From: gooch@leland.Stanford.EDU (Carl Gooch)
Subject: Re: Ticketing illegal cycling
Organization: DSG, Stanford University, CA 94305, USA
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 92 22:25:24 GMT

In article <1992Nov1.083228.2232@netcom.com>, tomk@netcom.com (Thomas H. Kunich) writes:
|> In article <1992Oct30.221533.4611@ncar.ucar.edu> ilana@kiowa.scd.ucar.edu (Ilana Stern) writes:
|> 
|> >Number of years riding: 14
|> >Number of times being run over by a car driver turning left or right 
|> >	into me: 0
|> >Number of times being t-boned by another cyclist: 2

This is, of course, anecdotal evidence, but someone (I forget who) did ask
for it specifically.

|> There is a man who has been struck by lightning 6 times. I suggest that 
|> either you and he have a serious problem with luck, or that you have
|> the need for a more alert attitude while on the bike.

I would say that if Ilana has avoided being hit by turning cars for 14 years,
she is either a) very lucky, b) _extremely_ alert while cycling, or c) both.
My personal experience leads me to expect that about once every two months
someone will turn close enough in front of me to require evasive action on
my part.

By the same token, while riding on campus at Stanford, I find that somewhere
around once a week I have to take evasive action to avoid a cyclist.  This is
due in part to the large number of cyclists on campus, in part to the brain-dead
way in which many of them ride, and in part to the random traffic patterns on
campus.  Unlit cyclists at night are a special problem category which the
Stanford police only sporadically try to address.  I wouldn't expect the 
situation to be significantly different at other universities, and since 
Boulder is a college town, I suspect that riding near UColorado could be an 
adventure.

|> >Ah.  So anything short of death does not impress you.  Other people,
|> >however, find broken bones, knocked-out teeth, even severe road rash
|> >to be more than mere inconveniences.
|> 
|> A good friend of mine was negotiating an intersection in San Francisco.
|> While she was still in the intersection the light turned green and a 
|> pedestrian stepped off of the curb directly in front of her. The colision
|> slightly damaged the pedestrian and broke the riders face in several
|> locations, as well as her palate and teeth.
|> 
|> Since there are many times more of these dangerous pedestrians around than
|> these dangerous bicyclists perhaps you ought to be discussing the very
|> real problems of the danger pedestrians pose to bicycle riders.

Do you happen to know the relative frequency of serious ped-bike crashed vs.
bike-bike crashes?  If so, please enlighten us so that we will be aware of 
the scope of this problem.  If not, your anecdotal evidence is just that.

|> >In the state of Colorado, most crashes do not involve motor vehicles.
|> 
|> Another example of someone misusing statistics. _Most_ serious
|> accidents involve motor vehicles and the vast majority of fatalities
|> involve motor vehicles.
|> 
|> Most reported accidents on bicycles are relatively minor and
|> while reportable are common accidents involving children and
|> new riders. These have about as much in common with the accidents
|> that we are discussing as falls in the bath tub do.
|> 
|> But be very sure that you use figures that don't differentiate between
|> these two cases so that the statistics will prove anything you wish to
|> prove.

Speaking of statistics, you might try citing some.  But be sure to follow your
own advice and make certain that they prove your point.

|> >Again I am astounded by people who see that the idiocy of automobile 
|> >pilots is likely to have a more severe effect on a cyclist than the
|> >idiocy of another cyclist (which I will agree with), and infer from that 
|> >that idiot cyclists are not a problem.
|> 
|> It would be quite interesting to know what the hell that is suppose
|> to mean. This all seems to be an indictment of any bicyclist that 
|> ever ignores any traffic law whatsoever.

I would interpret that statement to mean that merely because car-bike 
accidents are, typically, more damaging to the cyclist than bike-bike
accidents is no excuse to dismiss the problems caused by cyclists riding
in violation of both statutes and common sense.  It's very easy, as far
as I'm concerned, for a cyclist to violate traffic laws without being an 
idiot.

|> If you stop at every stop sign I would be completely dumbfounded. It
|> has been my experience that those who bitch the most about people
|> running stop signs are the very first to do so as soon as they get tired.

I think this is the beside the point.  It is one thing to object to cyclists
running stop signs at any time, and another to object to cyclists causing
accidents by running stop signs.  Regardless of one's opinion on the former,
it's hard to disagree with the latter.  

And, if I recall, Ilana stated categorically that she had been T-boned by 
unlit cyclists running stop signs at night.  These people are pretty clearly 
idiots, and natural selection will doubtless take care of them if they don't 
wise up.  But in the interim, they do pose a problem.  Pretending they don't
doesn't make the problem go away.

Carl

-- 
Carl Gooch                     |      Confidence:  The feeling you get just
gooch@leland.stanford.edu      |      before you discover you're wrong.