4 ms·

As a cyclist, I believe that the driver should be held to the higher standard, but also that I can never trust them to live up to their responsibility, so I got

by lkbm 7y ago

As a cyclist, I believe that the driver should be held to the higher standard, but also that I can never trust them to live up to their responsibility, so I gotta be ready to stop and/or dodge any reckless maneuver they make. We tend to conflate the moral judgement of responsibility/fault with the actual reality of responsibility. If you're driving a deadly vehicle, the moral burden is on you not to kill me, but I still carries the practical burden of not getting killed. Obviously, if I'm super reckless on my bicycle, I could still be killed by a responsible, blameless driver, but if we're equally careless, I would say I was behaving in a practically irresponsible manner and the driver a morally irresponsible manner. I was stupid, they were negligent. (I rode a motorcycle occasioanlly for a while, but not enough to get to where I felt other cars were a bigger threat to me than my own inexperience was. "I could die taking this corner.")

falcolas 7y ago
> held to the higher standard This I disagree with. For better or worse, we are typically the ones who are riding on roads designed and built for them. We need to be held to the same standards, if not higher standards as motorcyclists and bicyclists, as we're intentionally playing in their turf, without their safety equipment. If a bicyclist is careless, they are both stupid and negligent. If a car driver is careless, they are both stupid and negligent. The difference is that being careless on a bike of any type is more dangerous to you than being careless in a car, meaning that a biker can't afford to be careless if they want to go home at night.
- lkbm 7y ago
  > is more dangerous to you Emphasis on "to you". I consider it worse to be careless with other people's lives than with my own. I could cause someone else's death with my bicycle, but it's less common than in a car. Additionally, I'm not cycling on the highway. I'm cycling on mixed-use roads, the majority of which have bike lanes. None of these are car-only roads. Those do exist, but I don't bike on them.
- cgiles 7y ago
  I am not saying this applies to you and GP, but there are those of us who absolutely hate cyclists on the road at all (bike lanes are fine) because many of them have an entitled mentality and indeed, don't seem to care about their own safety, let alone the rules of the road. Just this morning I had two cyclists cut horizontally across at 40 MPH street in front of me and other drivers. Many of them weave between cars or treat traffic signals as suggestions. Basically they want to be treated like normal traffic when it suits them and ignore laws when they want to. The ones who signal, wear helmets and reflectors and bright clothing, and drive on the road correctly are merely annoying because they hold up traffic and disrupt speeds, which is dangerous in itself because it causes a lot of lane swapping, but I can tolerate them. I guess what I am trying to say is, thank you and GP for not being among those cyclists who are stupid, reckless, and entitled. I just know that someday I am going to be cleaning what passes for the brains of some idiot cyclist off of my windshield and am not looking forward to it. I have however driven a motorcycle and while it is very dangerous, it is less so than a bicycle because you have the acceleration and maneuverability to get out of many situations. And motorcycles can drive the same speeds as the rest of traffic. People underestimate how many collisions are caused by traffic disruptions and abrupt changes of speed.
  - godelski 7y ago
    > Many of them weave between cars or treat traffic signals as suggestions. Basically they want to be treated like normal traffic when it suits them and ignore laws when they want to. I don't want to defend this but rather explain this. Legally we are neither pedestrians nor normal traffic. But there is no explicit law for cyclists. You have to be both and it depends which situations it you are in, which typically falls under when it is most advantageous (or safest). Specifically to the traffic signals, I'll illustrate first. The only time I have been struck by a vehicle while on my bike was while I was in a shared space (marked with sharrows) and waiting at a stop sign (I've also had cars come into the bike lane and hit/almost hit me, but that's another story that every cyclist has). Statistically this is actually the most likely place to be hit (motorcyclists know this too!). So why do cyclists not stop at stop signs? Because sitting at a stop sign is dangerous. Because to cross the intersection with momentum takes 2 seconds instead of the 5 that it takes when stopped. You are reducing your chance of being struck. This is why you won't see cops pull them over either (unless they are pulling into traffic, which is a different issue). Having momentum also SIGNIFICANTLY increases your ability to dodge things. You are absolutely the most vulnerable when you are not moving. To be safe on a bike you want to keep moving. We can't accelerate away from dangerous situations like motorcycles or cars. Humans don't have that kind of torque. It isn't just laziness or wanting to get to places faster (I'll give you that this is part). If you aren't moving then you are more vulnerable. Cyclists that are breaking the law are generally doing it from learned behavior to increase their safety. Another common example is riding close to the middle of the road on shared roads. I cannot tell you how many times someone has opened a door on me. I've hit more than a few (most often when in I'm in a bike lane!). Both in day and night (when I have a fucking light that I directly aim into peoples' mirrors to try to make me more noticeable!). It's just easier to ride closer to the center and deal with the driver behind you that is upset and should be on the main roads anyways. Also, lots of dirt and crap accumulates in the bike lanes, so that's why we frequently move out of them. Frequently there's also gutters that would cause us to go over the handle bars. Frankly, I value my safety over your convenience. That's what it comes down to. > [the ones that] drive on the road correctly are merely annoying because they hold up traffic and disrupt speeds, which is dangerous And we all agree. This is why you should argue for not just bike lanes, but protected bike lanes. But frankly most cars don't care about bike lanes and treat cyclists like second class citizens and disregard their spaces.[0] There are plenty of cyclists that are idiots and doing dumb things that will make you question how much they value their life. But I want others to also realize that cyclists also develop other patterns that may not be straight forward to drivers. Understanding each other and the vulnerabilities we face is how we make everyone safer and how we inconvenience each other less. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzE-IMaegzQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzE-IMaegzQ
