cyclist/driver relations

Mark Shroyer said:

Amen. On the other hand (or the same one?), I used to ride with
someone who would wave thankfully at cars who yielded to his right
of way at intersections. I always wanted to ask him whether he was
surprised when drivers decided against ignoring him and running him
over.

I try to remember to do this. And yes, it is because in many
situations I am surprised that a driver had the "patience" to wait an
extra ~5 seconds for me. It is also because I try to create goodwill
with these large, heavy, powerful, often aggressive, beasts known as
"motor vehicles".

- JR

On Sun, 08 Jul 2007 22:57:08 GMT, Luigi de Guzman <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

My pet peeve is when drivers see me roll up to intersections and freak
out--waving me across.

I mean, sure, it gets me across sooner, but I'm riding along expecting
them to behave in a certain (lawful) fashion, and whenever they stop and
wave me through, it disrupts my timing. It's as unnecessary as it is
unexpected.

snip

Last time it happened to me it was a police cruiser waving me through
a stop sign without stopping. Would I have been arrested for failing
to obey a lawful order if I stopped?

Agreed it was awkward because I was unclipped and hard on the brakes
at the time.

Luigi de Guzman said:

Tom Keats said:

Yeah, dependent on the context of the situation (i.e:
no third parties end up being delayed,) if a driver
gives me a break, I've come to gratefully take it,
rather than being a stickler for the rules.

I take it, but it rattles me to no end, since it's not something I expect.
Sometimes it even catches me off-balance.

It really bugs me when drivers do this at four-way stops. I'm almost OK
with the gesture when we are the only two vehicles at the intersection,
but when a third vehicle enters into the mix, things get silly, since the
third car has no idea what's going on. I'm afraid that one of these days
I'll be waved through by some well-meaning motorist and get crunched by a
third car who wasn't expecting me to be where I ended up.

I handle the four-way-stop situation by sort of taking charge - but
always according to the rules of the road.

For example, I try to avoid simultaneous arrival and the resulting
confusion and politeness wars. Facing a simultaneous arrival, I don't
sprint toward the stop sign, but I will brake later and harder than
usual, do a micro-second track stand, and immediately take the right
of way. IOW, when appropriate, I resolve the confusion by just
getting things done.

But if it's clear the other vehicle operator has the legal ROW, I'll
slow early and wave them through as I'm still approaching. They do
seem to appreciate it, and it smooths the flow of traffic.

This sort of behavior on my part seems to work well even if there are
more cars lined up. I think it shows I'm competent and predictable.

BTW, when someone violates ROW rules to let me go first, if I _must_
accept, I'm more likely to shrug "OK, if you say so" than to wave "Oh,
thank you." I'd prefer everyone just use the rules of the road. They
work.

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Cathy Kearns said:

A couple a weeks ago I was waiting to turn left, and a cyclist was coming
toward me from the other direction. He did the perfect left arm, bent up at
a right angle exactly at the elbow with the hand straight up, just like we
learned for a right turn signal back in our bike rodeo days. Now, if I
believed he was actually going to turn right, I could have made my left
turn. But I didn't believe him. And sure enough, I'm not sure what he
thought that signal meant, but he went straight through the intersection. I
would have T-boned him had I made the turn.

A cyclist I was following (I was on my bike about 100 feet back) did that
too. Stuck his left arm up in what I thought was a retro right turn
signal and then went straight through the intersection.

I'm now worried that this signal now means something other than it used
to but no one told me.

Perhaps some movie or TV character has been mis-signalling turns?

I've noticed waves of road misbehavior come and go -- a few years ago, I
noticed a surge of an even more dangerous behavior: when I was in my
car, approaching a bicycle from the rear, the bicycle rider, without
looking back, would swerve suicidally across the roadway and ride on the
wrong side of the road while I passed, then swerve back to the right
side of the road. I don't know what made this suicidal behavior
suddenly popular, but it seemed to fade away in a year or two, so I
suspected some popular-culture mis-example that went away.

Anybody know anyone in tween/youth media who wants yet another social
message to add to a show? I'm sure they could make a good physical
comedy routine out of a bike-on-bike accident caused by signaling a turn
then not turning, and it would reach more people than all the PSAs you
could ever hope for on the subject.

--
[email hidden] is Joshua Putnam
<http://www.phred.org/~josh/>
Updated Infrared Photography Gallery:
<http://www.phred.org/~josh/photo/ir.html>

josh said:

Anybody know anyone in tween/youth media who wants yet another social
message to add to a show? I'm sure they could make a good physical
comedy routine out of a bike-on-bike accident caused by signaling a turn
then not turning, and it would reach more people than all the PSAs you
could ever hope for on the subject.

The message: don't ride your bikes, kids.

At least that's what people will see.

--
Luigi de Guzman
http://ouij.livejournal.com

Quoted message said:

Anybody know anyone in tween/youth media who wants yet another social
message to add to a show? I'm sure they could make a good physical
comedy routine out of a bike-on-bike accident caused by signaling a turn
then not turning, and it would reach more people than all the PSAs you
could ever hope for on the subject.

A year or two ago there was a fatal bike on bike accident, so nothing
like that would seem funny to me.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Yeah, dependent on the context of the situation (i.e:
no third parties end up being delayed,) if a driver
gives me a break, I've come to gratefully take it,
rather than being a stickler for the rules.

I take it, but it rattles me to no end, since it's not something I expect.
Sometimes it even catches me off-balance.

I used to protest but there's a lot of drivers here with an ingrained
pig-headedness. I've begun taking advantage of their stupid
insistence if it's otherwise safe to do so.

I curse them broadly and take my damn sweet time about doing what
they wanted me to illegally do.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

It really bugs me when drivers do this at four-way stops. I'm almost OK
with the gesture when we are the only two vehicles at the intersection,
but when a third vehicle enters into the mix, things get silly, since the
third car has no idea what's going on. I'm afraid that one of these days
I'll be waved through by some well-meaning motorist and get crunched by a
third car who wasn't expecting me to be where I ended up.

I handle the four-way-stop situation by sort of taking charge - but
always according to the rules of the road.

Amen. But, in some situations I'll filter forward and cross with
another straight-thru vehicle when it's their turn.

Quoted message said:

For example, I try to avoid simultaneous arrival and the resulting
confusion and politeness wars. Facing a simultaneous arrival, I don't
sprint toward the stop sign, but I will brake later and harder than
usual, do a micro-second track stand, and immediately take the right
of way. IOW, when appropriate, I resolve the confusion by just
getting things done.

Yep. If I can avoid the four-way-stop dilemma, I do. If not, I'll
play traffic cop.

Quoted message said:

But if it's clear the other vehicle operator has the legal ROW, I'll
slow early and wave them through as I'm still approaching. They do
seem to appreciate it, and it smooths the flow of traffic.

Another situation is when an approaching driver is signalling a left
turn, notices me and slows. If I see that they can safely make their
turn in front of me or any following traffic I'll usually give them a
nod or wave to go across my path. That mostly depends on my speed and
whether it's uphill or down.
--
zk