Columbia, Missouri – known as “The Berkeley of the Ozarks” – has passed a law against road-raging against bikers.
My jury is still out on the law itself – stupid road rage is stupid road rage, no matter who it’s aimed at.
But this op-ed in the Wichita paper touches on some preconceptions that need to get looked at:
Imagine if you will, cruising down the street in your car when you come upon several bicyclists heading the same direction that you are going. It’s a busy street and they are riding two and maybe even three wide, and you’re not able to get around them for quite some time. What do you do?
That does depend on local laws. Bikes are entitled to half a lane and three feet of clearance in Minnesota (assuming I have it correct). They’re also well-advised to clear out of the way of traffic, into the parking lane, if people are piling up behind them; tense drivers are dangerous drivers.
You might decide to hit your horn to encourage them to move over a bit. You may shout at them, telling them to get off of the road, or, as you finally do pass them, you may extend a hand and a certain finger while yelling obscenities at them. Now I would never endorse nor do the two latter ones, there have been plenty of times when my horn was put into effect.
As of this past Monday, all of those reactions could cost a heavy fine or even land you in jail for up to a year over in Columbia, Mo. The Columbia City Council passed an ordinance prohibiting such road rage geared towards bicyclists. Don’t be surprised if that trend starts to take hold here in Kansas, especially over in Lawrence.
Enh. Road rage should be illegal, no matter who the target is. Bikers are more vulnerable, since we’re not wrapped in a ton of metal, but rage is rage.
But here’s where we get into preconceptions:
I understand that road rage is high, especially against bike riders. The general knowledge, or I should say, what everyone thinks concerning bicyclists may be wrong. They do have a right to the road just as much as cars do. I don’t have a problem with that. What I have a problem with is the fact that bicyclists are supposed to follow the same rules as cars do.
Stopping at stop signs and red lights. Signaling when turning.
Well, no kidding. I mean, bikes are vehicles, and they should act like vehicles – right?
I mean, just like the semis on Summit Avenue have to follow “turn on red” rules, and dirt bikes on University Avenue have to mind the speed limit, and mopeds are allowed to use the shoulders on the freeway just like MTC buses, and bicycles have to maintain proper clearance on the freeways!
Well, no – semis aren’t allowed on Summit, dirt bikes aren’t allowed on the street until you slap a lights and signals on ’em, and mopeds aren’t allowed on the road at all (much less freeway shoulders), and bicycles aren’t allowed on the Interstate.
Vehicles are not one size fits all, even in the eyes of the law. They have different rules.
I’m an advocate of the Boise Stop rule, in which bikes are allowed to treat stop signs as “Yield” signs, and stoplights as stop signs. It doesn’t change the rules of the road – just makes them safer. Intersections where cars and bikes aren’t mingling about as fake equals are just plain safer. Having bikes and cars trying to accelerate out of corners together is bad news – getting through or out of intersections is always good if you’re a biker – and that doesn’t even address the stress injuries caused by sitting too long at pointless lights, letting ones’ muscles get all cold, then heated up, then cold again.
So yeah, bikers should follow the rules. But the rules should make sense, too.
Yeah, my life would be soo much easier if I didn’t have to stop that big huge truck at pointless lights also. Not to mention the time and fuel it takes to get back up to speed. Then you get these idiot 2 wheelers who decide they need to race me away from said light and thereby increase their exposure to me forgetting or not noticing they are there. We’ve spent millions, or rather probably billions, building bike paths and wide sidewalks–use them!
I ask this with all respect: are you insane, Mitch?
Tell me, exactly, how it is safer for bicyclists to run red lights, rather than wait? And how it is safer for a car to have to stop at a four-way while the bicyclist whizzes through?
If a light is pointless, isn’t it pointless for all vehicles?
Nope, I’m sorry. We need predictable, repeatable behavior on the road. And that means that all vehicles that are allowed on a road need to follow the same predictable rules.
Consider this: if bicyclists are given special privileges, allowing them to disregard certain traffic controls that other road users must obey on pain of heavy fines, will that increase or decrease incidents of road rage against bikers?
And one more thing: Honking, yelling and finger-raising is usually protected speech, unless that speech includes or implies threats. “Get off the road, you moron!” isn’t, and shouldn’t be, illegal.
