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A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

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Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#431

Post by beat »

cgriswald wrote: post #423
rout39574 wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Of course! In a world where there were only cyclists there would still need to be a set of rules that all cyclists are required to follow. What about walking? People can run into other people, knock them down stairs, it's a risk... I think that most observers find the idea that bike use is a public hazard, and must be restricted to be obviously ludicrous.

I don't. In the United States, bicyclists must follow largely the same rules of the road that drivers of motor vehicles must follow. They can even be ticketed for violating those rules although usually the tickets don't have much in the way of teeth (except things like DUI while biking). Here in the Bay Area, it's a rare bicyclist that actually follows the rules. Talking to other bicyclists, I've found a large number…

Forcing bicycles to follow rules designed for cars is often silly and sometimes actively dangerous. For example, the bike route from downtown to my house involves making a left turn on a busy street. For a mile and a half, the street is nice and wide, with generous bike lanes in both directions - sensible and safe. But the moment I have to turn left? By car laws, I need to stop in the middle of the road, with traffic coming up behind me (often at 40+mph), and wait until I have a clear path to turn left, which can take a while. This is deadly.

So I do the illegal. I turn right on the quiet side street and immediately u-turn to the stop sign, to wait to cross both sides. It's not a dangerous maneuver for me or anyone else, although it would be dangerous for a car to do so.

See the problem?

edit: A car waiting to turn left is in considerably less danger. It's much easier for traffic coming from behind to see, so it's less likely to be hit. And if it is hit, the driver is protected by the car itself. At worst, the car gets totaled. But a bicycle hit at 40mph? The cyclist is likely going to be killed. It's not just silly to follow the car law - it's hazardous.

Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#432

Post by cgriswald »

chimprich wrote: post #354
papermule wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why shouldn’t cyclists need a license to ride on the road? Others road users must have one. ---- It's a shame I'm getting downvoted, but the current state of affairs is that in cities like London bicycles, cars and trucks will be sharing the road for the near-mid future. I'd rather not have trucks or cars in the city, and ideally cyclists would have their own road separate from cars and pedestrians, but I think that'…

> Why shouldn’t cyclists need a license to ride on the road? Thought experiment: if you didn't have any motorised vehicles on the road, would you still want cyclists to have a licence? In a general case though, requiring cyclists to have a licence would reduce the number of cyclists, probably significantly. This would correspondingly increase the number of motorists. This dual effect would have a number of negative i…

> In a general case though, requiring cyclists to have a licence would reduce the number of cyclists, probably significantly. This would correspondingly increase the number of motorists.

Most cyclists are licensed drivers, and a test for cycling licensing would, at worst, probably be no more difficult than that for driving. The impact on the number of cyclists would be minimal.

A bicycle can injure or kill a pedestrian or cause a motor vehicle accident. What is the justification for licensing motor vehicle driving but not bicycling when done on public roads? I cannot think of anyone who fails a motor vehicle licensing test that I consider competent to not cause others harm while operating a bicycle on public roads. I would much rather suffer the 'dangers' of increased carpooling or public transit use.

Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#433

Post by bllguo »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #60
jmts wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sometimes I wonder if I would have actually hit them if anyone would have believed I didn’t see them As a daily motorcyclist that also drives a car, I'm uncomfortably aware of how much of your vision the A-pillar obscures. Not to mention the passenger side one, the B-pillars, and seating. That said, it is as much my responsibility (or any road user, or pedestrian) not to put myself into a dangerous position as much…

It seems to be worse in newer cars. Most cars I've driven have been older models, pre-2000, every time I have to drive a new car, I'm always surprised at how bad the visibility is, they all have tiny rear windows and massive A pillars. I used to own an old Datsun truck from the 1980s and the A-pillar blindspot was tiny because it had small, vertical A-pillars. A-pillars are a lot thicker and a lot more angled in newe…

There has to be a solution where we can remove the A-pillars entirely and have a single unbroken window. I know it doesn't mean much, but I would pay significantly for that, for peace of mind and safety.

Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#434

Post by papermule »

cup-of-tea wrote: post #356
papermule wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pedestrians are, with the exception of some rural areas, provided with dedicated carriage such as a pavement or sidewalk. The rules of crossing the road are well defined and in some European countries pedestrians are even arrested for J walking.

"Some rural areas" is in reality almost every mile of road outside of towns. You've clearly never walked in the countryside.

> You've clearly never walked in the countryside.

I've lived in the countryside for 14 years. I don't walk on the roads where I live. The roads are narrow and there is no place to walk as the side of the roads are raised embankments built from tree roots. Looks like this: http://c8.alamy.com/comp/C41G6T/country-lane-with-trees-form...

Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#435

Post by lmm »

papermule wrote: post #410
brewdad wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the actual gain to society from requiring a cyclist license? Today, without licenses, police can and do hand out moving violations to cyclists. Today, drivers who have their license revoked or car impounded still find ways to drive cars, at least in the US. The barrier to picking up a new bike after having yours impounded by police is far lower. If it's forcing a baseline requirement for skills and knowledge,…

> What is the actual gain to society from requiring a cyclist license? Today, without licenses, police can and do hand out moving violations to cyclists. I could, as someone who doesn't have a driving license, or has never learned to drive, go out on the road with my bicycle and more or less ride whenever and wherever I like. I don't know what any of the road signs mean and I have no experience or training in hazard…

> I could, as someone who doesn't have a driving license, or has never learned to drive, go out on the road with my bicycle and more or less ride whenever and wherever I like.

