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Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

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Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#321

Post by mmooss »

jart wrote: post #303
freeone3000 wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We do have political power; if you’re in the US, you had the opportunity to exercise it in the last week. Your local elected officials make the plans for roads and bike lanes and zoning and parking lots and variances; and they are usually quite responsive to the voting public.

lol that voting is power. double lol if you think local elected officials plan anything.

Mine do. There is a political process via the legislature and executive, a public planning process that includes multiple technocratic agencies, and then often another political process when citizens who ignored all that realize what's about to happen. Where I live, people complain that there is too much planning and it takes too long (except when it's something they don't want!).

Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#322

Post by exe34 »

Tade0 wrote: post #314
exe34 wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

trams are pretty damn loud as well, but I guess people can be very distracted. to be fair though, getting hit by a tram in a car instead of on a bike probably wouldn't be any more fun.

Survivability is much greater though. Funnily enough it happens approximately 100 times every year in my city of 650k, but fatalities are rare (I'm not aware of any). Pedestrians are less fortunate, as a few die annually being hit/run over by a tram. But I would rather restrict cycling than trams, as the latter perform a valuable service.

would you restrict pedestrians too?

people forget that cyclists can also get off their bikes and push them along like pedestrians. just put a big sign, and if needed, post a policeman with a ticket book. or make the pavement bumpy enough and they'll get off voluntarily.

Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#323

Post by mmooss »

Lio wrote: post #246
mmooss wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you see drivers regularly hitting people? You don't think almost anyone would be horrified if they hit a person? I don't have evidence, but let's not imagine people are the sociopaths they claim to be on the Internet.

YouTube is littered with examples of drivers and their passengers attacking cyclists. There is a whole industry dedicated to selling cameras and warning radar for cyclists because driver attacks are so common in fact. Every serious cyclist I know has a few stories. One of mine includes a passenger leaning out of a car trying to put a plastic bag over my head. Another has a builder stop his van to threaten me with a c…

Youtube and social media have all sorts of things that are badly misrepresented, especially sensationalized paranoid stories. I wouldn't take social media as evidence of anything.

I know plenty of cyclists. While some have had accidents with cars, some drivers have driven away rather than face the consequences, I've never heard these stories of naked aggression. I've heard of the occasional argument, but often a self-righteous cyclist is involved.

Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#324

Post by mmooss »

faer12321 wrote: post #212
mmooss wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you see drivers regularly hitting people? You don't think almost anyone would be horrified if they hit a person? I don't have evidence, but let's not imagine people are the sociopaths they claim to be on the Internet.

I see drivers regularly perform dangerous overtakes. They do these stuffs and expect the other person to avoid them instead. To me that is very much not "drivers are very adverse to hitting people".

Do they understand the danger? I think most drivers, having never been out there, vulnerable, on a bike, don't grasp the risk and the alarm they cause.

Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#325

Post by mmooss »

scott_w wrote: post #230
mmooss wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could say that jumping out of a plane without a parachute isn't dangerous, it's the ground that's dangerous. Cyclists make mistakes, make bad judgments, take big risks, just like car drivers. They are human too. You could say cyclists have a bigger incentive to avoid problems, but no driver I know wants to hit someone and injure them, and cyclists I know become inured to the risks after riding for years without i…

> Cyclists make mistakes Stats in the UK show that the majority of car/bicycle collisions are due to driver error, not cyclist error. Given the USA standard of driving is much lower, and policing is much less consistent, I’d put good money on that being higher in the USA. > Cars and bikes don't mix Yes but you’re looking at the wrong category of people making the mistake.

It seems irrational and transparently self-righteous for cyclists to claim to be victims or somehow superior.

Why would Homo sapiens on bicycles be any less prone to error or negligence or aggression than those in automobiles? Often, the same person does both (at different times)!

Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#326

Post by mmooss »

kmoser wrote: post #217
nl wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> no driver I know wants to hit someone and injure them As a cyclist I don't think this is completely true. I've been in cars with drivers who do dangerously close passes on cyclists and the common excuse is "oh I just want to scare them" or similar. So while I guess it's technically true that even these drivers don't technically want to hit the cyclist the distinction is somewhat moot.

There is something about bicyclists, and especially skaters, that leads to active hostility from drivers. On at least two occasions, I've had cars purposely try to hit me when I was skating. I know it was on purpose because in one case the driver said "you're not a vehicle" as he came within inches of hitting me, and in another case the driver, completely unprovoked, began cursing loudly and tried to run me off the r…

> I wouldn't want to get hit by a car going 15 mph.

Agreed, f=ma and the car has 10x the mass of you and your bike.

I meant that if they are moving at the same rate then accidents are much less likely. Even when it's just cars and no bikes, if most cars are moving at 80 km/h then a car moving at 20 km/h creates much higher risk of accidents.

Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#327

Post by mmooss »

bluecalm wrote: post #198
mmooss wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could say that jumping out of a plane without a parachute isn't dangerous, it's the ground that's dangerous. Cyclists make mistakes, make bad judgments, take big risks, just like car drivers. They are human too. You could say cyclists have a bigger incentive to avoid problems, but no driver I know wants to hit someone and injure them, and cyclists I know become inured to the risks after riding for years without i…

When you speed, use your phone when driving or ignore basic safety rules then you can't really say you don't want to hit someone or injure someone. I mean you can say that but it's as believable as shooting your rifle without looking in general direction of a crowd of people and then saying you really didn't mean to shoot anyone.

I see cyclists using their phones - looking at them - while riding on streets.

Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#328

Post by mmooss »

totalcode wrote: post #213
mmooss wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could say that jumping out of a plane without a parachute isn't dangerous, it's the ground that's dangerous. Cyclists make mistakes, make bad judgments, take big risks, just like car drivers. They are human too. You could say cyclists have a bigger incentive to avoid problems, but no driver I know wants to hit someone and injure them, and cyclists I know become inured to the risks after riding for years without i…

Of course no one wants to hit and injure other people. But every one want to get ahead of traffic, and then ignore the fact that more dangerous maneuver = more chance of hitting someone. Saying "no driver I know wants to hit someone and injure them" is just playing with semantics.

Yes, there are other motivations, but I think the desire to avoid hurting someone is a powerful one.

> But every one want to get ahead of traffic

They should get a bike! :)

Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#329

Post by mmooss »

PittleyDunkin wrote: post #161
mmooss wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could say that jumping out of a plane without a parachute isn't dangerous, it's the ground that's dangerous. Cyclists make mistakes, make bad judgments, take big risks, just like car drivers. They are human too. You could say cyclists have a bigger incentive to avoid problems, but no driver I know wants to hit someone and injure them, and cyclists I know become inured to the risks after riding for years without i…

Ok so it still seems easier to blame the people forcing bikes onto roads than to blame the people with the least capacity to hurt others.

Must we blame someone?

Re: Ambulance hits cyclist, rushes him to hospital, then sticks him with $1,800 bill

#330

Post by meiraleal »

fetzu wrote: post #229
fy20 wrote: post #169

As a European, the fact that you have to pay for emergency transport in an ambulance is enough internet for today.

Because you think you don’t pay for your healthcare? As an European, I have probably paid upwards of 150k for healthcare and probably got about 10k worth of it (at what might consider unreasonable prices, mind you). Even in countries with universal healthcare, it’s not free. There is always someone footing the bill. EDIT: a word

What other countries pay for healthcare, the US taxpayer pays for their military (much more actually) so for the end user, free healthcare is much better.
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