Lawyers are a highly educated bunch – right? I mean, when they make a statement of law they know what they are talking about (goes the common wisdom). So boy was I excited when I read the following, written by a Nebraska Attorney:

Bicyclists always have the right of way […in Bellevue, Nebraska]

Really? Someone from Nebraska – tell me it’s true!

In my time writing for JustAnotherCyclist and VeloReviews, I’ve become accustomed to half-truths, or even complete falsehoods, being included in media publications on cycling. I find them and mentally pick apart these articles. I mean, after all it allows me to go through the rest of my day feeling all superior about myself. This guy is a lawyer after all – defending against verbal assaults in his job. So let’s take a look at the article he posted on a media website. The article starts out well enough:

In today’s fitness-centered world, bicycling has become a popular mode of travel and keeping fit.   More and more Americans are relying on two-wheeled transportation to get them to and from work, as well as replacing gym memberships for many avid cyclists.

However, that is immediately followed by the oh-so-common statement:

Cycling brings with it risks of injury that may be different than those in standard automobiles, but certainly no less serious.

Cue eye roll. What is it about American society that is so hung up on safety in completely unbalanced ways? Why do we hype the dangers of some things (like cycling) while intentionally downplaying the dangers of other things (like driving a car on the freeway.) We cover some accidents (plane crashes) on every single channel, while other accidents (like the thousands killed in auto collisions every year) go without even a mention?

I’m poking a little fun at Mr Kelley here for sure. But his article actually captures almost exactly the common wisdom of our society regarding cycling. He talks about the health benefits of cycling quite a bit. In fact, most would probably classify his piece as a “pro-cycling” article. But then he counters that by scaring the hell out of everyone with how dangerous cycling is. Few would even question me if I hit 75 MPH in a 65 MPH zone on the freeway. But ride without a helmet on my bike and oh boy am I taking my life into my own hands there.

I’m guessing that the folks writing these types of pieces don’t even realize the impact they can have. Let’s take a look at his final paragraph:

When you are traveling on the main roads, it is a good idea to avoid wearing earphones and concentrate on the sounds of the road.  Being observant as a cyclist can reduce your risk of injury.  Be sure to use your hand signals when making turns or stopping and remember to wear reflective gear.  Pay attention to traffic control measures and travel at safe speeds for the conditions you are experiencing.  Know the bicycle routes that provide the most visibility and always make sure your bicycle has working equipment and can be easily seen at night.  It is also important to inform loved ones of which routes you are taking and what time you expect to be back so they know where to look if you don’t return on time.  Ultimately, bicycling has become a safe and effective mode of transportation in the metropolitan area, as well as being a great step towards physical fitness! [embedded links his]

I agree with the first sentence. And the last statement I of course agree with. But what may be non-obvious is everything in between. Of course we want people to be safe, but every sentence in that article has an implicit declaration of a hazard that you will encounter if you ride a bike. Instead of providing a list of things to do to keep you happy, the message conveyed is really a list of things that are going to get you maimed or killed if you ride a bike. I fear THAT is the message that many non-cyclists will take from postings like this.

We need to work to reduce the presumption of risk in cycling if we are to succeed in getting more people on bikes. As I have said before, please PLEASE stop the fear mongering. We do it to ourselves as a group. We continue to use the dangers of cycling to motivate lawmakers and city planners to give us infrastructure. Lots of things in life are dangerous. However, compared to most of the things we do in life cycling is actually quite safe. And as a good doctor I know said, not-cycling is quite possibly a whole lot more dangerous than cycling.

Long time JustAnotherCyclist blogger friend BikingInLA posted a rather interesting tweet tonight:

The Culver City Chamber of Commerce might as well just tell bicyclists to take their business somewhere else. http://t.co/ezzhWOKZ6z #bikLA
3/29/13 8:17 PM

So of course I checked out the link. While disappointed, I was unfortunately not surprised by the comments of Chamber of Commerce President Steve Rose. The crux of his argument is, basically, that cyclists are being granted rights without corresponding responsibilities. Here it is in his words:

Here are a few points I would like to ask about bicyclist’s responsibility:

• Insurance in case of an accident. Is my uninsured motorist insurance going to be raised because of bicyclists’ rights?
• Motorcyclists are required to wear helmets. Are all bicyclists?
• Why can a bicyclist ride in the street and then on the sidewalk and then back on to pedestrian walkways?
• Bicyclists should not only have lights on the front and rear of their bikes, but lights that can be seen from a legal distance.
• Should bicyclists be allowed to straddle the white line and then stop in front of vehicles at a red light?
• Why do bicyclists not stop at stop signs, as vehicles legally must do?
• How do we tax bicyclists for maintenance of the right of way, as motor vehicle owners have to do?

