling stop law wouldn’t stand a chance in the current environment. That’s not to say that we shouldn’t talk about it and try to figure out whether it is safe or not, but the political climate in Texas isn’t in our favor right now and I believe that we have an obligation to make changes to improve that fact.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 10:19 pm
Wes,
I am a political professional, and I believe as a community we are just starting to tap into our potential political power. Things can happen a lot quicker than you think. Less than five years ago all the talk was of the Republican generational dominance of national politics. Where is the GOP today?
DON”T BE TIMID! We can change the political climate if we are willing to do the work and get over the egos.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 10:33 pm
I’m afraid that this issue crosses party lines, at least in Texas. TBC has been working on a safe passing law for at least three legislative sessions (6 years) and it really isn’t very controversial, as it simply requires cars to pass cyclists the same way that they would pass another motor vehicle. Change lanes or at least give three feet of clearance. The Idaho stop grants greater privileges to cyclists than it does to motorists by giving them permission to do something at an intersection that others can’t do. Even if it is logical, I just don’t think the legislature is going to willing to elevate us above motorists, at least until we can repair the damage that has already been done. Now, that’s just my opinion. If we can find sponsors for an Idaho Stop bill, I’m certainly not going to oppose it.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 10:43 pm
Well, Wes, beginning with “I just don’t think the legislature is going to. . .” is probably not going to get you to the finish successfully. Yes, BikeTexas has been working for multiple sessions, but they have not had the on the ground critical mass (pardon the pun) that is there right now and will likely increase. I do believe the organization has been too timid in the past, but I think that’s changing.
Setbacks if used properly can be a catalysis for making a movement stronger. The Democrats were all but dead in Texas in 2002, but the power grab of Tom Craddick and Tom Delay unified the party and now the Texas House is evenly split. Perry’s veto of the safe passing bill may be just what we needed to get serious. It’s about time.
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
I don’t mean to be pessimistic. That’s not normally my nature. Let’s saddle up. Have you talked to Robin at BikeTexas?
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 10:55 pm
If we do want to pursue this, I think the onus will be on us to provide evidence that such a law would be safer. I don’t think it will be enough to say that there is no evidence to prove that it is not safer. If we want the change, I think it’s fair to expect us to meet that burden. The problem that I have is that I’m not convinced that it is safer. Do we have any reliable studies demonstrating that a controlled rolling stop is safer than a complete stop?
on Jun 25th, 2009 at 11:25 pm
News from Bike Portland on their Idaho stop efforts. http://tinyurl.com/cphxoc. It appears that the proposed bill failed to get the necessary support this session and they are hoping to try again in the future.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 8:32 am
Wes,
This is likely an issue that will take at least a couple of sessions to get successfully resolved. Thanks for the link from Bike Portland. I think being more proactive in media outreach is the lesson to be learned there. I am supposed to meet with Robin at some point about some other things, and I’ll ask him about this as well.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 9:56 am
As I understand it, a car legally comes to a complete stop at a stop sign when the forward motion of the car ends. Most cars “almost” stop but legally fail to stop. I sat at that same intersection recently and I observed 12 cars out of 15 that did not come to a complete stop. Cars habitually roll stop signs. Where is the outrage???
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 9:59 am
So, I guess the question is, what do we encourage cyclists to do in the meantime while we are waiting for the law to change? If we know that running stop signs incite motorists against our cause (and if you read the comments in the KVUE articles that should be clear) and if we know that our chances of successfully passing an Idaho stop law in Texas is hurt by (and I believe irreparably so) angering the general population, wouldn’t we serve our best interests by encouraging cyclists to follow the current law? If you review the Bike Portland stories on the Idaho stop bill, you will see that it was killed by outcries of favoritism from the general population. Texas is not Oregon. I guess I’m just saying that we can wish for change all we want, but if we aren’t willing to make some changes ourselves to create an environment where change has a legitimate chance, our wishes will never come true. In your comparison of the Rep / Dem changes, you can’t ignore that there were a lot of things that lead to a climate for change including, but not limited to, an unpopular war, a failing economy, a widening gap between the haves and the have nots, etc. These factors created an environment where change could happen. What are we doing to create an environment that permits change? Running stop signs simply solidifies anti-cyclists’ positions by turning public opinion against us in this law and order state. I don’t think we will be able to even have an honest debate on the validity of the Idaho stop if we don’t first quell the public outrage against us. Austin cycling attorney, Lenore Shefman, recently reported that juries tend to find cyclists 30% liable in civil cases, even when there is no evidence to support any liability on the part of the cyclists. It is unacceptable that an injured cyclists loses 30% of his or her damages even when they did nothing wrong, but that’s the current environment.
