Who is at fault and how should it be dealt?

[Artoi]

In article
<[email protected]>,
"[email protected]" <[email protected]> wrote:

> On Nov 21, 7:39 am, Artoi <[email protected]> wrote:
> > Excuse the cross-posting but I think this could be interesting for
> > discussion.
> >
> > Came across this hypothetical scenario on a cycling forum...
> >
> > Several riders are returning from their weekend club ride and are riding
> > together in a bunch. One cyclist signals turning and another cyclist,
> > riding second wheel in the group, looks back to wave him an extended
> > farewell. In the meanwhile, the cyclist at the head of the bunch signals
> > stopping at a congested round-about, slowing to an almost complete stop.
> > the cyclist waving his mate fails to heed the signal, and the loud
> > warnings of others behind him, and collides with the cyclist at the head
> > of the bunch writing-off his expensive carbon fiber frame.
> >
> > Who is at fault here? If you were the cyclist with the wrecked frame,
> > what would you be thinking? What would you expect of the rider who
> > rammed you from behind?
>
> Don't look back. Glance. Real quick.
>
> Because otherwise, you'll run into someone or something-- it's a
> setup; nothing ever happens until you have your head turned.
>
> What kind of new frame are you going to get <g>? --D-y

Not me. It was a hypothetical setup by a buddy who knows of a similar
case. As the case caused quite a heated debate within our club, I just
want to get the view on this in the wider cycling community.
--

 

[Artoi]

In article
<fbf82481-2eee-4798-93bf-af22dc3709cf@b32g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
Pete <[email protected]> wrote:

> That said, if you aren't looking where you're going and you hit
> something, you're pretty much automatically at fault, especially if
> what you hit is in the right place. So - IMO, guy at the front gets a
> new bike (in the same price range, not taking the **** with a 5 grand
> colnago) and the guy not looking pays.

Did you take into account of the fact that it was a voluntary club bunch
ride? An activity with known risks?
--

 

[Artoi]

In article <[email protected]>,
"xzzy" <[email protected]> wrote:

> > At least in the U.S., the negligent rider's homeowner's or renter's
> > insurance policy probably includes personal liability coverage that
> > would usually apply to an accident other than a motor vehicle accident.
> >
>
> any info regrarding this for a negligent rider in Colorado would be helpful

Are there insurance coverage with your racing license there in the US?
--

 

[Paul Cassel]

Artoi wrote:

>
> Who is at fault here? If you were the cyclist with the wrecked frame,
> what would you be thinking? What would you expect of the rider who
> rammed you from behind?
> --

Clearly, IMO, the fellow who rammed from behind. It's his duty to make
sure the way is clear for him to proceed. He failed to do so by looking
backwards.

 

In article <[email protected]>, mrbikejoc1
@comcast.net says...
> > At least in the U.S., the negligent rider's homeowner's or renter's
> > insurance policy probably includes personal liability coverage that
> > would usually apply to an accident other than a motor vehicle accident.
> >
>
> any info regrarding this for a negligent rider in Colorado would be helpful

The rider should contact his/her own insurance agent to see if the
policy in question has appropriate coverage.

I'm not licensed in Colorado and haven't seen the individual's insurance
policy, so I can't be more specific than that.

--
[email protected] is Joshua Putnam
<http://www.phred.org/~josh/>
Braze your own bicycle frames. See
<http://www.phred.org/~josh/build/build.html>

 

[Zebee Johnstone]

In aus.bicycle on Thu, 22 Nov 2007 02:11:00 GMT
Artoi <[email protected]> wrote:
> With your experience, would the fact that this was a voluntary club
> bunch ride affect your view? Some argue that bunch rides are inherently
> dangerous and everyone should be responsible for their own
> participation, even if it was not your fault.

Negligence and not keeping a proper lookout are things no club rider
should have to cope with.

The bod who hit was not looking where he was going. Stupid and he
can't expect to get away with breaking someone else's kit.