Sure. Realistically, how much danger do people doing this represent to society? There are plenty of dangerous things that people could do, but the heavy machinery of law should be reserved for actual problems rather than hypothetical ones.

> If I tried to do the same thing in a car I'd be arrested.

And quite rightly, because if you weren't there's a good chance you'd kill people. Car drivers kill a lot of people, they're something like the 4th biggest cause of death in the UK IIRC.

Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#436

Post by jessriedel »

aidenn0 wrote: post #152
idoh wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah where I live (the outer sunset neighborhood of San Francisco) it feels like half the stops are 2-way and the other half are 4-way. As a cyclist this is dangerous for me, because if I go through an intersection where I am not stopped but cars are subject to the stop, they will stop, not see me, then start going. So consistency is key!

It happens the other way around too; I had a bicyclist roll through a 2-way where I had no stop and almost cause a collision. They yelled at me, probably thinking it was a 4-way. It might be my imagination, but I seem to recall nearly all, if not all, 4-ways marked as such with a small rectangular placard below the stop sign in Virginia. I've seen them sometimes in California, but not even at the majority (not really…

> It might be my imagination, but I seem to recall nearly all, if not all, 4-ways marked as such with a small rectangular placard below the stop sign in Virginia.

This is the key problem. Whether an intersection is a 4-way or 2-way stop sign changes the right-of-way of any person with a stop sign. (If it's 2-way, I must yield, but if it's 4-way and I've reached the intersection first, I have the right-of-way.) It is crazy that in the US, a person at a stop sign can't distinguish these two situations for certainly without looking to see if the other direction has a stop sign.

(Similar complaints can be made about flashing-red and flashing-yellow intersections.)

Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#437

Post by brewdad »

papermule wrote: post #426
brewdad wrote: post #422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you choose to venture out onto the roads with no idea what the signs mean or how to avoid obstacles, good luck to you. Realistically, every 5 year old knows what the colors on a traffic light mean and what a stop sign tells you.

There are many more rules that just red, yellow green and the stop sign. It would be nice if the highway code was that simple though. For example, how to navigate a busy multi-lane roundabout safely as a cyclist, such as Old Street roundabout in London, which looks like this: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dc/Old_Stre... , or this roundabout in Bristol, UK: http://c8.alamy.com/comp/B2NMCH/aerial-vie…

Driver or cyclist, if you fail to navigate that intersection safely and correctly you will be cited (or injured or killed). How does requiring a license for cyclists solve this problem? You mentioned that driving without a license will get you arrested. This is true, but only after you've committed a violation, unless your country has random driver's license checkpoints (mine doesn't). We can already cite cyclists for moving violations today. Licensing doesn't change anything.

Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#438

Post by jnty »

Boltgolt wrote: post #281
7952 wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most roads in the UK are perfectly well designed to handle bike traffic. But they are not designed for the massive quantity of vehicle traffic travelling at relatively high speed on roads originally designed for a different age. Danger to cyclists are a symptom of this wider problem which we have no real solution for. Also, this particular junction is terribly designed for cars and will result in collisions.

I mean, you say that, but every time I see cyclists on an A road or pedestrian crossings on a 2-2 lane highway I die a little inside

Assuming you see them when you're driving, it's probably the sedentary living that's killing you rather than other road users.

Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#439

Post by jessriedel »

aidenn0 wrote: post #149
mrb wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

« make it a 4-way stop » You may be unaware, but 4-way stop signs are very uncommon outside of the US. In fact, in the UK they have always been formally prohibited by the Department for Transport in 2002. As a European driver, I discovered the existence of 4-way stop signs when I moved to the US, and I have always found them dangerous in a counter intuitive way: drivers are so used to 4-way stop intersections, that t…

At least 4-way stops have the same basic rules throughout the US (cars go in order of arrival). 2-way stops do not : Consider the case where the first car to arrive is turning left, but cannot do so due to traffic on the main road. Then a car arrives from the opposite direction going straight. Who is supposed to go first? In some states it's the car that reached the stop sign first, in others it's the car going strai…

> In some states it's the car that reached the stop sign first, in others it's the car going straight.

Do you have a cite/link about this? I've heard people say different things, but I've never seen evidence that the left-turning vehicle has legal right-of-way in any state.

Re: A Type of Road Junction that Kills Cyclists

#440

Post by [deleted] »

cgriswald wrote: post #423
rout39574 wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Of course! In a world where there were only cyclists there would still need to be a set of rules that all cyclists are required to follow. What about walking? People can run into other people, knock them down stairs, it's a risk... I think that most observers find the idea that bike use is a public hazard, and must be restricted to be obviously ludicrous.

I don't. In the United States, bicyclists must follow largely the same rules of the road that drivers of motor vehicles must follow. They can even be ticketed for violating those rules although usually the tickets don't have much in the way of teeth (except things like DUI while biking). Here in the Bay Area, it's a rare bicyclist that actually follows the rules. Talking to other bicyclists, I've found a large number…

[deleted]
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