Oh boy… I don’t see a single point of any value here. But in fairness, let’s look at each one individually.

Insurance in case of an accident. Is my uninsured motorist insurance going to be raised because of bicyclists’ rights?

Two big flaws with this question. One, it assumes that all cyclists are uninsured. In fact, cyclists are often covered by a myrid of policies – homeowner’s insurance and even auto insurance carried by the cyclist. Yes Mr. Rose, many cyclists are also licensed motorists too. Second, the amount of damage a cyclist can do, in the vast majority of cases of collisions with automobiles, is financially insignificant. Insurance rates are based on risk. The financial risk of property damage caused by a cyclist just isn’t that large.

Motorcyclists are required to wear helmets. Are all bicyclists?

No they are not. But this question has no relevance either. Debates about cycling helmets aside, Mr. Rose seems to be indicating that an arbitrary number of laws is what is required to entitle cyclists to access to the highway infrastructure.

Why can a bicyclist ride in the street and then on the sidewalk and then back on to pedestrian walkways?

Well, in fact this is the exact issue that the campaign Mr. Rose is opposing intends to address.

Bicyclists should not only have lights on the front and rear of their bikes, but lights that can be seen from a legal distance.

The legal requirements for lighting and reflectors are clearly laid out in the California Vehicle Code. Unless Mr. Rose has more specific complaints, this feels like a straw man argument in a way far more obvious than the rest of his points.

Should bicyclists be allowed to straddle the white line and then stop in front of vehicles at a red light?

This is, in fact, required by state law (As far right as practical). In addition, again, this is one of the issues that the campaign Mr. Rose is opposing intends to address.

Why do bicyclists not stop at stop signs, as vehicles legally must do?

Such a tired argument. First, his statement implies that cyclists never stop at stop signs. It further implies that motorists do stop at stop signs (ever hear of a California Stop?) The argument itself is fundamentally flawed, implying that only those groups that follow the laws as a whole are entitled to rights on the road. By the same argument, I (as a cyclist) could counter that motorists should be denied rights to the road due to the statistically significant number of motorists that ignore posted speed limits.

How do we tax bicyclists for maintenance of the right of way, as motor vehicle owners have to do?

And last but not least, the mythical road tax argument. Learn the facts, Mr. Rose. We already tax bicyclists for maintenance of the right of way. Again, not only are the vast majority of cyclists also licensed owners of legally registered vehicles, the vast majority of the monies used to maintain our roads come from taxes collected from the general population, regardless of how much or how little they use the roadways.

I’ll leave you with this parting thought to consider Mr. Rose. As the president of the Chamber of Commerce, I would think that your primary interest (in that role) would be to foster business in your community. I would encourage you to look at the financial impact directly attributable to cycling as a lifestyle and/or recreation choice. In addition, I would further encourage you to look into the commercial impact created by behavior changes induced by cycling. There have been a number of studies demonstrating how cyclists are more likely to stop at, and patronize, urban business compared to the population of motorists driving by the same establishments. As President of the Chamber of Commerce, you may best serve your community by evaluating the economice impact of increased cycling as opposed to the emotional reaction your “questions” demonstrate.

Ooops…  Looks like there were some inaccuracies in my original story.  I’ve taken the content offline while I do more research.

California SB 582 has passed and is now awaiting signature from the Governor Jerry Brown.  This bill allows regional planning authorities to require employers to offer commuter benefits – pre-tax deductions that can be use for public transportation or cycling costs incurred by bike commuting.  That’s right, you may soon have the opportunity to pay for those tires shredded by road debris with pre-tax funds.  Folks familiar with Flexible Spending Accounts (FSA) for health care will be familiar with this concept.  These plans are, in essence, an FSA for commuters.  Jerry Brown has 12 days to either sign or veto.  You can get the details of the bill, including the full text, here.

Bike lanes are both a blessing and a curse, and anybody that has done much commuting in urban environments has likely experienced both sides of that.  On the blessing side, studies have demonstrated that bike lanes do, in fact, encourage more folks to ride.  However, it may also create a false sense of security, and can even create greater danger in some situations.  Here in US cities, most bike lanes are right in the “door zone” along parallel parked cars, causing cyclists to need to dart into traffic unexpectedly should a car door get opened in front of them.  Couple that risk with the pretense of “Mandatory Use Laws” and the dark side of bike lanes shows itself.