Zebee

 

[ZBicyclist]

[email protected] wrote:
>
>
> Assuming this is a ride on an ordinary public road, not a closed
> course, not an organized event, the rider who failed to stop is very
> likely at fault, given the information provided. From the
> description, he's lucky he had an accident with the lead cyclist,
> rather than blindly riding into traffic in a congested roundabout,
> adding injuries to his failure to yield.
>
Forgetting legal liability for a moment, I've paid in similar circumstances.

The similar situation: Club ride with standard waiver. We've reached our
destination and are sightseeing a historic district. One rider points out a
landmark. I look to the left to see it. The two riders immediately in front
of me stop (I did not hear/heed their warning, although the rider behind me
did hear them and stop.). There was less damage -- a badly bent rim that was
capable of being trued enough to be ridden back 40 miles home with the brake
disabled.

I looked at it this way: I can make a friend or lose a friend. For the cost
of a new wheel I can look like a generous person or like an asshole. I
immediately offered to pay for a repair or a new wheel. (I ended up paying
for a used wheel he found.)

I'm just reporting my choice in an actual situation, not trying to make a
universal statement about a "hypothetical" situation.

 

[Bret]

On Nov 21, 6:39 am, Artoi <[email protected]> wrote:
> Excuse the cross-posting but I think this could be interesting for
> discussion.
>
> Came across this hypothetical scenario on a cycling forum...
>
> Several riders are returning from their weekend club ride and are riding
> together in a bunch. One cyclist signals turning and another cyclist,
> riding second wheel in the group, looks back to wave him an extended
> farewell. In the meanwhile, the cyclist at the head of the bunch signals
> stopping at a congested round-about, slowing to an almost complete stop.
> the cyclist waving his mate fails to heed the signal, and the loud
> warnings of others behind him, and collides with the cyclist at the head
> of the bunch writing-off his expensive carbon fiber frame.
>
> Who is at fault here? If you were the cyclist with the wrecked frame,
> what would you be thinking? What would you expect of the rider who
> rammed you from behind?
> --

I had some co-workers that were involved in a similar incident only
funnier. Four of them were out for a noon ride in the late 80's when
they spotted Andy Hampsten riding in the other direction. The rider at
the front was so awstruck that he stopped pedaling and gawked at Andy.
The rider behind was only semi-awstruck because he gawked, but kept
pedaling and ran into the rider in front. It was like, "Look, there's
Andy Hampsten! Crash! Crash! Crash! Three riders went down. The 2nd
rider broke his frame and thought the lead rider should pay to replace
it. He lobbyed the "more experienced" riders at work, including
myself, hoping to get a judgement that yes indeed he was due a new
frame. We all told him it was his fault and that anyway, you accept
the risk. He wasn't happy with that and never rode with a co-worker
again. He also never acknowledged that it was his mistake that brought
the other riders down. All that over a late 80's Trek frame that you
couldn't give away today.

Bret

 

[TimC]

On 2007-11-22, Zebee Johnstone (aka Bruce)
was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea:
> In aus.bicycle on Thu, 22 Nov 2007 02:11:00 GMT
> Artoi <[email protected]> wrote:
>> With your experience, would the fact that this was a voluntary club
>> bunch ride affect your view? Some argue that bunch rides are inherently
>> dangerous and everyone should be responsible for their own
>> participation, even if it was not your fault.
>
> Negligence and not keeping a proper lookout are things no club rider
> should have to cope with.
>
> The bod who hit was not looking where he was going. Stupid and he
> can't expect to get away with breaking someone else's kit.

I do mostly agree, with one caveat. Being the communist hippy *******
that am I, is it my responsibility to pay the full amount if I destroy
your bike when

1) Your bike is more extravagent than it needs be for the purposes you
are riding it for, and I should only have to pay a reasonable cost for
an equivalently usable bike in the circumstances[1].