- godelski 7y ago
  >> held to the higher standard > This I disagree with. Well the law and society disagree with you. The type of reasoning is very ubiquitous too. The more dangerous thing you are operating the more responsibility you have. We generally have morals that align to it being worse to take someone else's life than your own, though we don't encourage either. A car can do much more damage to others than a motorcycle can. A motorcycle can do more damage than a bicyclist can. A bicyclist can do more damage than a pedestrian. It isn't surprising that the right of way follows the inverse of this; those that are most vulnerable have a higher right of way. I think you are also conflating two different things. Legally and socially we consider the car to be held to a higher standard because it is more dangerous. Practically when I'm on a bike I have to be more vigilant because I'm more vulnerable and I value my life. But when we say that someone should be held to a higher standard we can take an inverse to check our understanding. Disagreeing that cars should be held to a higher standard is equivalent to saying "cars should be held to less (or equal) standards as bicyclists", which I think sounds kinda absurd. > The difference is that being careless on a bike of any type is more dangerous to you than being careless in a car And I think this demonstrates that confusion. The bike is not more dangerous, the car is. There is more danger involved when riding a bike, but the car is definitely more dangerous. There is no way you can argue that a bike can do more damage than a car can. The car is more dangerous, therefore it has more responsibility. But that doesn't mean you should trust them to be responsible. Different things.
  - falcolas 7y ago
    First, I'm in no way advocating for taking responsibility away from car drivers. I'm saying that it doesn't matter when there is an incident between a bike and a car. At the end of the day, the only person you can depend upon to keep yourself safe is you. You can hope everyone else is doing what they can to avoid injuring you, but the most you can do is hope. The responsibility for remaining safe ultimately falls to you (regardless of your mode of transportation - there's always a bigger vehicle). We can argue legal and moral responsibility until we're blue in the face, but at the end of the day it won't make a dead cyclist any less dead. The motorcyclist idiom "The car always has the right of weight." is spread about for a reason.
- eru 7y ago
  > For better or worse, we are typically the ones who are riding on roads designed and built for them. There's your problem right in the open. (Interestingly, the first modern roads were built for bicyclists.)
taneq 7y ago
You've chosen to place your life in jeopardy by riding a push-bike in traffic. Surely that bears some consequence?
- lkbm 7y ago
  If I drive a car, I'm choosing to put other people's lives in jeopardy instead. Seems like the bike is the moral choice here.
- foxyv 7y ago
  Often there is no other alternative. If you ride a bike for transportation, you have to live with traffic. Trails and bike lanes are almost non-existent. If you ask, most cyclists would love to not ride in traffic. We are always advocating for dedicated trails and protected lanes so we don't have to ride with large vehicles. I would be fine restricting bikes to trails and dedicated bike lanes, if they existed. In the meantime we have to find a way to live together, like roommates in an apartment.
- blacksmith_tb 7y ago
  Couldn't say about your local laws, but in the US (where I ride) cycling is a right extended to all, but driving a car is a privilege which requires certification. My sense is that the spirit of those laws aligns with some of the discussion here, cars kill (other) people, where cyclists are likely to only get themselves killed.
- mikestew 7y ago
  "You've chosen to place your life in jeopardy by showing up at school..." Yeah, well, there was a time that riding a bicycle or going to school wasn't nearly as dangerous. But you're going to blame the victims here?
  - godelski 7y ago
    > But you're going to blame the victims here? I think this needs to be emphasized more. Saying that a bicycle is more dangerous than a car is equivalent to saying that being a bank teller is more dangerous than a gunman. Sure, that may be true, but are we really going to blame the bank teller here?
dsfyu404ed 7y ago
FWIW everywhere other than public roads the smallest traffic is held to the highest standard (i.e is expected to look out for and plan around other traffic). The rules are basically only go where you're allowed to go (don't walk on railroad tracks and don't be the wise ass who drives the mini-fork lift into the office to deliver the mail) and when you encounter a different type of traffic yield to everything bigger than you. For example: If you are on foot and get hit by a fork lift it's on you. If your forklift gets hit by a truck it's on you. If your truck gets hit by a mining dump truck it's on you. If your mining dump truck gets hit by a train then it's on you. (Obviously these examples don't hold in exceptional circumstances.) The reasoning behind it is that the smaller the traffic the more situational awareness it has (no blind spots on a pedestrian) and the quicker and easier it is for it to adjust what its doing to account for other traffic. Public roads have a much more complex set of rules and large swaths of them are usually ignored in specific situations and in general there's a lot more ambiguity over who should do what.

