A Cycling & bikes forum. CycleBanter.com

Go Back   Home » CycleBanter.com forum » rec.bicycles » Techniques
Site Map Home Register Authors List Search Today's Posts Mark Forums Read Web Partners

Bicyclist Fatalities in AZ 2009



 
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1061  
Old December 9th 10, 05:21 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Dan O
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 6,098
Default Bicyclist Fatalities in AZ 2009

On Dec 8, 7:56 pm, Jay Beattie wrote:
On Dec 8, 4:38 pm, Frank Krygowski wrote:



On Dec 8, 4:54 pm, Jay Beattie wrote:


On Dec 8, 9:40 am, Frank Krygowski wrote:


On Dec 8, 11:26 am, RobertH wrote:


On Dec 7, 7:35 pm, Tēm ShermĒn™ °_°


How does defensive driving apply? The only similar situation would be
on a low-powered scooter that could not keep pace with other motorized
traffic.


False. When you're simply cruising down the road in your vehicle, the
principles of defensive driving apply, whether you're being passed or
not, because you have to be ready for encroachment from the wings,
watch the road surface, etc. While you're being passed these
principles of defensive driving are even more important.. Furthermore,
when you're being passed, in any vehicle, the principles of defensive
driving should be applied to your relationship with that anonymous
driver to the extent that it is practicable to apply those principles.
Obviously in passing situations the operator of the vehicle being
passed must rely at least somewhat on the faculties of the passing
driver.


So, Robert: Of course, I know you'd be ever alert, well prepared,
extremely skillful and always taking responsibility for your own
safety, etc.


But in a 10 foot lane, curb at the right, with an 8.5 foot truck
behind you, where exactly would you ride?


Probably the same place he always rides, being that very few people
shift their position in the lane based on vehicles approaching from
the rear. "Oh, look, its an Escalade, better get left." "No, its
just a Prius, I should ride further right." "But wait, its a
Kenworth, better go down the center." Really, I'm riding a bike, not
a yoyo.


Your hypothetical also assumes that the truck is going to try to pass
you in your own lane rather than cross the centerline and pass at a
safe (and legally required) distance. You can make that assumption
sometimes, but not all the time. And if there is a place where
everyone always tries to pass too closely (I admit, there are such
places), then taking the road may be the safe thing to do. It also
requires you to pull off when there are cars piled up behind you to
let them pass. In that case, you are no different than the slow moving
lawn tractor driving down the road. The fact that you are on a bike
does not make you special and immune from the "slow moving vehicle
must yield" laws.


Are you aware of the Trotwood vs. Selz case, and what Bob Mionske and
of course Steve Magas have explained regarding that?


http://ohiobikelawyer.com/bike-law-1...ase-revisited/


http://velonews.competitor.com/2006/...aking-with-bob...


AFAIK, most states do not have a "slow moving vehicle must yield"
law. A few do have one, but it's restricted to situations where there
are (typically) five vehicles held behind _and_ there is a safe place
to pull over. If slow moving vehicles had to yield all the time, we
would have no right to the road, motorhomes would never make it out of
the flatlands, and commerce would become severely limited.


I'm pushing the "where would you ride" question because certain
posters were exaggerating the danger of bicycling, implying that one
can't trust motorists not to smash you. I'm trying to see who really
dives into the gutter or onto the sidewalk whenever a vehicle
approaches. I chose those dimensions because they're common in my
area, and there's no rational way to try to share that lane - at
least, not in my view nor according to any cycling instructional
material I know of.


Based on that, I would control that lane and not try to share the lane
to let the truck squeeze by. Do you agree?


By the way, Frank, I don't necessarily disagree with your proposition
that sometimes the only safe thing to do is take the lane -- or a
larger part of it. I DO take a larger portion of the lane to prevent
busses from passing me in certain places because they will squeeze me
in to the curb, and probably with great satisfaction. There is also a
down hill, off camber turn out of down town where cars tend to hug the
inside curb, and I ride out in the lane there, although I'm usually
going about the speed of traffic. In your truck scenario, I might
ride farther out in the road if I were approaching a turn where the
truck likely would cut the curve, if only innocently. On one lane
roads, I just ride to the right but not in the gutter, and cars and
trucks seem to get by without scaring me too often. I would never
take the whole road just because some people might pass me too
closely.


