New law for passing bicyclists starts Tuesday in CA

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  • 12_oz_Curls
    12_oz_Curls Posts: 140 Member
    Skipped Everything after reading the first few posts. Here in SoCal Bikers are ridiculous. We have AWESOME bike lanes that I use when I ride. Do biker groups care? NOPE! They routinely ride on the shoulder, or even in the road. When I have the protected green to make the precious 30 second turn into my neighborhood do they yield like the sign says? NOPE! So I routinely run directly in front of bikers who are in flagrant disregard of posted signs? YEP! and I laugh when they cuss at me. Why? Because I am a biker in addition to being a runner. I have to follow the same rules they do. And just like a car, I have to stop and yield to an oncoming vehicle. Have I almost been hit by cars? Yep, but they were in the wrong not I. And guess what? I WOULD HAVE LOST! So do I have friends who are dedicated bikers? YUP! do I respect bikers? YUP! do I respect A**holes who think they own the road because they can pedal? NOPE! and guess what!?!?!? the cops in my area are now ticketing bikers who get hit cause they were dumba**es! I LOVE IT!
  • mgalsf12
    mgalsf12 Posts: 350 Member
    I completely agree! I live in San Francisco and the bicyclists have made me hate them. They run lights, stop signs, don't care about pedestrians, and are stupid enough to zig zag in and out of moving vehicles. Grrrrrrrr....we have bike lanes, but they are only on certain streets. IF they followed the laws of traffic it would be safer for everyone. I mean seriously, my car weighs over 3500 lbs, no contest!
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    Skipped Everything after reading the first few posts. Here in SoCal Bikers are ridiculous. We have AWESOME bike lanes that I use when I ride. Do biker groups care? NOPE! They routinely ride on the shoulder, or even in the road. When I have the protected green to make the precious 30 second turn into my neighborhood do they yield like the sign says? NOPE! So I routinely run directly in front of bikers who are in flagrant disregard of posted signs? YEP! and I laugh when they cuss at me. Why? Because I am a biker in addition to being a runner. I have to follow the same rules they do. And just like a car, I have to stop and yield to an oncoming vehicle. Have I almost been hit by cars? Yep, but they were in the wrong not I. And guess what? I WOULD HAVE LOST! So do I have friends who are dedicated bikers? YUP! do I respect bikers? YUP! do I respect A**holes who think they own the road because they can pedal? NOPE! and guess what!?!?!? the cops in my area are now ticketing bikers who get hit cause they were dumba**es! I LOVE IT!

    We've had a specific group ride that was bad about running red light on busy road that stays in town, and several times they have stopped the group and ticketed the whole lot of them that ran a light or stop sign. The bike club warns the other group rides too then as reminder.

    The police worked with that group, warned them, told them at stops they could like get 10-15 bikes across at once just like the time a car would take, but don't go running lights and stop signs otherwise.
    The could do 2 wide on the several wide streets they take that aren't busy, and blind hills, but warned them there too if 2 wide impedes traffic, they'll ticket. I was glad to see it.

    When I first did group rides I thought perhaps it was only during the group ride the guys must do that, but as awful as the majority are for clipping in from a stop and being in the right gear - I'm thinking that points to them rarely doing it because it's not habit. And while they might be strong, they ain't doing track stands either.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member


    Where I live, they have these city streets that are very busy, two lanes on each side. The made one of those lanes a bike lane if a bike is there. So, effectively, at rush hour, it's a one lane road now. Back to 1973. They made it two lanes because of traffic. Duh.

    I'm not against bikes, I'm against the approach to the problem. It's very dangerous here for a lot of different reasons. Not only are moving vehicles aggressive, but all the cars parked on the side where bikes are riding...I saw someone open their door to get out of their car, and a biker came to a dead stop into that open door. They need to do this differently. Integrating cars and bikes is a mistake, IMO.

    They did this here too. In NW portland there are two one way streets to cross the interstate. So effectively ONE surface street to get across. It had two lanes. Until 2 weeks ago when one of those lanes became a bike only lane. Now, it's 100% packed traffic on the single lane, backed up and takes two full light cycles to get through each intersection. The bike lane? one biker every 5 minutes or so.

