Alzerbster

yeah you missed the whole idea of the post. I wasn't likening as you say someone getting their finger cut off from sticking it under a mower to an inattentive driver hitting a bike rider. Read the whole post. I was saying how people that make stupid decisions are always looking to blame someone else for their stupid decision. Do I think the bike rider made a stupid decision to ride the white line when he had other choices? Yes I do. Was the driver at fault? Yes he was.

JW Fas

Of course electronics fail, but do they fail at a higher rate than human judgment? Hell no. Here in the states the NHTSA found that 94% of all crashes are due to human error. I'll take the electronic aids any day.

genec

Probably not in our lifetimes... even if AVs were perfected in 5 years... how many more decades to replace all the cars on the roads today?

The only place I feel safe, and fully relax on my bike is on isolated bike paths, well away from kids and dog leashes, and very isolated country roads... but with the latter, I still keep my "spider senses" on tiny alert.

The only other place I totally relax when I exercise is when ocean swimming... yeah there are sharks... but they are not human. It's the humans that do unpredictable dumb things... such great minds... yet...

mcours2006

I got your post fine first time. And it's still a silly analogy. Riding on the fog lone is not the same thing as sticking your thumb up a mower. Everything else you said after that irrelevant. Most of us have ridden on the fog line and continue to do so. None of us would eve stick a thumb up a running mower. Maybe you're different.😏

Jim from Boston

Knowing you are in Metro Boston, @mr.bill, good compromise vis-a-vis riding into the sun…northbound / southbound routes. However sun can still be a problem. My sun problems though are short-lived, twice a year, and depend on departure times, but the route at least is in the reverse commuter direction. But it seems East to West in the morning, and vice versa in the PM is best, especially from Center City outbound.

I recall once meeting a car commuter who had just retired, He bemoaned his AM West to East commute in the rush hour direction, and the return home into the sun for decades.

Alzerbster

I can see you clearly didn't understand the content of my post, but that is okay, you can look at it how ever you want. Yeah, its certainly your choice to ride the fog line. In my opinion its stupid and irresponsible to do so, if there is a shoulder to ride on. Its also your choice to ride in the middle of the road if you want to. Its a bit more risky, but if you get hit by a car, its still the drivers fault. Get my point? Its about removing risks. Does it really matter if it was the drivers fault when he runs you over and kills you, or puts you in a wheel chair for life, because you were riding on the white line? You can piss and moan all you want about how the driver of the car wasn't paying attention. It won't do you any good, nor change your situation, of being dead or paralyzed. It all comes down to how much trust you have in other people being able to avoid hitting you while riding. Again for me.the risk simply isn't worth it. BTW, there have been people that stuck their hand under a mower while it was running. Its the direct reason manufacturers had to warn stupid people not to do that. So your claim that none of us would do that is false. Whether you know it or not, You alone are responsible for your safety, no one else is. The fact is from what I see in the video. If the rider was riding off the white line, which he had the opportunity to do so, he never would have got hit. And that is a fact, some of you are having a hard time grasping.

mcours2006

I think it is you who doesn't understand his own post. Let me show you why.

1. You are equating a driver of a vehicle to a lawn mower--strawman argument.

2. The only way to guarantee your own safety is to not ride at all. That is not an option for people on this board. Where cars are concerned, the only way to guarantee that you do not make contact with them is to stay off the road and ride on MUPs and trails. That is an option for some people on this board. Most people recognize this truth, and it is a truth, but still choose to take the risk. A cyclist riding on the white line cannot be equated with a stupid person sticking a limb into a mower blade. The former is usually fine. The latter almost always ends up with severed digits.

3. This is not a fact because it didn't happen. It is a fact that he was hit while riding on the white line. It is a fact that the driver hit him at 55 mph. What you are saying is not fact. It is speculation.

Newspaper_Nick

I can't believe some users are blaming the victim here. I mean if a driver can't see ahead, he/she should slow the f.... down! It doesn't matter if there is a fog line, shoulder, whatever, that doesn't change the fact that the driver hit the cyclist with high speed, because he/she "failed" to see him. I myself would have taken the shoulder, yes, but that still doesn't change the fact that a distracted driver hit someone from behind in high speed.

ChrisWagner

This is why we can't have nice things.

I propose to all those admonishing anyone suggesting to think twice of their actions on a route such as this to mount all their video cameras up and ride their local high speed highways to demonstrate to all the newbs how it is properly done.

Bicycles will become banned on this route if they are not already.

Lemond1985

The victim's fault is not in daring to ride a bicycle on public roads, but rather in expecting perfect driving and observation skills from an average human who is blinded by the sun, failing to put himself in the position of the blinded driver, and failure make allowances for perfectly predictable lapses in human attention.

For someone riding like the person in the video, it's not a question of "if" they will get hit, only a question of "when".

JoeyBike

At least with a mirror you have a chance to do something, often with time to spare. I toured many 2-lane high speed roadways, often with sparce to moderate traffic. If I see a vehicle appear on the horizon ahead in the opposing lane I automatically glance in my mirror to see if there is a chicken truck/log truck/dump truck approaching from behind and try to figure out the synchronicity of the two vehicles. If it looks like we are all going to occupy the same road space at the same time I look for a driveway to bail into or just pull off the tarmac (assuming no shoulder). If I were in a rush I wouldn't be riding a bike. I pull over, take a swig of water, when all clear I resume. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Another scenario is when approaching an intersection/driveway made of rocks. Often rocks will be spewed across the highway several feet from the rock source. I would NEVER just swing around into the center of a lane to avoid the rocks without looking in my mirror.

I bet I have pulled off the road 10,000 times in my 50 years of road cycling to avoid a tight situation before it became a danger to everyone involved.