2) Your bike is more fragile than it ought to be because it is more
expensive and hi-tech etc. Why don't you have suitable insurance?
I'm equally going to skip the country rather than pay for someone's
luxury $200,000 status symbol of a car in the event of a failure of
mine.

[1] Club ride. Being able to show your status is not something I
should be responsilble for. A $1500 bike is perfectly sufficient in a
club training ride and is much more practical than a $8000 carbon
frame.

--
TimC
NOT A CHANCE! I know for a *fact* the kittens aren't frightened
by temporal anomalies. Clock watching simply ain't their bag.
John Schmidt in ARK

 

[Stu Fleming]

[email protected] wrote:

> The rider should contact his/her own insurance agent to see if the
> policy in question has appropriate coverage.

Or, if it's a Bianchi, contact the manufacturer directly.
Did the frame break directly behind the bottle cage mounts?

 

[G-S]

Artoi wrote:
> As the case caused quite a heated debate within our club, I just
> want to get the view on this in the wider cycling community.
> --

*Looks at waistline*

Oh... not that sort of wider cylist.


G-S

 

[G-S]

TimC wrote:
>
> Why don't you have suitable insurance?
>

Even if a suitable insurance policy is held that only covers the rider
of the 'not at fault' bike (lets assume that's the broken carbon frame
$5000 bike for the moment ok).

The insurance company will pay to the rider with the busted bike but
they will then pursue you for the money.

That pretty much ends up the same way for the rider at fault I'd have
thought.


G-S

 

[G-S]

Duncan wrote:
>
> If you aren't at least third-party insured and you are racing (or
> commuting), you're just being naive..
>

That sounds entirely reasonable to me (but then I manage a transport
company for a living and I wouldn't dream of not having insurance on
vehicles).

> Low cost insurance (such as the standard BNSW membership) covers the
> guilty party (in this case, the guy behind) for this sort of thing:

I wonder how many state associations/groups have something similar?


G-S

 

[Pete]

On 22 Nov, 02:15, Artoi <[email protected]> wrote:
> In article
> <fbf82481-2eee-4798-93bf-af22dc370...@b32g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
>
> Pete <[email protected]> wrote:
> > That said, if you aren't looking where you're going and you hit
> > something, you're pretty much automatically at fault, especially if
> > what you hit is in the right place. So - IMO, guy at the front gets a
> > new bike (in the same price range, not taking the **** with a 5 grand
> > colnago) and the guy not looking pays.
>
> Did you take into account of the fact that it was a voluntary club bunch
> ride? An activity with known risks?

It's voluntary any time you go out on your bike, you know the risks.
Just because you're riding with other guys doesn't change that.

If a car hits you in that situation, you'd say the driver should pay
(and their insurance would). I don't see why a cyclist you know is any
different.

If it was something a bit less clear cut - maybe the group's doing a
paceline, the guy on the front signals to slow for a car and although
everyone's paying reasonable attention someone doesn't slow in time
and there's a pile-up - then I'd say that's a risk of group riding,
and everyone pays for their own repairs. That sort of thing happens
often enough, where maybe you could pin blame on someone but you'd
concede that you might do that yourself easily enough. In a race pile-
up, basically that's a risk of racing (but hopefully you are insured
then).

Short version: if you cause an expensive crash through being a
complete idiot (approaching a busy roundabout, and the guy must have
known it, where you expect that maybe you have to stop, and instead of
paying attention turning round and looking the other way for no good
reason) then causing someone else to be two grand out of pocket -
that's the holiday money, so perhaps your guy at the head of the group
is now stuck between not riding for a year or messing over his wife
and kids - is not acceptable.