I think that if you look at the reasons for not following the current law, you will see that they are all self-serving and they tend to infringe on the rights of others. Cyclists are not lazy people. If we were, we would be driving cars.
I also think there are also legitimate reasons to keep rules of the road simple. Stop means stop. It may not always be efficient, but everybody understands the meaning. When you add options at intersections, you add confusion and when you add confusion, you create problems and promote conflicts. Is he going to stop, is he going to slow down, should I go now or wait to see if he is going to stop, how slow does he need to go to determine whether or not it is safe to proceed, and, a big one, how do authorities enforce it.
Initially, Eugene bicycle advocates opposed the Idaho stop in Oregon for the reasons identified above. They revised their position from opposition to neutral after public pressure from the cycling community, but many bicycle safety experts recognize that an Idaho stop type law promotes uncertainty by having one set of rules for one type of vehicle, while having different rules for others further complicating the orderly flow of traffic.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 10:54 am
i’d like to apologize to m1ek. my “crazy” comments, were references to a previous post in this thread that i thought was funny, and were not intended as attacks.
m1ek, i will offer you two quotes from yourself, and just put a question-mark after them, not as an attack, but simply to ask what you mean.
“Anything that clearly doesn’t indicate an intention to stop (even if the wheels don’t rock back in the car’s case or the foot doesn’t go down in the bike’s case, modulo track-stands) is ‘blowing the stop’.”
and,
““blowing through” = distinct from “rolling stop”, which both cars and cyclists do. Again, people are being disingenuous to claim not to know the difference.”
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 11:13 am
i encourage cyclists to do two things: first, always ride your bike with the assumption that no car sees you, no car is going to obey stop signs, lights, speed limits, or lane lines. And second, COMMUNICATE/INTERACT with every car that you see while you’re riding. Look every driver in the eyes; even if you can’t see through the glare of the windscreen, you know where in the car the driver is…look there. Wave cars through at intersections when they don’t know what to do because they aren’t used to interacting with a bike. Indicate your intentions. Smile at them. Wave at them like they “allowed” you to go on your turn.
These things are simple and go a long way to making drivers less stressed around us.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 11:27 am
Sunny, I was pointing out that both bikes and cars do the “almost but not completely come to a stop” thing. It’s a common tactic of the folks trying to excuse the vastly different lawbreaking by cyclists to try to confuse the issue by pointing out that hardly anybody comes to a full and complete stop.
It’s like if you tell me that I shouldn’t speed excessively every day on the way to work and you take a picture of my speedometer and I’m going 120 in a school zone; but I see you going 66 in a 65 the next day and say “AHA! See? You do it too!”
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 11:33 am
Hayduke,
I think the outrage is more directed at the blatant non-stops than the near stops. I think the general population would be a lot less angry about the situation if 95% of cyclists slowed down to one or two feet per second, but then proceeded through the stop. A fellow cyclist did a small traffic study on Shoal Creek yesterday afternoon and posted the results on the ACA listserve. He broke it out into northbound and southbound traffic, but I’ve combined the two to produce the following results, as I feel that distinguishing based on direction unnecessarily complicates the results:
Vehicle Stopped Rolled Didn’t Slow Total
Cars 25 (30%) 53 (65%) 4 (5%) 82
Bikes 0 (0%) 6 (50%) 6 (50%) 12
In the interest of full disclosure, I don’t know how the individual who performed the study defined “Rollled.” As an LCI, I’m somewhat obligated to encourage lawful cycling so I can’t really recommend a roll instead of a full stop, but it would seem that slowing to 1 or 2 feet per second gives a cyclist a pretty good chance of observing the intersection while also somewhat demonstrating to motorists that he/she is making an effort. I really think it is the 50% of us who don’t come close who are hurting our efforts most, but that’s just my personal opinion. As a side note, the KVUE story found that 61% of cyclists didn’t slow at all. The percentages are not that far off (50 vs. 61), but KVUE reports that they observed 64 cyclists whereas the above study observed 12.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 1:02 pm
`Dave, speeding is directly responsible for far fewer collisions than failure to yield right-of-way.’ Sheesh. By that reasoning, DRUNK DRIVING is directly responsible for zero collisions. After all, it’s the drunk’s failure to yield that directly caused the accident, not his drunkenness.