New York cyclist Casey Neistat put together a video in response to a ticket he received for riding outside of the bike lane on a New York street.  The video has taken off, due in large part to his rather dramatic demonstration of the utter absurdity of the uneducated interpretation of exactly what mandatory means.  Here’s to you Casey – for putting your self on the line to demonstrate to the world what should have already been obvious – but wasn’t.

[yframe url=’http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzE-IMaegzQ’]

In contrast, the fuzz on the other coast in San Francisco does a great job of illustrating exactly why and when “mandatory” is anything but.

[yframe url=’http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7M-_ueoU2E’]

It is human nature – when you are aware and think of a particular topic, you tend to find things related to that topic in the world around you.  Even so, my eyes kinda bugged out of my head when I ran across an article about a New Jersey lawmaker Cleopatra Tucker wanted mandatory license plates for bicycles.

Umm…  wasn’t I just talking about this just the other day?  The motivation for this bill was identical to what I speculated about in my previous post:

That, anyway, is the basic outline of a bill (A3657) introduced by Assemblywoman Cleopatra Tucker (D-Essex) who said she proposed it after several senior citizens in Belleville and Bloomfield called her to complain about kids on bikes.

“They had been knocked down, knocked over and they had no way to register a complaint. They couldn’t identify the person,” said Tucker.

Efforts to license bicycles almost always seem to stem from a belief that cyclists are anonymous, and thus unaccountable for their actions.  However, bicycle licensing doesn’t really address the issue.  For one thing, bikes are much less expensive than cars, and thus are more likely to be loaned, borrowed, or sold at garage sales for $15 bucks.  How do you account for every change of ownership?  If you are already frustrated with crowded DMV offices now – can you imagine this additional overhead?  And just like a car, the license plate tells you who owns the bicycle, not who may have been riding it at the time when an infraction occurred.

Luckily cooler heads prevailed, and the legislation was withdrawn.  However, this continues to come up again and again.

Bicycle lanes are something of a double-edged sword in certain circumstances.  Study after study has shown that the presence of bicycle lanes has a positive effect on overall cycling.  However, some will argue that traditional bike lane placement – especially on city streets – comes with its own problems.  Usually, bike lanes are placed in the exact spot where drivers would get out of their cars when parallel parking next to the curb – the “door zone.”  Bike lanes can also put cyclists in conflict with motorists that are making right hand turns at stop lights.

One of the less obvious conflicts, however, are laws that are often referred to as “Mandatory Use Laws.”  California has just such a law on the books in the form of CVC 21208:

(a) Whenever a bicycle lane has been established on a roadway pursuant to Section 21207, any person operating a bicycle upon the roadway at a speed less than the normal speed of traffic moving in the same direction at that time shall ride within the bicycle lane, except that the person may move out of the lane under any of the following situations:(1) When overtaking and passing another bicycle, vehicle, or pedestrian within the lane or about to enter the lane if the overtaking and passing cannot be done safely within the lane.

(2) When preparing for a left turn at an intersection or into a private road or driveway.

(3) When reasonably necessary to leave the bicycle lane to avoid debris or other hazardous conditions.

(4) When approaching a place where a right turn is authorized.

(b) No person operating a bicycle shall leave a bicycle lane until the movement can be made with reasonable safety and then only after giving an appropriate signal in the manner provided in Chapter 6 (commencing with Section 22100) in the event that any vehicle may be affected by the movement.

I’m not going to comment on the law itself.  However, I do object to the summation of this as a “Mandatory Use” law.  In fact, the law is written with more language regarding the exceptions where the law does not apply than statement of the law itself.

Why do I object to calling it mandatory use?  Well, in truth very few of us actually take the time to read the law.  Rather, we rely on basic understanding to guide our actions and opinions.  Summarizing and tagging this as “Mandatory Use” spreads the message that, if there is a bike lane, cyclists must use it.  Period.

Unfortunately, some even interpret this phrase a bit further and assume that mandatory use means that cyclists must always use bike lanes, and extrapolate that to mean that if there is no bike lane than cyclists should not be on the road.

I’ve experienced driver frustration as I took the lane – legally and safely – to prepare to make a left hand turn.  I’ve also witnessed cyclists attempting to figure out how to make left hand turns from the bike lane against the right curb – apparently thinking that was the proper place for them to be.

