Friday Morning Commute - Missed Star Wars Day and Cinco de Mayo

photo by Stephen Miller

Go on vacation a couple of days, and everything falls apart.

• Osama Bin Laden was killed by US troops - and a bunch of people rode CaBi's to the White House to celebrate. "Unlike buses or trains, bike sharing can operate at full capacity at any hour of the day, even in the middle of the night when a special occasion warrants it." The system had 558 rentals including 300 between midnight and 2 a.m. They had to warn people to bring the bikes back "“FYI, if you rented a CaBI early this morning and haven’t returned it, the meter is running. After 24 hrs = $1000 lost bike fee.” But "By afternoon, most of the bikes were back in place.
• TBD does a profile on the guy who hates Capital Bikeshare. "All response to Capital Bikeshare from retailers has been very positive. We receive thousands of requests for Bikeshare stations to be installed, and many of them are from retailers," writes Eatough via email.
• Cars aren't the only threat to cyclists. Bad roads are a danger too.
• WABA's comments on the South Capitol Street FEIS. They want you to comment too.
• A big project in Silver Spring includes a ROW for the future MBT-CCT/Purple line
• Yes, it's bike month. With events in DC. Like Bikefest.
• GGW calls for more education. I agree that some education can help, but a lot of the problems out there aren't due to ignorance, they're due to selfishness - or worse.
• Help raise money for US Bike routes in Virginia.
• A Berlin study of blame in bike-car crashes points the finger at cyclists, but one in London says that cyclists are only to blame 7% of the time. In Ohio it's more 50/50, but these are all based on police reports which seem to vary jurisdiction to jurisdiction.

Comments

[cream]

No, I think alot of the problems with conflict between cyclist and driver is that one or both don't know the rules of the road for themselves or the other party. They aren't widely understood.

[charlie]

The Steve Migas Ohio report actually agrees with the Berlin report: about half of all crashes are the fault of the cyclist. Migas's point is when you see a larger number being blamed -- 70% -- then you can suspect police bias.

take a step back, however. 50% is a large chunk.

[oboe]

I "educated" a cabbie about the three-foot passing law at a red-light this morning.

[oboe]

@charlie:

I wonder how many of those "at fault" were cyclists under the age of 18. Also, how many of the adults were cyclists who were cringing around the periphery so as not to offend drivers. I would really, really like to see a comprehensive break-down of accident statistics.

[oboe]

From "guy who hates bikeshare" piece:

On the county GOP's blog, Miller took aim: "The loss of on-street parking in Rosslyn means additional inconvenience for visitors to stores and attractions. It also hurts Rosslyn shops and restaurants, who depend on available parking to attract customers."

Let's re-write that, since CaBi users tend to be middle-class and with disposable income:

"The loss of on-street parking in Rosslyn means additional inconvenience for [automobile drivers] to stores and attractions."

Once you pierce the assumption that only auto drivers are "customers", this sounds like a rather banal statement.

Of course, it means additional convenience for bikeshare members.

[charlie]

@oboe; good point about the youts. However, I don't know if your "cringe" factor would play a role in Berlin.

I'd really like to see a breakdown of how exactly smoking kills as well.

[oboe]

@charlie:

I don't know if your "cringe" factor would play a role in Berlin.

Oh, I'm not so sure... From the write-up:

...the single biggest cause of vehicle-bicycle accidents is bikes popping up where they are not expected: on sidewalks or riding the wrong direction on bike paths.

In a city where many cyclists are not also drivers, cyclists may be unaware that a driver checking for peds before proceeding may not be looking up the street far enough to account for the speed of movement of a bicyclist. And even drivers who takes care to check for bikes on the bike lane can easily miss a bike coming in the wrong direction...

You could argue that salmoning and sidewalk riding are the ultimate expression of "cringing" behavior. Generally speaking you're on the sidewalk because you're afraid to be in the street (and there's no real infrastructure). And while a good portion of "salmoning" is due to cyclists taking short-cuts, I know that in a lot of circumstances, you do this because you don't want to be on that busy arterial street a block over.

[oboe]

I'd really like to see a breakdown of how exactly smoking kills as well.

65% - Coronary diseases

34.968% - Cancers of the Lung/Mouth/Throat

.03% - Dropped cigarette in car leading to high-speed collision with bridge abutment.