+1 (the whole thing)
Ads
  #1062  
Old December 9th 10, 05:39 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Tim McNamara
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 6,945
Default OT - Medical Costs

In article ,
Tēm ShermĒn °_° " wrote:

On 12/7/2010 9:39 AM, Peter Cole wrote:
On 12/7/2010 8:12 AM, Tēm ShermĒn °_° wrote:
On 12/6/2010 11:04 PM, Tim McNamara wrote:
In , Peter
wrote: [...]
Medicine, in the US, via a number of mechanisms, is pretty
much a cartel.
Bull****. But you have to stop mixing things up to be able to
understand that.


The financing of medical care in the US is a cartel.


It doesn't stop there.


Indeed, the artificial barriers to becoming a provider are almost on
the level of the old medieval guilds.


I see. The standards for becoming a physician should be lower than they
are? This would make health care safer and more effective? Maybe we
shouldn't require four years of college, four years of medical school
and 7-12 years of internships and residencies.

Hell, how hard can neurosurgery be, anyway?

--
Gotta make it somehow on the dreams you still believe.
  #1063  
Old December 9th 10, 05:48 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Tim McNamara
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 6,945
Default OT - Medical Costs

In article
,
Jay Beattie wrote:

On Dec 7, 4:27*pm, Tim McNamara wrote:
In article , *T m Sherm n
_ " wrote:

On 12/6/2010 11:04 PM, Tim McNamara wrote:
In , * Peter
*wrote:
[...]
*Medicine, in the US, via a number of mechanisms, is pretty
much *a cartel.
Bull****. *But you have to stop mixing things up to be able to
understand that.


The financing of medical care in the US is a cartel.


You'd have to prove collusion between insurance companies to
prevent competition or inflate prices to demonstrate that health
care finance is a cartel. *It may very well be, and if so it is one
of many (along with the oil industry, the cell phone industry, the
music industry, the movie industry, the...). *Drug companies, OTOH,
operate as monopolies rather than as cartels.


Insurance policies and premiums are approved by state regulators.
Premiums are set based on actuarial data, and annual increases must
be approved. Insurance companies are treated like regulated utilities
and not cartels in the sense that they are competitors engaged in
illegal price fixing or other monopoly-like activity. The problem
is that there are too few insurers competing for business, so there
is no real choice for consumers.


There are at least a dozen competing health insurance companies in my
state. Four of them split up most of the market share and another four
or five take most of what's left with a few smaller players. What's the
minimum threshold for effective competition? There are three times as
many insurance companies as there are paid TV signal providers here (and
many people spend as much or more on TV service than they do on health
insurance premiums).

Patent rights may give drug companies "monopolies" on certain drugs
in the same way that Shimano has a monopoly on Di2, but the drug
companies are not "monopolies." Since we are talking about multiple
competitors, it would have to be a trust or a cartel in any event.


Drug companies have legal monopolies on drugs covered by patent
protection, and then maintain those monopolies as long as possible once
the patents expire by tying up the generic drug with lawsuits over
things like pill coatings. Another favored technique is to modify the
delivery system to get new patent protection for an old drug (Advair is
a great example of this).

The problem is that market forces are very, very weak in the health
care industry. The capitalist model does not work well. I am pushing
for a complete overhaul: socialized voo-doo. -- Jay Beattie.


Fine by me. Simple, straightforward, universal coverage.

--
Gotta make it somehow on the dreams you still believe.
  #1064  
Old December 9th 10, 05:52 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
RobertH
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 342
Default Bicyclist Fatalities in AZ 2009

On Dec 8, 10:43 am, Frank Krygowski wrote:

But what if there are no parked cars. Why not ride further left?
Wouldn't that be more effective?


It can be. Sometimes I do.


Under what circumstances.

"Down the middle" doesn't mean anybody's
used a tape measure.


Wait, are you now saying you always aim for the general middle of the
lane in lane-controlling mode, but that sometimes you are a little
sloppy so you end up on the left? Or do you consciously decide to ride
further left than middle?

So Robert, where would you ride?


Depends primarily on what's happening on the right edge of the road.

Ten feet is an extremely narrow lane. Most people don't understand how
narrow ten feet is. To compare, the Cherry Creek bike path here in
Denver is never less than eleven or twelve feet across. Riding in the
middle of such a lane gives a five-foot buffer to right side hazards,
less than the width of a standard suburban sidewalk.
  #1065  
Old December 9th 10, 06:03 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Frank Krygowski[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 7,511
Default Bicyclist Fatalities in AZ 2009

On Dec 8, 9:00*pm, Jay Beattie wrote:
On Dec 8, 4:38*pm, Frank Krygowski wrote:

Are you aware of the Trotwood vs. Selz case, and what Bob Mionske and
of course Steve Magas have explained regarding that?


http://ohiobikelawyer.com/bike-law-1...ase-revisited/


http://velonews.competitor.com/2006/...aking-with-bob...