As for having time to bail, I'll tell my best story. I was on tour in Virginia on a 2-lane road without 1mm of shoulder. Where the tarmac ended the ditch began - about as deep as a grave. The local high school had just let out and the little darlings going past were having their fun yelling and throwing small object at me. Keeping a sharp eye out for the next vehicle I see one approaching that APPEARED to be moving over to give me some room. But at the last second they swerved toward me to either clip me or frighten me into that ditch. I saw it unfold with about one full second to react and slammed on my brakes. The rear bumper of the car missed me by inches. Expecting to hear a "thud" when they hit me caused the driver to swerve too far and his back right wheel dropped off the tarmac into the ditch. The car made a huge lunge as he forced the car left. I watched it bounce around and fishtail with a lot of noise and the four boys contained within likely defiled their tunics. Without the mirror, and the suspicion that every car was a menace likely saved me.

I have other stories where knowing what was coming up behind me was a big deal but nothing as obvious as the Virginia high schoolers.

JoeyBike

The reason they don't slow down is because they aren't expecting to encounter a deer, a turtle, or a cyclist. The motorist keeps their speed up because they feel they could easily see another motor vehicle. Even in areas where deer are plentiful and the shoulder is littered with their carcasses, most motorists only worry about other motorists. This is why all the deer are DEAD. I don't believe that deer do much thinking and don't parallel the fog line. They love to take the lane! Ever seen a deer carcass close up that had been hit by a high speed vehicle? It gets your attention fo sho.

Don't be a deer.

Unca_Sam

FWIW, I avoid plenty of animals in the lane. The animals that take me by surprise (and other drivers) are the animals that are hiding on the shoulder. What's worse, the critters don't use lights or anything! It's an excellent argument for being where drivers will notice you.

MaxKatt

__________________

I don't know about that Rseeker.

Many drivers don't give a rat's about some cyclists off on the right, BUT...they do have some measure of self interest / self preservation.

This woman was blinded by sun, but probably would have pulled over and stopped if she couldn't see at all at least for a short bit out in front of her driver side wind shield.

I sincerely think you stand a better chance with a driver like this putting yourself right there where they would have to be blind folded not to see you. Again...they may not care about you...but they care about them and will only move forward to the extent they won't kill themselves.


...or get right of stripe. Driver fault, but if she was blinded by sun, rider also had to know it was an issue for any vehicle coming up behind them. Not smart to take chances like that.

mcours2006

Riding into a setting or rising sun is one of situation that I have become keenly aware of. For a two-week span in the spring my commuting route takes me on east with sun low on the horizon right in your eyes. During this time I ride on the road only if there is no traffic on the road. But more often I would just hop on the sidewalk for the 1.5-km stretch and not have to give it another thought. I have also taken an alternate route where the sun isn't at zero azimuth.

If I'm blinded by the sun then so are the drivers.

mr_bill

Even if I'm NOT blinded by the sun some DRIVERS will CLAIM that they are blinded by the sun.

-mr. bill

mr_bill

p.s. Important! Your long shadow points to the people who are blinded by the sun. You may be able to see fine, but if your long shadow points to a driver waiting to turn left or right, or to pull out, they can’t see you.

p.p.s. Tuan’s shadow was NOT pointing at the driver of the Toyota Avalon.

-mr. bill

rseeker

Didn't that happen in Phoenix a year or two or three ago. Person walking a cargo-laden bike across a road at night, broadside, full radar/lidar cross-section, AV in full auto didn't detect it or didn't react. The "safety driver" was dinking around with a phone. (Where have we heard this story before.) IIRC the issue was one of division of control between safety systems of the underlying car (a Volvo?) and the add-on AV systems. As well as between the driver and the vehicle. "I thought you had it."

Like you said, big outcry and the research collaboration was shut down (for a while?). It was probably discussed here already.

rseeker

Believing the hype that people sell us to make money has brought us to the point of declining planetary habilitability and civilization-level impacts to come. Extinction appears very unlikely, but how whack is it that we're at a point where we have to ask the question seriously. Part of the problem is our automatic willingness to accept that we should plow ever more of the world under for the sake of another round of gee-whiz tech innovation. Progress is good, but being high-tech doesn't automatically make it progress, nor does simply being new.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixth_mass_extinction

As I see it. Since you brought it up.

Newspaper_Nick

I don't really think this thread is the right thread to discuss this kind of subjects. In another thread maybe.

MikeyMK

The cyclist had right to the traffic lane. The motorist should've waited until it was clear to overtake - and then given plenty of room.

But let's say we all agree that riding in the lane is stupid, and getting hit is inevitable. Because that's the reality.

What constitutes a close pass? Let's say 2ft wheel-wheel. Thats door mirror to elbow. Too close. But it means almost certain survival.

The car's wheels were just in the shoulder at the point of impact. The still-shot of it passed shows the front wheel further right, as it's returning to the lane (the driver, who was female for those who weren't paying attention, swerving back to the left slightly to get off the rumble strip). But let's just say, for universal sake, it was merely rumbling the strip.

So, to avoid contact, the cyclist needed to be over 2ft into the shoulder for starters.. Not all roads have useable shoulders. And certainly not a clean, useable section for cyclists over 2ft away from the line.

They'd better get widening all the shoulders and cycle lanes then, and get regular road-sweepers along them. Like our cycleways have.

Paul Barnard

People don't know how to use a visor. If you put the bottom of the visor below the sun you can see just fine. With a dirty windshield you can still easily see a bike if you are paying attention. With moisture on your windshield it can be bad.

Unca_Sam

The driver was. < and > on your keyboard for frame by frame.

marcoguzm

It's risky out there, on the road...

marcoguzm

It's risky out there, on the road....