Pete

 

[Artoi]

In article <[email protected]>,
Zebee Johnstone <[email protected]> wrote:

> In aus.bicycle on Thu, 22 Nov 2007 02:11:00 GMT
> Artoi <[email protected]> wrote:
> > With your experience, would the fact that this was a voluntary club
> > bunch ride affect your view? Some argue that bunch rides are inherently
> > dangerous and everyone should be responsible for their own
> > participation, even if it was not your fault.
>
> Negligence and not keeping a proper lookout are things no club rider
> should have to cope with.
>
> The bod who hit was not looking where he was going. Stupid and he
> can't expect to get away with breaking someone else's kit.

Been looking around, it would appear that quite a number of clubs have a
signed liability waiver requirement for any of their riders joining
their rides. These include a clause that waives one's right for claims
in the event of an accident.

I wonder how effective these waivers are in situations where there's
undeniable negligence by another rider.
--

 

[Artoi]

In article
<[email protected]>,
TimC <[email protected]> wrote:

> On 2007-11-22, Zebee Johnstone (aka Bruce)
> was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea:
> > In aus.bicycle on Thu, 22 Nov 2007 02:11:00 GMT
> > Artoi <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> With your experience, would the fact that this was a voluntary club
> >> bunch ride affect your view? Some argue that bunch rides are inherently
> >> dangerous and everyone should be responsible for their own
> >> participation, even if it was not your fault.
> >
> > Negligence and not keeping a proper lookout are things no club rider
> > should have to cope with.
> >
> > The bod who hit was not looking where he was going. Stupid and he
> > can't expect to get away with breaking someone else's kit.
>
> I do mostly agree, with one caveat. Being the communist hippy *******
> that am I, is it my responsibility to pay the full amount if I destroy
> your bike when
>
> 1) Your bike is more extravagent than it needs be for the purposes you
> are riding it for, and I should only have to pay a reasonable cost for
> an equivalently usable bike in the circumstances[1].
>
> 2) Your bike is more fragile than it ought to be because it is more
> expensive and hi-tech etc. Why don't you have suitable insurance?
> I'm equally going to skip the country rather than pay for someone's
> luxury $200,000 status symbol of a car in the event of a failure of
> mine.
>
> [1] Club ride. Being able to show your status is not something I
> should be responsilble for. A $1500 bike is perfectly sufficient in a
> club training ride and is much more practical than a $8000 carbon
> frame.

If you are a communist, then you should be well versed in Frederick
Engel's dialectical materialism, heavily adopted in Marxist thinking.
Your two highly subjective points lack foundation and should be rejected.
--

 

[Artoi]

In article <[email protected]>,
G-S <[email protected]> wrote:

> TimC wrote:
> >
> > Why don't you have suitable insurance?
> >
>
> Even if a suitable insurance policy is held that only covers the rider
> of the 'not at fault' bike (lets assume that's the broken carbon frame
> $5000 bike for the moment ok).
>
> The insurance company will pay to the rider with the busted bike but
> they will then pursue you for the money.
>
> That pretty much ends up the same way for the rider at fault I'd have
> thought.

No, the insurance company would only pursue the excess amount, which
happens to be $1000 for insurance associated with Cycling Australia's
membership.
--

 

[Artoi]

In article
<10b0690e-4d4d-4cf3-a25a-77416170fc26@i29g2000prf.googlegroups.com>,
Pete <[email protected]> wrote:

> On 22 Nov, 02:15, Artoi <[email protected]> wrote:
> > In article
> > <fbf82481-2eee-4798-93bf-af22dc370...@b32g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
> >
> > Pete <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > That said, if you aren't looking where you're going and you hit
> > > something, you're pretty much automatically at fault, especially if
> > > what you hit is in the right place. So - IMO, guy at the front gets a
> > > new bike (in the same price range, not taking the **** with a 5 grand
> > > colnago) and the guy not looking pays.
> >
> > Did you take into account of the fact that it was a voluntary club bunch
> > ride? An activity with known risks?
>
> It's voluntary any time you go out on your bike, you know the risks.
> Just because you're riding with other guys doesn't change that.
>
> If a car hits you in that situation, you'd say the driver should pay
> (and their insurance would). I don't see why a cyclist you know is any
> different.
>
> If it was something a bit less clear cut - maybe the group's doing a
> paceline, the guy on the front signals to slow for a car and although
> everyone's paying reasonable attention someone doesn't slow in time
> and there's a pile-up - then I'd say that's a risk of group riding,
> and everyone pays for their own repairs. That sort of thing happens
> often enough, where maybe you could pin blame on someone but you'd
> concede that you might do that yourself easily enough. In a race pile-
> up, basically that's a risk of racing (but hopefully you are insured
> then).
>
> Short version: if you cause an expensive crash through being a
> complete idiot (approaching a busy roundabout, and the guy must have
> known it, where you expect that maybe you have to stop, and instead of
> paying attention turning round and looking the other way for no good
> reason) then causing someone else to be two grand out of pocket -
> that's the holiday money, so perhaps your guy at the head of the group
> is now stuck between not riding for a year or messing over his wife
> and kids - is not acceptable.

As I replied in another post, within parts of the cycling community,
there are waiver requirements that tries to remove one's right to claim
responsibility on another. One example being BNSW's liability waiver
document, which has been adopted by bunch ride groups as a condition for
joining their rides. Similar waivers are also used by cycling groups as
a condition of membership.

http://www.renegadecycles.com.au/media/docs/RideSydney_Information_and_Wa
iver.pdf

http://www.sydneycyclingclub.org.au/Files General/new member.pdf

Any comments on these and their legal merits?
--

 

[Dorfus Dippintush]

Artoi wrote:
> In article <[email protected]>,
> scotty72 <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Artoi Wrote:
>>> Excuse the cross-posting but I think this could be interesting for
>>> discussion.
>>>
>>> Came across this hypothetical scenario on a cycling forum...
>>>
>>> Several riders are returning from their weekend club ride and are
>>> riding
>>> together in a bunch. One cyclist signals turning and another cyclist,
>>> riding second wheel in the group, looks back to wave him an extended
>>> farewell. In the meanwhile, the cyclist at the head of the bunch
>>> signals
>>> stopping at a congested round-about, slowing to an almost complete
>>> stop.
>>> the cyclist waving his mate fails to heed the signal, and the loud
>>> warnings of others behind him, and collides with the cyclist at the
>>> head
>>> of the bunch writing-off his expensive carbon fiber frame.
>>>
>>> Who is at fault here? If you were the cyclist with the wrecked frame,
>>> what would you be thinking? What would you expect of the rider who
>>> rammed you from behind?
>
>> Just as with the rules for cars, unless there is some extra-ordinary
>> circumstance, the guy behind would be a fault for not maintaining a safe
>> stopping distance.
>
> With your experience, would the fact that this was a voluntary club
> bunch ride affect your view? Some argue that bunch rides are inherently
> dangerous and everyone should be responsible for their own
> participation, even if it was not your fault.
> --

The end result would be both views, the guy in front would rightly feel
that he's owed a new frame, the guy behind would insist that since it's
a friendly group ride it's just an unfortunate accident and shouldn't
have to pay. The outcome will be that the two will become bitter enemies
and never ride together again. the group will probably split too, as
each person takes sides.

Dorfus

 

[Artoi]

In article <[email protected]>,
Dorfus Dippintush <[email protected]> wrote:

> The end result would be both views, the guy in front would rightly feel
> that he's owed a new frame, the guy behind would insist that since it's
> a friendly group ride it's just an unfortunate accident and shouldn't
> have to pay. The outcome will be that the two will become bitter enemies
> and never ride together again. the group will probably split too, as
> each person takes sides.

Yes, so how should it be managed?

Would it be fair to say that anyone participating in a bunch ride should
be fully responsible for anything that happens to them during the bunch
ride, with no claim on any of the other participants and the organizer?
--