Yes, they're wrong -- at least in Oregon. *I know that because of
this:

"Evidence was sufficient to support conviction for impeding traffic,
even though defendant's conviction involved his use of bicycle and
definition of offense referred only to motor vehicles; nothing in
vehicle code provided that such offense be applied only to motor
vehicles. ORS 811.130(1), 814.400. State v. Potter (2002) 57 P.3d 944,
185 Or.App. 81."

So, go ahead and impede traffic in Ohio, but not here. *You'll get
busted. *


First, I'd have thought you could talk to Mionske about this. Both of
you are in PDX, IIRC.

Second, although IANAL, we both know that there are bad decisions.
If, in the case you cite, it seems the conviction was based on a law
regarding _motor_ vehicles, it was a bad decision. There's no
guarantee that appeals at a high enough level would overturn it (even
the US Supreme Court makes bad decisions) but I expect that someone
willing to pay for appeals would have eventually gotten it reversed.
(And BTW, that would be a productive thing for your BTA to do. Or the
near-useless LAB.)

Third, the bicycle section of the Oregon law specifically permits
controlling a lane. That's in the section 2c that you quoted
yourself.

Fourth, I rode in Portland again this year. I absolutely controlled
the lane many times, as always. I specifically remember doing that at
5 PM on a Friday, riding uphill on either Morrison or Taylor, for just
one example. Ditto on 23rd in the NW, etc. I didn't get busted.

Get with Mionske. See what he says. Seriously.

- Frank Krygowski
  #1066  
Old December 9th 10, 06:14 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Frank Krygowski[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 7,511
Default Bicyclist Fatalities in AZ 2009

On Dec 8, 11:52*pm, RobertH wrote:
On Dec 8, 10:43 am, Frank Krygowski wrote:

But what if there are no parked cars. Why not ride further left?
Wouldn't that be more effective?


It can be. *Sometimes I do.


Under what circumstances.


In a ten foot lane? If there's any hazard at all at the right. That
includes things like a motorist quickly approaching a stop sign from
the right, because if he doesn't stop, I'll value the maneuvering
room. Ditto a car backing out of a drive. Ditto road surface that's
too rough. Slippery wet leaves. A pedestrian walking toward me in
the road. Etc.

"Down the middle" doesn't mean anybody's
used a tape measure.


Wait, are you now saying you always aim for the general middle of the
lane in lane-controlling mode, but that sometimes you are a little
sloppy so you end up on the left? Or do you consciously decide to ride
further left than middle?


I have NEVER said I always "aim for," or ride in, the middle of a
lane. I have many times said I share a lane whenever it's safe to do
so. However, it's not safe to do so in a ten foot lane, unless
perhaps the passing vehicle is a motorcycle or other bicycle.

So Robert, where would you ride?


Depends primarily on what's happening on the right edge of the road.

Ten feet is an extremely narrow lane.


Absolutely. Yet common in older eastern cities.

Riding in the
middle of such a lane gives a five-foot buffer to right side hazards,
less than the width of a standard suburban sidewalk.


So you seem to be saying you, too, would ride in the middle of that
lane when a truck is behind. Don't be shy about saying that.

- Frank Krygowski
  #1067  
Old December 9th 10, 06:30 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
James[_8_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 6,153
Default Bicyclist Fatalities in AZ 2009

Frank Krygowski wrote:

DR picked you up on this once already today.

I have NEVER said I always "aim for," or ride in, the middle of a
lane. I have many times said I share a lane whenever it's safe to do
so. However, it's not safe to do so in a ten foot lane, unless
perhaps the passing vehicle is a motorcycle or other bicycle.


In a previous post in this thread you wrote:

I'm going to continue to ride in the center of the lane,
and I'm not going to cede
my legal right to the road out of fear the trucker is really a
murderer.


Need you be reminded of your own words twice in one day? Or does
"middle" not also mean "centre" in your dictionary?

JS.
  #1068  
Old December 9th 10, 06:41 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Tēm ShermĒn™ °_°[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,339
Default Bicyclist Fatalities in AZ 2009

On 12/8/2010 11:03 PM, Frank Krygowski wrote:
[...] even the US Supreme Court makes bad decisions [...]


When you load a court with activist Christofascists, what do you expect?