There are many challenges to getting understand among the community – both cyclist and motorist alike – about the rules and regulations of our highways.  I strongly believe that the usage of the phrase “Mandatory Use Law” makes these challenges more difficult by creating a false understanding among folks on the roads.

I’ve received some interesting responses – both directly and indirectly – about my recent post titled ‘Anti-bike Propaganda.’  In that article, I picked random comments made by folks on various websites, forums and news posts.  All of the quoted comments – by design – had a decidedly anti-cycling flavor.

I’ve now taken some time to ponder some of the responses, and I think I’ll start selectively addressing some of the statements I collected.  The first statement I’d like to examine deals with the issue of bicycle registration, or licensing

Share the road. Make insurance mandatory along with license plates on bicycles, they can cause accidents just as cars, and be used in crimes just like cars so the laws should be made “center of the road” so it is equal for both parties using the road. Simple.

I decided to approach this issue due to a timely posting by BikingInLA regarding Santa Monica’s own current bicycle registration requirements.  As with most bicycle registration programs that have been employed, the intent is usually to assist in identifying the rightful owners of recovered stolen bikes.  Clearly, however, this is not the intent of the comment quoted above.

This is evidenced by the combination of licensing and insurance in the same clause: “Make insurance mandatory along with license plates on bicycles.”  It sounds as if this person believes that cyclists are not accountable for property damages they may cause, and that insurance and licensing would somehow address this issue.

It is not clear to me at all how a license plate would do anything to change the legal liabilities of cyclists to compensate for damages they cause.  My opinion is that the inclusion of a license plate requirement demonstrates a lack of understanding of bicycles as vehicles.  For example – are we going to require that every 3 or 4 year old’s bicycle be registered?  What about their tricycle?  Big Wheel?  What about transfers of registration at sale?  State motor vehicle department’s funding often comes – in large part – from tax dollars.  When you can easily find used bicycles at garage sales for $25 or less, sale of bicycles obviously happens at a lot faster rate than sale of cars – and would thus require a significantly larger investment in tax dollars to support.

I suspect that the insurance comment actually hits a lot closer to the target this comment’s author was aiming for – holding cyclists accountable for damages they cause.

This would seem to imply a perception by this person that there are no laws that hold a cyclist accountable – and that is simply not true.  First off, everyone is legally responsible for damages they cause no matter how they cause them.  Secondly, it is extremely difficult for me to cause any significant amount of monetary loss due to use of my bike.  If I hit the side of your parked car with my bike, the physical amount of damage I can cause is simply limited.  It is very very likely that any financial compensation due to the property owner would fall below the deductible of a liability insurance policy anyhow.  In other words, except in rare case, liability insurance would seem to be irrelevant to most bicycle caused accidents.

The real kicker for me here, however, is that most cyclists actually are covered by insurance (even though they may not know it).  In fact, a cyclist may actually have more coverage for liability cause by an accident than your average motorist.  There are two potential insurance policies that can cover a cyclist in this scenario:  vehicle liability coverage, and homeowner’s or renters insurance.  The latter – a homeowner’s or renter’s policy – is a sure bet.  If you’ve got one, our almost guaranteed some sort of coverage for liabilities due if you damage someone else’s property while riding your bicycle.  Your vehicle liability policy may be a little trickier to work out – and will vary by state.  However, you may be surprised to find out that often bicycles do indeed fall under the general umbrella of “vehicle,” and thus can be covered by your auto insurance.

Ultimately this person’s statement feel like a straw-man argument – an excuse to not respect cyclists when they are on the road.

Parked out front of the coffee shop this afternoon I noticed not one but three Sacramento Police Department bicycles.  All were different makes and models, but all were mountain bikes.  The three officers had stopped for a cup of coffee.  Apparently (but not surprisingly) officers on bicycles are much healthier than their car-bound brethren.  There was not a doughnut in a single one of their hands – even a stereotypical one.

All of them were similiarly equipped – with lights and a siren on the handlebars.

Ah bicycle helmets.  The topic that I just can’t leave alone.  While I try to remain non-judgmental to the choices of others, and personally can take it or leave it, I still remain decidedly against helmet laws.

Unfortunately, the folks that support helmet laws often throw out statistics without saying where they come from.

These types of issues are never as cut-n-dry as they appear.  The bicycle helmet debate even more so for two major reasons:

1) The fact that wearing a helmet prevents injury just seems “obviously right.” to many folks.  So did the fact that the earth was flat at one point.

2) There is precious little actual data – thus we tend to fall back on what seems “obviously right”

What does it take to get some real data into this discussion?