Ditto for cell phone use, failed brakes, falling asleep while driving, etc.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 1:16 pm
To expand on my last comment, speeding itself doesn’t directly lead to accidents — it leads to a situation where one can’t avoid an accident or fails to avoid an accident. Ditto for drunk driving, by the way.
But what’s special about speeding is that the faster you’re going the higher your kinetic energy (double your speed, quadruple your kinetic energy, which will double your reaction distance and quadruple your stopping distance) which leads to much higher chances of serious damage or injury or death. Accidents caused by speeding that leads to a failure to yield are more likely to be fatal than accidents caused by a simple failure to yield at a lower rate of speed.
You can break the laws of Man, but breaking the laws of Physics is another matter entirely.
Speed thrills, and speed kills. I’m not saying that I never speed, but if you’re speeding and have an accident, do be aware that it’s more likely to be serious than an accident had when not speeding.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Doug, you are being disingenuous yet again. Speed is used as a ‘contributing factor’ any time the speed limit is exceeded – yet we know full well that many speed limits are set for reasons of politics rather than safety.
Yes, injuries could be more severe at speed. That doesn’t change the fact that failure to yield right of way is a far more serious infraction than minor speeding. The only reason you hear otherwise here is that cyclists, by and large, are incapable of speeding.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 2:19 pm
The are also, by and large, incapable of injuring motorists.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 3:59 pm
m1ek,
I hear what you’re saying…just didn’t pick up on it the first time around i guess. It’s actually, almost exactly what I am saying too. Minor speeding IS usually safe. I’m just making the additional statement that safely yeilding is also usually safe…
I may be a badass bike handler, but I find that I am able to yeild or take right-of-way, whichever is appropriate, without stopping completely at 9 out of 10 intersections. It sure would be great if I wasn’t breaking the law when I did that.
The “rules of the road” are really different for different types of vehichles. 18 wheelers are not allowed on certain roads(that’s an appropriate rule imo for 18 wheelers, not for cars though), motorcycles are allowed to split lanes(again, imo, an appropriate rule for motorcycles, absolutely NOT for cars). Sure, the CONCEPT of yeilding r-o-w is shared by all vehichle types, it is necessary that any user of the public roads understand when/where and how to yield. But the specific rules by which the basic concepts of driving are codified differ from vehichle type to vehichle type. Look at it this way, would you rather foot the bill for the city to outfit every intersection with another sign, specifically for cyclists, or would you rather change the rule so that Cyclists know that a stop sign may be interpreted as a yield sign…and don’t forget that a yield sign means STOP when it’s appropriate to do so.
I guess i really just differ with your opinion on one point. You say that, “failure to yield right of way is a far more serious infraction than minor speeding.” And I would simply modify that to say, failure to yield r-o-w CAN be a far more serious infraction. But nobody is asking that cyclists be exempted from having to yield r-o-w, just that specific regulations, appropriate to the vehichle-type be adopted, so that cyclists can yield r-o-w safely, and without stopping unneccessarily…do you have an issue with yield signs? People (as dumb as most of us are) don’t seem to have a problem figuring those out. What about the 4-way yield traffic circle things in Hyde Park and South Austin? People manage to not kill themselves at those intersections, even in cars, without stopping.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 4:32 pm
“I’m just making the additional statement that safely yeilding is also usually safe…”
And I’m saying that’s wrong. Stop signs are overplaced compared to yield signs, sure, but they’re still right-of-way control devices. And by the way, the closest I came to getting in a serious accident while driving was when one of you “safe yielders” ran a red light across 24th – leading me to swerve into oncoming traffic to avoid killing him; almost wrecking my car and the oncoming vehicle in the process.