    Wonderful legislation guys. Really progressive! If we inconvenience drivers enough, maybe we'll have a carbon free, bike-riding, progressive society!

    Wow, usually seems like those bonehead grabs for too much for the bikers fails. In those cases with short little streets and not moving fast, I'm betting they could even have made each lane about 1 ft narrower and gotten a bike lane on the side that is wide enough.
  • Ohhim
    Ohhim Posts: 1,142 Member
    Isn't there a yearly tax that automobile owners pay that goes to the roads? Do bike riders pay that tax on their bikes?
    Seems like bikes should be getting out of the way of the cars since they are basically paying to be on the road.

    I know you bike riders won't like that but the truth is there are other places to ride your bikes that don't interfere with traffic.

    In reality, all tax revenues just go into a big f'ing bucket - some coming from the federal government, some coming from local/state income/payroll taxes (depending on your state), some coming from gas taxes, some from sales tax... some is used for infrastructure, some is used for services, some is used for defense/public safety, some is used for education. Arguing that your registration/gas tax paid for your car is the only source of infrastructure money (and directly pays for it) is a pretty weak thing to say as yes gas tax is earmarked for infrastructure, but at this point, those revenues barely cover maintenance nevertheless new roads (which are often paid for by developers, city/county governments, etc..). With that reasoning, you could also argue that if you pay 10x what others pay in taxes, you should be able to kick all other driver off the road when you want to get to the office. You could just as easily argue that the environmental damage spewed out by a car is disproportionately higher than what a bike produces, and that all cars should be banned since their fuel taxes aren't offsetting the costs of dealing with polar vortexes, rising sea levels, etc... leaving only bikes on the road.

    All of these are BS arguments.

    In short we have roads meant to facilitate transportation for the public, we have vehicles that can operate at different speeds, and we just have to figure out how to safely let them operate together so as few people get killed as possible. Will a 3 foot radius rule slow down some traffic? Sure. Will stop signs that regulate flow in occasional used intersections slow down traffic? Sure. Should we get rid of both just because some drivers won't get to their destinations as quickly? Of course not.
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  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,992 Member
    Had a few yutes try to pull me off my bike, moment they realized they didn't find a soft target they got to steppin.
    What did you say? Did you say yute? What the hell is a yute Mr. Gambini?

    A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
    IDEA Fitness member
    Kickboxing Certified Instructor
    Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,992 Member
    Interested today to see how this goes in my city. I have a 7 mile commute through my city to get from my house to my job and there are many bikers that I pass along the way.
    At between 11:30am and 12:30pm (lunch riders) there's a huge group that ride from Livermore Labs up and down one of the main streets daily. Haven't heard anyone that's been hit yet, but gonna see if any riders become insistent. For what I've seen of most of them, they do obey standard road rules.

    A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
    IDEA Fitness member
    Kickboxing Certified Instructor
    Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition
  • TheRoadDog
    TheRoadDog Posts: 11,788 Member
    I'm all for sharing the road and looking out for cars, pedestrians, bicyclist and motorcycles, but, here in Portland, Oregon, the cyclists are beginning to take it too far. They seem to be the ones that can't share the road with everyone else. Portland is a very cyclist friendly city. Lot's of clearly marked bicycle lanes and trails. They keep throwing events and deliberately shutting down streets to motorists in their protests. They like to confront motorists. A lot of them don't obey the traffic signs. They're turning rabid.
  • waltcote
    waltcote Posts: 372 Member
    A lot of cyclists in denver can't decide if they are a vehicle or a pedestrian. Running red lights or coming off the sidewalk into the street when it's convenient for them. I work construxtion on the streets and they disregard traffis zones and have almost hit me in a cone zone a few times. You can't hear them and they don't even warn you. I have almost been hit by a bike once or twice in a cone zone.
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,992 Member
    I'm all for sharing the road and looking out for cars, pedestrians, bicyclist and motorcycles, but, here in Portland, Oregon, the cyclists are beginning to take it too far. They seem to be the ones that can't share the road with everyone else. Portland is a very cyclist friendly city. Lot's of clearly marked bicycle lanes and trails. They keep throwing events and deliberately shutting down streets to motorists in their protests. They like to confront motorists. A lot of them don't obey the traffic signs. They're turning rabid.
    Where I live, some people believe they are more "privileged" than others too (cost of living is higher in my city area than some other counties nearby). So I can see these same people being more of an issue if they are riders who will now try to challenge drivers just to see what result happens.