--
Tēm ShermĒn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.
  #1069  
Old December 9th 10, 06:46 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Jay Beattie
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 4,322
Default Bicyclist Fatalities in AZ 2009

On Dec 8, 9:03*pm, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On Dec 8, 9:00*pm, Jay Beattie wrote:





On Dec 8, 4:38*pm, Frank Krygowski wrote:


Are you aware of the Trotwood vs. Selz case, and what Bob Mionske and
of course Steve Magas have explained regarding that?


http://ohiobikelawyer.com/bike-law-1...ase-revisited/


http://velonews.competitor.com/2006/...aking-with-bob....


Yes, they're wrong -- at least in Oregon. *I know that because of
this:


"Evidence was sufficient to support conviction for impeding traffic,
even though defendant's conviction involved his use of bicycle and
definition of offense referred only to motor vehicles; nothing in
vehicle code provided that such offense be applied only to motor
vehicles. ORS 811.130(1), 814.400. State v. Potter (2002) 57 P.3d 944,
185 Or.App. 81."


So, go ahead and impede traffic in Ohio, but not here. *You'll get
busted. *


First, I'd have thought you could talk to Mionske about this. *Both of
you are in PDX, IIRC.


Why would I? I can read statutes, in fact, I've even written a few.

Second, although IANAL, we both know that there are bad decisions.
If, in the case you cite, it seems the conviction was based on a law
regarding _motor_ vehicles, it was a bad decision. *There's no
guarantee that appeals at a high enough level would overturn it (even
the US Supreme Court makes bad decisions) but I expect that someone
willing to pay for appeals would have eventually gotten it reversed.
(And BTW, that would be a productive thing for your BTA to do. *Or the
near-useless LAB.)


A bicycle is treated identically to a motor vehicle for most purposes,
including the impeding statute. Sorry, that's the law. The opinion
was correctly decided, and there is no impetus for changing the law.

Third, the bicycle section of the Oregon law specifically permits
controlling a lane. *That's in the section 2c that you quoted
yourself.


No it doesn't. Read again, and read all the relevant sections. They
work perfectly together.

Fourth, I rode in Portland again this year. *I absolutely controlled
the lane many times, as always. *I specifically remember doing that at
5 PM on a Friday, riding uphill on either Morrison or Taylor, for just
one example. *Ditto on 23rd in the NW, etc. *I didn't get busted.


I do all sorts of stupid things and don't get busted. All the streets
you mentioned are narrow and slow, and typically I'm trying to get
around traffic, particularly riding east (downhill).


Get with Mionske. *See what he says. *Seriously.


The Court of Appeals has answered the question. I don't need to talk
to Bob, and if I want an expert on bicycle law, I would talk to Ray
Thomas anyway. No offense to Bob. -- Jay Beattie.
  #1070  
Old December 9th 10, 07:03 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Michael Press
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 9,202
Default OT - Medical Costs

In article ,
"(PeteCresswell)" wrote:

Per Tim McNamara:
That does happen; indeed, it happened with some family members in a
hospital. I challenged the charge and had it removed. Always get an
itemized bill, go over it and look for weird charges. Call for an
explanation; if they cannot show the documentation for the charge,
demand to have it removed from the bill.


A looong time ago the son of our civic association's president
fell out of a tree and broke his arm.

He'd broken the other arm a few years before and the family doc
had set it and put a cast on it for something like the cost of an
extended office visit plus materials.

This time, somebody called 911 and they took the kid to the
nearest hospital.

The father came to the hospital, found the kid alone in a hallway
with a cast on his arm, half-conscious, laying on a gurney
about 3 feet off the concrete floor, with no side rails, and
plaster splattered all over him.

Father took the kid home, and the feeding frenzy began.
Bill-after-bill-after-bill for totally BS stuff.

Being a direct sort of person, the guy went down to the hospital,
located the person in charge, and said "If I get one more goddamn
bill from this hospital I'm gonna come back and punch your lights
out."

The bills stopped...


And the police arrived.

--
Michael Press
 




Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

vB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Forum Jump

Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Reduce fatalities or danger rates instead? Doug[_3_] UK 3 September 19th 10 08:05 AM
Three cycling fatalities in London last month. Daniel Barlow UK 4 July 7th 09 12:58 PM
Child cyclist fatalities in London Tom Crispin UK 13 October 11th 08 05:12 PM
Car washes for cyclist fatalities Bobby Social Issues 4 October 11th 04 07:13 PM
web-site on road fatalities cfsmtb Australia 4 April 23rd 04 09:21 AM


All times are GMT +1. The time now is 02:21 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.6.4
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright Š2004-2024 CycleBanter.com.
The comments are property of their posters.