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How to Not Get Hit by Cars

bicyclesafe.com

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Re: How to Not Get Hit by Cars

#111

Post by alistairSH »

SimonPStevens wrote: post #71

Regarding number 4, "Don't ride against traffic." Seems pretty obvious, but in my local area they've started building bike lanes for both directions on a single side of the road [1]. It's great that they have nice wide bike lanes with some separation from the cars, but quite frankly it's an accident waiting to happen at the junctions with one of the bike lanes running opposite to the expected flow of traffic. Cars pu…

That sounds like a terrible design. Or rather, a reasonable design implemented poorly. I don’t have a problem with double bike lanes, but they have to be signed properly for the reasons you mention. And they should be continuous - forcing one direction to periodically divert onto sidewalks is bonkers.

After seeing some of the designs of bike lanes, sidewalks, etc in my area, I’m convinced the traffic engineers are either 100% incompetent or they’re all anti-bike/pro-car. State funding requires bike infrastructure when major roadworks are planned, but it doesn’t appear to require bike infrastructure that makes any sense.

Re: How to Not Get Hit by Cars

#112

Post by sokoloff »

yt-sdb wrote: post #85
Fricken wrote: post #40

I've been commuting by bicycle for nearly 40 years, under a broad array of circumstances, and the article's advice checks out with my own personal rules. Although the vast majority of the crashes and wipeouts I've suffered involved no cars, just me losing control. However, over hundreds of wipeouts accumulated over a lifetime of cycling, I have never hit my head! Wiping out is a skill. A skill best cultivated when on…

For anyone else reading this, hundreds of wipeouts is many standard deviations away from the mean. As a point of comparison, I've been biking for 10+ years and bike commuting for ~5 of those. I've had exactly one wipeout, the first time I wore clip in shoes.

That seemed like a lifetime count of wipeouts (including as a kid and while learning). I don’t know my lifetime count, but I could believe it’s around 100.

Re: How to Not Get Hit by Cars

#113

Post by solar-ice »

dotancohen wrote: post #98

Car driver here, not a bicyclist. I don't see your side of the story, and probably never will unless I kill one of you. Don't want me to hit you? Make yourself visible and courteous. Put on a bright jacket, bright helmet, or something else bright. And use a steady (not flashing) red light in the back and a steady (not flashing) white light aimed at the ground in the front. If you use flashing lights I cannot tell how…

Overtake a cyclist like you would overtake a car. Move to the next lane. If you can't safely do that, you shouldn't be driving.

Re: How to Not Get Hit by Cars

#114

Post by sokoloff »

wongarsu wrote: post #57
FatalLogic wrote: post #42

>#2 The Door Prize: A driver opens his door right in front of you. If you have time to react to a car door suddenly opening in front of you, is it best to go around the door? Or should you brake and stop in a straight line, even if you might crash into the door and the person stepping out of the car? The same site contains a list of cyclist fatalities[0]. In over 95% of the car door collisions, the bicyclist was kill…

I think it's similar to car collisions: swerving is tempting because you might prevent the crash, but often taking the crash head on at the lowest speed possible is much safer. A compounding effect for cyclists is that usually you have a shorter stopping distance in a straight line (since bicycles don't have ABS, so you have to limit breaking while steering)

With or without ABS, stopping distances are shortest when not asking a tire to generate lateral forces as well.

Re: How to Not Get Hit by Cars

#116

Post by Bostonian »

avianlyric wrote: post #54
Bostonian wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I live, the cars greatly outnumber bikes. Cyclists that go in the main traffic lane will slow things down substantially, and I think that is inconsiderate.

I think hitting cyclists with cars and horrifically injuring them is inconsiderate. But each to their own.

You are putting words in my mouth. Of course I am against hitting cyclists, and I have never done so.

Re: How to Not Get Hit by Cars

#117

Post by thomasahle »

Retric wrote: post #78
hammock wrote: post #2

So much of this advice is “ride to the left” and I wish to emphasize it. Novice riders are trained to stick to an invisible (or painted) bike lake which ends up with them being far less visible than they need to be. Your safety is more important than some car’s need to get to work 5 seconds faster, and you shouldn’t feel controlling anxiety if some idiot honks at you for riding in the main traffic lane. You have righ…

Just understand if you take up a traffic lane when a bike lane is right next to you, some cars will pass you then slow down to walking speed in front of you. Hostility results in hostility, and you’re not surrounded by steel.

> some cars will pass you then slow down to walking speed in front of you.

I have never heard of this happening to anybody.

Re: How to Not Get Hit by Cars

#118

Post by nojs »

avianlyric wrote: post #107
dotancohen wrote: post #98

Car driver here, not a bicyclist. I don't see your side of the story, and probably never will unless I kill one of you. Don't want me to hit you? Make yourself visible and courteous. Put on a bright jacket, bright helmet, or something else bright. And use a steady (not flashing) red light in the back and a steady (not flashing) white light aimed at the ground in the front. If you use flashing lights I cannot tell how…

> You've got a right to use the lane just as much as I do, but be a good citizen and actually let me pass you safely. If you hear me coming up behind you or notice my flashing high beams, please dip to the right a bit so that I can continue past you and leave you safely. Do you take the same approach to cars? Or do you reserve such aggressive tactics only for vulnerable road users? As you say, bike user have just as…

You’re missing the major point that bikes go much slower than cars, so it makes sense for traffic flow to let cars pass safely.

Re: How to Not Get Hit by Cars

#119

Post by wongarsu »

83457 wrote: post #103
wongarsu wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The laws are for public roads (public in the sense of "you can drive there without driving through a gate of some sort"). The same places where all other traffic laws apply. That includes bike paths, but excludes most hiking paths where you would want to drive a mountain bike. Mountain bikes often don't come with light or a bell, and if you want to use them on public roads you have to spend about $12 to fix that ($2…

Was a confusing way to describe it. I meant road cyclists on surrounding flat and mountain roads. Probably a moot question now given advances in technology making everything lighter and smaller.

Even in a rural environment you will be hard pressed to get from A to B as a cyclist without being required to have lights and a bell.

In general service roads that run through a forest tend to be private roads where you don't have to follow that rule, everything else tends to be a public road. On anything that's just a flat place but isn't road like you're also scot-free.

But as you say, lights really aren't the bulky things they used to be.

Re: How to Not Get Hit by Cars

#120

Post by Lanolderen »

avianlyric wrote: post #89
jfabre wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both are. I've done both for a long time, forcing everyone to go at 30 km/h in a 50 zone is inconsiderate. Not as inconsiderate as not being careful around cyclists when you drive. This looks like a system design problem to me. The needs of the cyclists don't match the needs of the drivers. This is why we are fighting over this. There has to be a solution, but I know nothing about civil engineering.

There is a solution! Protected cycle lanes! Keep cycles, cars and pedestrians physically separated. Inside towns and cities we should be looking to give up road space for cars, to put in dedicated cycle infrastructure. Dedicated cycle infrastructure keeps cars and cycles separate, makes cycling safer, and most importantly more accessible and friendly. Every additional cycle on the road during rush hour is one less ca…

Or cyclists can be incentivised to move to small motorcycles (pedelec if they want to stay fit) and we avoid the whole issue of converting car lanes to bicycle lanes and then reverting that decision because a traffic jam occurred and residents were not impressed, wasting money in the process ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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