You can say that guy didn’t do it right all you want. We don’t put up traffic control devices for the best users of the roadway system; though; we put them up to constrain everybody so the 5th-percentile guy won’t do something that endangers others.
And the basic rules of the road ARE the same for every vehicle. There’s so few exceptions that they require special signage. (18-wheelers can use every road that doesn’t explicitly say the contrary).
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 4:48 pm
I think I have to agree with Mike on this. With a few limited exceptions that discriminate against cyclists, the rules of the road are the same. The exceptions that I am thinking of are the “As far to the right as practicable” type laws. Those are designed to get us the hell out of motorists way so we don’t slow them down, but they hinder our ability to be seen and encourage motorists to try to squeeze past us so they make us less safe. I think we are more likely to see more discriminatory laws that harm us than help us, at least if we don’t get our act together and try to address motorists’ concerns.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
So, safely yielding is not safe? I can see the logical fallacy of that statement; can’t you?
I think, based on what you’ve said, that what you really mean is that some/most/all cyclists fall into that 5% of people who are incapable of making a decision, and so, shouldn’t be afforded the opportunity to make a decision…tell me if I’m mis-interpreting you.
Again, how do you feel about yield signs? They require that the vehichle operator assess his situation and make a decision to speed up, slow down, or stop altogether.
motorcycles don’t get signs telling them when they can/can’t split lanes, and 18 wheelers have oodles of rules that apply specifically to them…most of those rules are not indicated by signs on the road…but again, if that’s all it will take to convince you (i know, i don’t have to convince you, but i want to), then I’ll support putting a “bicycle only” yield sign at every 4-way stop in town…seems like a waste of resources and a cluttering of the street-scape to me…
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 5:59 pm
Sunny,
Could you please point us to the statute that allows motorcycles to split lanes. I know that cyclists are allowed to share a lane next to another cyclist (provided that they ride no more than two abreast and don’t impede traffic), but to me, splitting lanes means riding between two lanes of traffic. I don’t believe cyclists nor motorcyclists are allowed to do that in Texas. I have heard of it for motorcyclists in California, but not Texas.
In regard to the bicycle only yield signs, they don’t put those signs on all of the stop signs because the law currently requires bicyclists and motorist to obey the same traffic control devices in the same way. Under the Texas Transportation Code, a cyclist has all of the rights and responsibilities as a motorist with a few limited exceptions, as previously mentioned. If the city put up bicycle only yield signs, it would violate the Transportation Code. In regard to the yield signs in place today, those are usually found at locations where either there is a relatively long section of roadway where same direction traffic merges (freeway onramps and offramps). I know that there are a very small number of yield signs at some intersections throughout town, but most, if not all, are at three way intersections or at roundabouts, which is also a same direction merge situation but at much slower speeds. Of course, when they are used, neither motorists nor cyclists are required to come to a complete stop. Regarding the 5% comment, I didn’t raise this as an issue so I’ll let someone else address it.
I hope you understand that I’m not debating the validity of the Idaho stop on its merits. Certainly there are benefits to be had. I’m just saying that we may never get discuss its merits in a substantive way if we don’t first create some goodwill with the general population. The Idaho stop was killed in Oregon (home of the most bike friendly city in the US), which is much more progressive than Texas. If we were able to find a sponsor for an Idaho stop bill in the Texas Legislature, the non-cycling general public outcry would be much louder than it was in Oregon and we would be lucky to even get a hearing in committee.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 11:37 pm
Lane splitting — if a cyclist can be required to ride to the far right because the lane is wide enough for a bike and a car, that pretty much *requires* that lane splitting be legal.