.0002% - Firing Squad related deaths

[Liz]

In Berlin, a lot of the bike "lanes" are really separate paved paths next to the street. They are wider than the typical sidewalk and function, essentially, as a mixed use path.

My sister lives in Berlin and got hit by a car in the dreaded "right hook" when she was riding in one of those lanes through an intersection and a right turning motorist didn't notice her. The motorist was assigned fault in her case.

I imagine people salmoning down those paths pose a tricky problem for watchful motorists.

[charlie]

@oboe; "Generally speaking you're on the sidewalk because you're afraid to be in the street (and there's no real infrastructure)."

But doesn't Berlin have a good infrastructure? Sidewalk riding/bikelane salmon may have different meanings there.

Heaven forbid a cyclist admit he was at fault....

[oboe]

Heaven forbid a cyclist admit he was at fault....

Just to be clear, I think a cyclist who gets hit because he's not where he's supposed to be is at fault. But obviously it's a lot easier to be "at fault" when all the infrastructure is designed to marginalize them.

It's one of the reasons "taking the lane" is so effective. It pisses off drivers, but you're visible, don't get doored, etc...

If you're cringing in the door-zone, or going the wrong way, you're at fault if something happens. That's why education is important.

[SJE]

The Arlington GOP argues against CaBi because it is a government program and not private enterprise and because it takes away parking spots, ignoring that the parking spots are a "government program"

[Jonathan Krall]

Wow! That South Capitol Street plan is amazing. No bicycle lanes or cycletracks at all, except on the bridge itself. Zero. Someone leading that project has not gotten the memo that bicycle facilities are widely supported by citizens and are good for the economy.

[Krickey7]

My favorite is the chorus of people who bemoan HOT lanes for taking away their right to travel on a free road, completely ignoring the massive subsidies to drivers involved in highway construction and maintenance. Any good that is subsidized has a tendency toward excessive demand, aka congestion.

Tain't free, on so many levels.

[Riley]

This was worth turning on the computer today.

I'd really like to see a breakdown of how exactly smoking kills as well.

...

.0002% - Firing Squad related deaths

[SJE]

Does anyone have any more data on the the different studies assigning "fault" to the bike accidents. The vastly different results could reflect differences in culture, but could also reflect different methodologies.

[Contrarian]

.03% - Dropped cigarette in car leading to high-speed collision with bridge abutment.

I was on a conference call once where one of the participants suddenly said, "gotta go now" and hung up. It turns out he was driving and smoking and had accidentally dropped his lit cigarette into an opening in his dashboard and started a fire.

You hear so much about distracted driving and so little about distracted smoking while driving...

[Contrarian]

I think Steve Migas is on to something that wildly varying reported rates of cyclist responsibility say more about the local police than they do about cyclists.

The best study I have seen on the issue is "A Guide for Reducing Collisions Involving Bicycles" by the Transportation Research Board (http://www.trb.org/Main/Public/Blurbs/156839.aspx)

On page 14 of the report it has this information:

Similar typology was used in the FHWA study by Hunter et al. (1996). In a six-state study of
3,000 bicycle crashes taken from hard copy police reports, the most frequent bicycle/motor
vehicle crash types were as follows:

Crossing Path Crashes % of All Crashes
• Motorist failed to yield to bicyclist (includes drive out/through 21.7
at intersections and at Midblock/driveway locations)
• Bicyclist failed to yield to motorist at an intersection 16.8
• Bicyclist failed to yield to motorist, midblock 11.8
• Other crossing path crashes 7.2

Parallel Path Crashes
• Motorist turned or merged into bicyclist’s path 12.2
• Motorist overtaking bicyclist 8.6
• Bicyclist turned or merged into motorist’s path 7.3
• Other parallel path crashes 7.4

From these numbers, we can do a very crude assignment of fault. If we assume that whoever fails to yield, or merges into someone else's path is at fault, and the operator of an overtaking vehicle is at fault in a collision, we get:

Motorist fault: 21.7+ 12.2 +8.6 = 42.5%
Cyclist fault: 16.8 +11.8+7.3= 35.9%

So at a rough level, the motorist is at fault about 20% more of the time than the cyclist.

[IMGoph]

they said, "By afternoon, most of the bikes were back in place."

Most?

So there was at least one bike that stayed out close to (or over?) 24 hours? That's a news story. Someone needs to find and interview the poor soul who payed that much, if the quote above is completely accurate.