    A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
    IDEA Fitness member
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    Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition
  • bugaha1
    bugaha1 Posts: 602 Member
    Heck yeah! I hope other states do the same real soon.


    EDIT; And I'm every bit of a driver as much as I am a cyclist.

    Give 'em a break! er uh brake.
    2 lane road. Traffic high going the opposite direction. Have 2 feet clearance to pass a biker, but CAN'T do it due to new law. So in essence, traffic behind biker has to slow to their speed until it's safe to pass with a 3 foot clearance. That could be for a few miles traveling at 15 miles an hour.

    I'm not for or against the law, just looking at possibilities of issues that may arise from it.

    A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
    IDEA Fitness member
    Kickboxing Certified Instructor
    Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

    We have this same law in NE and it's just not enforced. As a cyclist we have to continue to ride defensively on the streets.
  • BrianSharpe
    BrianSharpe Posts: 9,248 Member
    In Ontario it's.....
    (3) For the purposes of subsection (2), when a vehicle is meeting or overtaking a bicycle, the safe travelling distance is,

    (a) three feet between the vehicle and the bicycle, if the vehicle is travelling at a speed equal to or less than 50 kilometres per hour;

    (b) four feet between the vehicle and the bicycle, if the vehicle is travelling at a speed greater than 50 kilometres per hour, but less than 80 kilometres per hour; and

    (c) five feet between the vehicle and the bicycle, if the vehicle is travelling at a speed equal to or greater than 80 kilometres per hour.

    Presumption

    (4) In case of a collision between a bicycle and a vehicle, the driver or operator of the vehicle is presumed not to have left the safe travelling distance required under subsection (2).

    I still have vehicles almost brush my shoulder on city streets and roads where the posted speed limit is 80km/h :grumble:
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,865 Member
    We have a similar law in New Mexico...at least in Albuquerque, not sure if it's state wide. ABQ is a pretty bike friendly city with numerous bike only trails (or mixed use trails) as well as bike lanes. All in all, I'd say drivers and cyclists get along fairly well here...and while accidents do happen it has to do far more with the volume of traffic and just sort of the nature of the beast in RE to being on the road (just like car accidents happen all of the time)...I don't see a lot of motorists going out of their way to run down a bicyclist and by and large, bicyclist here seem to follow the rules of the road (of course, as with anything, there are bad apples).

    Personally, I think a lot of this has to do with the fact that the city itself has made great efforts to promote awareness and safety. Additionally, laws are enforced by police...for both motorists and bicyclists. In areas where bicycle traffic is heaviest, there are "mounted" police...not horses, but cops on bikes and sometimes those Segway things, and they will and do regularly pull cyclists over as well as motorized vehicles for not obeying basic traffic laws. I have also seen police pull over cyclists who were riding abreast and outside of their bike lanes on busier streets for impeding traffic.

    It just seems to me that a good awareness campaign in addition to the police actually policing goes a long way in solving a lot of these issues that people seem to have. I'm glad I live where I do....pretty much everywhere else seems messed up in comparison, at least judging by comments here.

    I would also add that as an avid fitness rider, I generally opt for the least trafficked routes to get where ever I'm trying to get...even if high traffic highways and roadways have a bike lane, it is obviously going to be more dangerous...not to mention, the exhaust, etc...all of which tend to make for a less than enjoyable ride...but sometimes I have no choice...I can't always take a bike only or mixed use path to get where I'm going...sometimes I can't always take a side street without having to go several miles out of my way...so sometimes I have to take that busy street and it would just be nice if some motorists could be a bit more considerate sometimes.

    FYI, I'm also a motorist...and I also have no love loss for *kitten* cyclists who give everyone else a bum wrap...but there are some major *kitten* drivers out there that can do far more damage than the *kitten* cyclist can.

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