(Well, lane splitting generally also means lane sharing. If you’re actually riding on the lane marker, that would seem to be illegal, but a bike can usually lane split without doing this. And of course a cop might hit you with the `as far right as practicable’ business if you were lane sharing and not in the far ride of the road.)
As for motorcycles lane splitting, there was a bill that was going to permit it, but it failed to pass. This blog –
http://motorcyclebloggers.com/2005/12/15/texas-lane-splitting/
got it wrong (read the comments.)
on Jun 27th, 2009 at 10:57 am
Without getting too deep into the legality/illegality of lane sharing/splitting or filtering, on pure safety grounds, I would not feel comfortable recommending it for any cyclist at an intersection. See http://bicyclesafe.com. Riding to the right of right turning traffic, whether you are sharing or splitting a lane (or even riding in a bike lane), leads to three of the most common types of bike-car crashes. See the Red Light of Death, The Right Hook, and the Right Hook Pt. 2 at the above website. These three types of common car-bike crashes are easily avoided if the cyclist is willing to take his/her place in the line of motor vehicles and wait his/her turn on a first come first served basis. It’s just a safer way to do things and is unquestionably legal.
on Jun 27th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
Sunny, the point is that an intersection with a yield sign has a yield sign. It doesn’t have a stop sign that some users can treat as a yield sign but other users cannot. Presumably, traffic engineers have determined that it’s safe for the 5% user to yield there.
Wes, “as far right as practicable” is largely an adaptation of “slower traffic keep right” which does apply to other roadway users.
on Jun 27th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
I think what I find discriminatory about the “far to the right” law is that a bicycle is the only vehicle that is sometimes expected to share a lane with another vehicle in the application of the law by law enforcement. I would not have a problem if the law required a cyclist to use the rightmost lane that serves their destination, with a few exceptions like one-way streets and when turning left. This FTR requirement in the law was discussed the the APD chief during the ACA meeting a few months ago and even the chief didn’t seem to understand that, in most cases, a cyclist is legally permitted to use the full lane. I think he has since been educated on how the law applies, but, in some parts of the country, we continue to hear about cyclists being ticketed for violating the FTR law and using the entire lane.
on Jun 29th, 2009 at 10:24 am
Wes,
I mis-spoke…the lane splitting bill died this session…all reports were favorable though…It will be back…Interesting too to note that lane splitting is not explicitly legal in California…neither is it explicitly forbidden…it is tolerated, as a policy, when it is done safely…so the police may still ticket lane splitters who are deemed to be doing it “unsfaely”…wow, a practicle solution to a real problem…without reinventing the wheel.
Also, the “roundabouts” where you see 4-way yield signs, were not roundabouts before, they were your standard 4-way stops…and at ANY yield sign you are REQUIRED to STOP if you have to in order to yield r-o-w…that decision is to be made by the driver…
How would bike-only yield signs be any more against the transportation code than bike lanes? I think that argument doesn’t really represent a major stumbling block.
perhaps the strategy for presenting an Idaho-like bill to TX should be a little different than it was for Oregon…It’s not difficult to imagine this as a Republican issue…
m1ek, what i think you’re ignoring is that, a yield sign is both, a “slow-down”, and a “sometimes stop” sign…so the decision-making by stupid people that you fear so much actually already happens at EVERY yield sign EVERY day by those very stupid people who you claim aren’t qualified to make that decision…your doomsday scenario has not unfolded…why not do you think?
on Jun 29th, 2009 at 10:26 am
Wes, if we didn’t have extra-wide lanes for the benefit of cyclists, it wouldn’t be an issue. If you want to go totally Forester, fine, but in the meantime and in the real world, if we create a ‘slow moving traffic area’ that’s too narrow for cars, we can expect slow-moving traffic that can fit to go there when practicable – and it’s not discriminatory.