Ahhh, my old college town, still crazy after all these years.
So, flip off another motorist – bad form, but legal. Flip off a bicyclist, and it’s a hate crime. Sure, they’re just calling it “road rage”, but special laws for special groups, based on interpreting the mindset of the alleged offender – sounds like hate crime to me.
And when did honking, flipping and cursing become “rage”? Those sound more like peevishness to me than rage which speaks of uncontrollable anger, physical assault or brandishing of weapons. In fact, honking/flipping/cursing sound more like controlled anger, intended to vent one’s frustrations.
On the plus side, if they were to implement heavy fines for such behavior aimed at all other vehiclists (car or bike) in Manhattan they could probably pay off the Bush deficit (it wouldn’t come close to paying the Obama deficit).
are you insane, Mitch?
Perhaps. But not on this subject.
For starters – read more carefully:
Tell me, exactly, how it is safer for bicyclists to run red lights, rather than wait?
Well, that WOULD be insane. Good thing that’s not what I propose, or what the law in Boise is. Bikes would treat stop lights like stop signs – meaning they come to a full stop and waiting for any cross traffic.
And how it is safer for a car to have to stop at a four-way while the bicyclist whizzes through?
I’m not sure where “whizzing through” comes into this. Four-way stops are still four-way stops; “whizzing through” one is a good way to end up dead.
If a light is pointless, isn’t it pointless for all vehicles?
For vehicles that can crush other vehicles and kill people? What do you think?
For vehicles that can’t damage other vehicles in the least, and who are at a crushing disadvantage in the dash from the line when a normal light changes? Not at all.
Nope, I’m sorry. We need predictable, repeatable behavior on the road.
What’s unpredictable about bikes stopping, yielding and staying out of the way?
Consider this: if bicyclists are given special privileges,
What “special privilege?” There’s no “privilege” here. It’s a way of treating a signal. If anything, it’s a special responsibility.
allowing them to disregard
And at the risk of repeating myself – no. No no no. There’s no “disregard” involved at all.
certain traffic controls that other road users must obey on pain of heavy fines, will that increase or decrease incidents of road rage against bikers?
I’m less concerned with “road rage” (indeed, I think the law in Columbia MO is stupid) than with bikers getting killed and maimed while waiting for signals to change, or in the crush of motor vehicles charging across the street when the lights change and they’re often essentially invisible (compared to the motor vehicles around them). Bikers are pretty much always safer when they’re out *away* from motor vehicles and able to keep moving, as opposed to trying to negotiate moving in a pack of cars, any one of which could run us over and not even know we were there. Ever gotten pissed at a driver who turns without signalling? That’s the kind of thing that kills bikers. It’s the best reason to get *out* of packs of cars.
And one more thing: Honking, yelling and finger-raising is usually protected speech, unless that speech includes or implies threats. “Get off the road, you moron!” isn’t, and shouldn’t be, illegal.
As noted above, I think the Columbia MO law is stupid. Yelling and gesticulating should either be legal, or considered an imminent threat of death or great bodily harm for purposes of affirmative self-defense.
(Joking on that last bit).
The trick with red lights is that the sensors that switch ’em don’t detect bicycles reliably as they do most cars and trucks. So if you’re going a way a car is not going, you can either use the pedestrian signals, crossing lanes of traffic to get there, or you can sit there a long time, or you can break the law by running the red light. The difficulty is really the consequence of trying to maximize the roads for cars instead of building adequate roads to allow reasonably flowing traffic.
Regarding sidewalks, it’s not legal to ride on them in most places, especially at the 20-25mph a healthy male can ride at times (35mph and up downhill). Bike paths are somewhat better, but you’re still limited to 10-15mph, they don’t tend to go anywhere (they’re really recreational in intent), and they tend to be poured very thin. Hence they crack as soon as a grass root grows beneath them.
yeah, your tax dollars at work. But if you want me to ride the sidewalks and bike paths, well, will you volunteer to pay the fines and fix my spokes?
That said, I can’t quite figure out how honking a horn or flipping someone off qualifies as road rage. Helping me suffer from my “sheet metal allergy” does, but honking is simply rude.