by lkbm 7y ago

falcolas 7y ago

> held to the higher standard This I disagree with. For better or worse, we are typically the ones who are riding on roads designed and built for them. We need to be held to the same standards, if not higher standards as motorcyclists and bicyclists, as we're intentionally playing in their turf, without their safety equipment. If a bicyclist is careless, they are both stupid and negligent. If a car driver is careless, they are both stupid and negligent. The difference is that being careless on a bike of any type is more dangerous to you than being careless in a car, meaning that a biker can't afford to be careless if they want to go home at night.

lkbm 7y ago
> is more dangerous to you Emphasis on "to you". I consider it worse to be careless with other people's lives than with my own. I could cause someone else's death with my bicycle, but it's less common than in a car. Additionally, I'm not cycling on the highway. I'm cycling on mixed-use roads, the majority of which have bike lanes. None of these are car-only roads. Those do exist, but I don't bike on them.
cgiles 7y ago
I am not saying this applies to you and GP, but there are those of us who absolutely hate cyclists on the road at all (bike lanes are fine) because many of them have an entitled mentality and indeed, don't seem to care about their own safety, let alone the rules of the road. Just this morning I had two cyclists cut horizontally across at 40 MPH street in front of me and other drivers. Many of them weave between cars or treat traffic signals as suggestions. Basically they want to be treated like normal traffic when it suits them and ignore laws when they want to. The ones who signal, wear helmets and reflectors and bright clothing, and drive on the road correctly are merely annoying because they hold up traffic and disrupt speeds, which is dangerous in itself because it causes a lot of lane swapping, but I can tolerate them. I guess what I am trying to say is, thank you and GP for not being among those cyclists who are stupid, reckless, and entitled. I just know that someday I am going to be cleaning what passes for the brains of some idiot cyclist off of my windshield and am not looking forward to it. I have however driven a motorcycle and while it is very dangerous, it is less so than a bicycle because you have the acceleration and maneuverability to get out of many situations. And motorcycles can drive the same speeds as the rest of traffic. People underestimate how many collisions are caused by traffic disruptions and abrupt changes of speed.
- godelski 7y ago
  > Many of them weave between cars or treat traffic signals as suggestions. Basically they want to be treated like normal traffic when it suits them and ignore laws when they want to. I don't want to defend this but rather explain this. Legally we are neither pedestrians nor normal traffic. But there is no explicit law for cyclists. You have to be both and it depends which situations it you are in, which typically falls under when it is most advantageous (or safest). Specifically to the traffic signals, I'll illustrate first. The only time I have been struck by a vehicle while on my bike was while I was in a shared space (marked with sharrows) and waiting at a stop sign (I've also had cars come into the bike lane and hit/almost hit me, but that's another story that every cyclist has). Statistically this is actually the most likely place to be hit (motorcyclists know this too!). So why do cyclists not stop at stop signs? Because sitting at a stop sign is dangerous. Because to cross the intersection with momentum takes 2 seconds instead of the 5 that it takes when stopped. You are reducing your chance of being struck. This is why you won't see cops pull them over either (unless they are pulling into traffic, which is a different issue). Having momentum also SIGNIFICANTLY increases your ability to dodge things. You are absolutely the most vulnerable when you are not moving. To be safe on a bike you want to keep moving. We can't accelerate away from dangerous situations like motorcycles or cars. Humans don't have that kind of torque. It isn't just laziness or wanting to get to places faster (I'll give you that this is part). If you aren't moving then you are more vulnerable. Cyclists that are breaking the law are generally doing it from