on Jun 29th, 2009 at 3:05 pm
I guess we will have to agree to disagree, respectfully. The bicycle is the only vehicle that has a legal FTR obligation. While it is recommended that other slower vehicles move to the right hand lane, they are under no legal obligation to do so. Bicycles are the only vehicles singled out with the obligation codified in the Texas Transportation Code and, in my opinion, that’s discriminatory. I certainly have no objection to sharing a lane when it is safe to do so, but believe that I’m in the best position to evaluate the roadway and make that determination in a reasonable manner rather than a police officer insulated from the road surface and surrounds by a squad car and with no real bicycle experience. The problem with the law is that many police officers will read it and think that’s all they need to know about bicycles. They sometimes fail to understand that 551.103 has some broad exceptions that really do give a cyclist the right to the lane in most situations.
on Jun 29th, 2009 at 6:15 pm
First law enforcement should start by shutting down critical mass, until you enforce the laws on that lawless crowd the culture won’t change. Second enforce it on the many group rides around town that blow through stop signs.
2 there should be a real effort to pass the Idaho stop through the legislature, then enforce it.
on Jun 30th, 2009 at 11:09 am
“While it is recommended that other slower vehicles move to the right hand lane, they are under no legal obligation to do so. ”
You are wrong – there has occasionally even been enforcement of the “slower traffic keep right” rules on the highways.
on Jun 30th, 2009 at 11:11 am
“m1ek, what i think you’re ignoring is that, a yield sign is both, a “slow-down”, and a “sometimes stop” sign…so the decision-making by stupid people that you fear so much actually already happens at EVERY yield sign EVERY day by those very stupid people who you claim aren’t qualified to make that decision…your doomsday scenario has not unfolded…why not do you think?”
Because the intersection was deemed safe (by traffic engineers) for “slow-down and sometimes stop”. What part of this are you not getting?
on Jun 30th, 2009 at 7:51 pm
M1ek, I guess I’m unaware of the legal obligation that requires slower traffic to keep right. Could you please share the reference in the law that you believe places this obligation on slower traffic? The requirement for bicycles is found in Section 551.103 of the Texas Transportation Code. I would like to read the general “keep to the right” obligation for all vehicles.
I also checked the City of Austin’s traffic fine schedule here http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/court/fine_sch.htm and did find a fine associated with a vehicle that fails to drive in marked lanes, appearing to make it illegal for a motor vehicle to split lanes.
on Jul 1st, 2009 at 11:45 am
Wes, are you kidding me? I don’t have time for your homework assignment, but are you unfamiliar with the signs up and down the interstate?
on Jul 1st, 2009 at 2:04 pm
“Because the intersection was deemed safe (by traffic engineers) for “slow-down and sometimes stop”.
so you’re contending that traffic engineers (btw, you put way too much faith in beureaucrats) have assessed EVERY 4-way intersection in town, and only the handfull where we see roundabouts were deemed “safe”…hahaha, you are so wrong…
on Jul 1st, 2009 at 2:07 pm
m1ek, why not articulate YOUR points as opposed to defining yourself simply in opposition to what others are saying?
on Jul 1st, 2009 at 3:13 pm
Wes,
545.051…(b) An operator of a vehicle on a roadway moving more slowly than the normal speed of other vehicles at the time and place under the existing conditions shall drive in the right-hand lane available for vehicles, or as close as practicable to the right-hand curb or edge of the roadway, unless the operator is:
(1) passing another vehicle; or
(2) preparing for a left turn at an intersection or into a private road or driveway.
on Jul 1st, 2009 at 3:27 pm
while I’m at it, here’s another little tidbit…544.004…”(b) A provision of this subtitle requiring an official traffic-control device may not be enforced against an alleged violator if at the time and place of the alleged violation the device is not in proper position and sufficiently legible to an ordinarily observant person. A provision of this subtitle that does not require an official traffic-control device is effective regardless of whether a device is in place.”
hmmm, an “ordinary observant person”…”ordinary” means more than 50% (one synonym of the word is average)…notice how it does NOT say, that a sign should be sufficiently legible to the dumbest 5% of us…hmmm
on Jul 1st, 2009 at 3:33 pm
and my favorite…544.010, “(b) If safety requires, the operator of a vehicle approaching a yield sign shall stop as provided by Subsection (c).