Traffic rules need to be adjusted for different classes of traffic. A bicycle isn’t the same as either a pedestrian or a motor vehicle. That Boise stop rule sounds like a good way to handle the stop sign problem. When I come up to an intersection on a bicycle, I can see and hear other traffic quite well without slowing down much. When I come to the same intersection in an eighteen wheeler, I can only hear very loud outside noises, and it takes a good deal more head turning and leaning this way and that, to determine if traffic is clear. In the truck I am much more dependant on the traffic signs and rules of right of way to keep me safe, than I am on a bicycle.
Pay the fines and fix your spokes for you using a bike path? WTF? Mitch, this is the bicyclist loonacy I was talking about. Not to mention this hate speech law in Missouri.
Er, KRod? You need to read more carefully.
Go back and do that, and then try it again.
Typical liberal behavior, rules for thee and not for me. This sounds like a great way to stir up even more bike hatred than already exists at a high level. Bikers either need to follow the rules of the road or get off of the road. END OF STORY.
I have stated that deciding to play in traffic with large vehicles that regularly kill the drivers of other large vehicles is insane. Also, the roads were not designed for bikes and motor vehicles and bikes lose in almost every mishap. Now you want a “make up your own rules for toys” law?
Your Boise stop law sounds like a recipe for Minnesota Road kill.
I bet Amy Klobuchar would love to talk to you about you ideas. They are just the sort of thing she loves to waste time on. Flash can introduce you and get you your DFL membership card.
Was just in Boise, visiting a friend who usually puts in his 100 miles a week cycling. He didn’t mention any trouble with that Boise rule, or any unusual number of bike wrecks. May actually work with a little good will.
Most of the trouble in matters like these comes from framing every issue in them/us terms: cyclists vs. motorists, hunters vs. birdwatchers, etc. I’m a “cyclist,” but like most cyclists I regularly motorize more miles than I cyclize, so why should I have to take a side? I spend more time observing wildlife than trying to shoot game, but I can get along with myself as a hunter. Avoiding the win-lose mentality in these and similar affairs is half the battle.
As to rules of the road, my observation is that — in MN at least — we still have some way to go in teaching the simple lesson that bicycles are to be ridden with, rather than against, vehicular traffic. I suppose kids learn early to walk facing traffic, and carry the habit over to bikes. That, to my mind, is where law enforcement could appropriately intervene with a warning for children or a ticket for adults. Much more important than stop vs. yield, or riding on our far-too-empty sidewalks.
Tracy,
What Bill said. Making this is not only a pointless us vs. them question, but in fact is exactly the way a gutless liberal hamster who’d weaned at the teat of Saul Alinsky would approach this sort of argument.
Typical liberal behavior, rules for thee and not for me.
Your reading comprehension is a dubious as your taste in liquor.
This sounds like a great way to stir up even more bike hatred than already exists at a high level.
Other peoples’ hatred and bigotry is their problem; not mine.
Bikers either need to follow the rules of the road or get off of the road. END OF STORY.
The rules need to make sense, just as rules are tailored for every other specific type of vehicle where it’s appropriate. END OF STORY IF YOU ARE SMART AND HAVE ACCEPTABLE READING COMPREHENSION.
I have stated that deciding to play in traffic with large vehicles that regularly kill the drivers of other large vehicles is insane.
Ah. You have “regularly stated it”. Well, that’s different then! With authority like that, you should be writing for Wikipedia! Or Dump Bachmann!
Also, the roads were not designed for bikes and motor vehicles and bikes lose in almost every mishap. Now you want a “make up your own rules for toys” law?
Your reading comprehension fails you again. Read the post; try to get what I actually wrote this time.
Your Boise stop law sounds like a recipe for Minnesota Road kill.
Only for stupid operators (bike or car).
I bet Amy Klobuchar would love to talk to you about you ideas. They are just the sort of thing she loves to waste time on. Flash can introduce you and get you your DFL membership card.
Har di har har! Plug your ears and keep repeating the same old long-debunked shrieking points! You should write for “MN Progressive Project!”
(Sheesh. I can’t believe anyone, much less Tracy, tried to pull that “END OF STORY” thing. What is this, sixth grade?)
Oh, and that “efficiency is patriotic” thread of yours? I read your “schedule”, and thought “Maaaaan, I remember when I could be such a slacker”. Good Lord, man, you would have a coronary if you tried to keep up with me, even in a car.
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