learned behavior to increase their safety. Another common example is riding close to the middle of the road on shared roads. I cannot tell you how many times someone has opened a door on me. I've hit more than a few (most often when in I'm in a bike lane!). Both in day and night (when I have a fucking light that I directly aim into peoples' mirrors to try to make me more noticeable!). It's just easier to ride closer to the center and deal with the driver behind you that is upset and should be on the main roads anyways. Also, lots of dirt and crap accumulates in the bike lanes, so that's why we frequently move out of them. Frequently there's also gutters that would cause us to go over the handle bars. Frankly, I value my safety over your convenience. That's what it comes down to. > [the ones that] drive on the road correctly are merely annoying because they hold up traffic and disrupt speeds, which is dangerous And we all agree. This is why you should argue for not just bike lanes, but protected bike lanes. But frankly most cars don't care about bike lanes and treat cyclists like second class citizens and disregard their spaces.[0] There are plenty of cyclists that are idiots and doing dumb things that will make you question how much they value their life. But I want others to also realize that cyclists also develop other patterns that may not be straight forward to drivers. Understanding each other and the vulnerabilities we face is how we make everyone safer and how we inconvenience each other less. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzE-IMaegzQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzE-IMaegzQ
godelski 7y ago
>> held to the higher standard > This I disagree with. Well the law and society disagree with you. The type of reasoning is very ubiquitous too. The more dangerous thing you are operating the more responsibility you have. We generally have morals that align to it being worse to take someone else's life than your own, though we don't encourage either. A car can do much more damage to others than a motorcycle can. A motorcycle can do more damage than a bicyclist can. A bicyclist can do more damage than a pedestrian. It isn't surprising that the right of way follows the inverse of this; those that are most vulnerable have a higher right of way. I think you are also conflating two different things. Legally and socially we consider the car to be held to a higher standard because it is more dangerous. Practically when I'm on a bike I have to be more vigilant because I'm more vulnerable and I value my life. But when we say that someone should be held to a higher standard we can take an inverse to check our understanding. Disagreeing that cars should be held to a higher standard is equivalent to saying "cars should be held to less (or equal) standards as bicyclists", which I think sounds kinda absurd. > The difference is that being careless on a bike of any type is more dangerous to you than being careless in a car And I think this demonstrates that confusion. The bike is not more dangerous, the car is. There is more danger involved when riding a bike, but the car is definitely more dangerous. There is no way you can argue that a bike can do more damage than a car can. The car is more dangerous, therefore it has more responsibility. But that doesn't mean you should trust them to be responsible. Different things.
- falcolas 7y ago
  First, I'm in no way advocating for taking responsibility away from car drivers. I'm saying that it doesn't matter when there is an incident between a bike and a car. At the end of the day, the only person you can depend upon to keep yourself safe is you. You can hope everyone else is doing what they can to avoid injuring you, but the most you can do is hope. The responsibility for remaining safe ultimately falls to you (regardless of your mode of transportation - there's always a bigger vehicle). We can argue legal and moral responsibility until we're blue in the face, but at the end of the day it won't make a dead cyclist any less dead. The motorcyclist idiom "The car always has the right of weight." is spread about for a reason.
eru 7y ago
> For better or worse, we are typically the ones who are riding on roads designed and built for them. There's your problem right in the open. (Interestingly, the first modern roads were built for bicyclists.)