(c) An operator required to stop by this section shall stop before entering the crosswalk on the near side of the intersection. In the absence of a crosswalk, the operator shall stop at a clearly marked stop line. In the absence of a stop line, the operator shall stop at the place nearest the intersecting roadway where the operator has a view of approaching traffic on the intersecting roadway.”
“IF SAFETY REQUIRES”…who do they think we are, a bunch of Einsteins? We need to be told exactly what to do…we cannot make decisions…That’s not a law, oh wait, it is.
on Jul 2nd, 2009 at 8:48 pm
Sunny,
Thanks for the cite. It helps to be able to read the law. However, I still believe the FTR law that is written for cyclists is discriminatory. If you will read the two laws carefully, you will see that the one that applies to motor vehicles allows the driver to use the full right hand lane. The one written for cyclists grants no such automatic right. Again, I’m not so much upset with the way the law is written, as with the way that it is enforced throughout the country. I can give you more examples if you need it, but here are two:
http://russroca.blogspot.com/2009/05/i-just-got-ticket-wtf.html
http://www.ohiobike.org/selz/Selz_Rt2Road.htm
The Selz case is an important one and I think every cyclist should read it. You will note that the original citation was for “impeding traffic.” However, if you will read through to the bottom, you will see that the judge seemed to believe that there was sufficient evidence to convict Selz on a FTR violation. However, since that was not the ticketed offense, the defense never was allowed to present evidence on the proper lane position.
Anyway, thanks for tracking down the motor vehicle version of the FTR law. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I would be happy with a law that required a cyclists to use the rightmost lane that leads to their destination, except when turning left, one way streets, etc., similar to the motor vehicle version.
on Jul 3rd, 2009 at 9:32 am
Sunny, once again, you’re arguing for one class of road users to be able to treat a sign as meaning one thing, while the rest of the road users get to treat it as a different thing.
This is very very different from sticking up a Yield sign – where every road user can do the same thing. Yield signs were put up after an intersection’s sight lines were analyzed; after traffic volumes were checked out (or known ahead of time to be trivially low); etc.
What about this is so hard for you to understand?
on Jul 21st, 2009 at 9:34 am
Let me tell you what the Idaho law has done for cyclists here in Boise.
I’ve seen riders flying down the road approaching a stop sign where I have just stopped and have the right-of-way. They are expecting to zip right in front of me without yielding or even slowing down. When I don’t give them the right of way, they get upset.
In one instance, had I not paid attention and just taken my turn, a cyclist would have hit me. But I give her time to slow down and to ride around me as I was leaving the stop sign.
Why would she be upset when clearly I had the right-of-way?
That’s the way it is here in Boise (I can’t speak for all of Idaho). Cyclists I’ve seen are arrogant and feel they own the road. I’ve seen people riding two across in the middle of the road when there’s an empty bike lane. I’ve seen cyclists zip in and out of the bike lane into the street in front of me and get upset when I want to get around them. It makes me nervous!
So from what I see, it’s made them feel as though no laws apply to them and every accident is blamed on careless motorists. This is just crap. Who would want to hit someone?
Boise has really grown in the past 20 years, not the rate of Austin, but it has taken off. The state has generously provided bike lanes on almost every major road in the city. Yet I see riders on the sidewalk. One almost hit me the other day when I turned to hear what I thought was a goose but it was someone saying, “On your right!”
Maybe I’m callous. But Ive seen these laws create a biking community that feels the motorists are persecuting them and they’re all to blame for accidents when there is no enforcement of using the lanes or of the yield law.
My two cents.
on Oct 11th, 2010 at 3:52 pm
> Let me tell you what the Idaho law has done for cyclists here in
> Boise.
>
> I’ve seen riders flying down the road approaching a stop sign where I
> have just stopped and have the right-of-way. They are expecting to
> zip right in front of me without yielding or even slowing down.
> When I don’t give them the right of way, they get upset.
Well, here’s the thing — even with the Idaho stop being law, what you’ve described is still illegal. In that situation, the cyclist is supposed to yield to you.
And it also happens in places where the Idaho stop isn’t law (i.e. it happens outside of Idaho too.)
So, I would suggest that this behavior is *not* the result of the “Idaho stop” law, and must instead come from something else.