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Re: Slate Article: In Defense of Jaywalking
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Ryan Sharpe
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Nov 05, 2009 06:39 PST
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Bob Shanteau wrote:
| | Peter L. Jacobsen wrote:
| | I suspect a similar article could be written about bicyclists. We're
blamed for our injuries about as often...
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True. An anti-cycling bias exists just as surely as the anti-pedestrian
bias described in the article.
But bicyclists are legally operators of vehicles, not pedestrians, and
so operate by vehicular rules. There is one set of rules for operators
of vehicles and another for pedestrians. There is no third set for
bicyclists. Some argue that there should be, but I have yet to see a
concise, logical set of such rules. Informally, it seems to be that you
can do anything you want (run stop signs, run red lights, ride the wrong
way, ride at night without lights, ride a fixed gear without brakes, not
stop for pedestrians at crosswalks, etc.) as long as you "stay out of
the way of cars". But isn't it this behavior that causes most bicycle
crashes in the first place?
Bob Shanteau
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But but, bicyclists are required to use motor vehicle facilities without
necessarily having gone through a training and certification process,
making them rather unique roadway users. I've been asked often enough
about equipment requirements and the rules-of-the-road at the Bicycle
Kitchen to have figured out that poorly-known laws -- especially those
that ill-serve bicycle use or seem illogical to bicyclists -- do nobody
any good.
Maybe we should start drafting our own set of "ideal" bicycle + traffic
rules, so we can get a better feel for what we should be asking for,
rather than merely complaining that the current system doesn't work.
I'm willing to host a wiki on my personal website to do this, if
anyone's interested in such a project.
--Ryan
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