taneq 7y ago

You've chosen to place your life in jeopardy by riding a push-bike in traffic. Surely that bears some consequence?

lkbm 7y ago
If I drive a car, I'm choosing to put other people's lives in jeopardy instead. Seems like the bike is the moral choice here.
foxyv 7y ago
Often there is no other alternative. If you ride a bike for transportation, you have to live with traffic. Trails and bike lanes are almost non-existent. If you ask, most cyclists would love to not ride in traffic. We are always advocating for dedicated trails and protected lanes so we don't have to ride with large vehicles. I would be fine restricting bikes to trails and dedicated bike lanes, if they existed. In the meantime we have to find a way to live together, like roommates in an apartment.
blacksmith_tb 7y ago
Couldn't say about your local laws, but in the US (where I ride) cycling is a right extended to all, but driving a car is a privilege which requires certification. My sense is that the spirit of those laws aligns with some of the discussion here, cars kill (other) people, where cyclists are likely to only get themselves killed.
mikestew 7y ago
"You've chosen to place your life in jeopardy by showing up at school..." Yeah, well, there was a time that riding a bicycle or going to school wasn't nearly as dangerous. But you're going to blame the victims here?
- godelski 7y ago
  > But you're going to blame the victims here? I think this needs to be emphasized more. Saying that a bicycle is more dangerous than a car is equivalent to saying that being a bank teller is more dangerous than a gunman. Sure, that may be true, but are we really going to blame the bank teller here?

dsfyu404ed 7y ago

FWIW everywhere other than public roads the smallest traffic is held to the highest standard (i.e is expected to look out for and plan around other traffic). The rules are basically only go where you're allowed to go (don't walk on railroad tracks and don't be the wise ass who drives the mini-fork lift into the office to deliver the mail) and when you encounter a different type of traffic yield to everything bigger than you. For example: If you are on foot and get hit by a fork lift it's on you. If your forklift gets hit by a truck it's on you. If your truck gets hit by a mining dump truck it's on you. If your mining dump truck gets hit by a train then it's on you. (Obviously these examples don't hold in exceptional circumstances.) The reasoning behind it is that the smaller the traffic the more situational awareness it has (no blind spots on a pedestrian) and the quicker and easier it is for it to adjust what its doing to account for other traffic. Public roads have a much more complex set of rules and large swaths of them are usually ignored in specific situations and in general there's a lot more ambiguity over who should do what.