Daily Commute

I sent this complaint into my local bus company:

Edit: I editted the complaint to correct two mistakes pointed out by other posters. The tiny print is the deleted text. The underlined text was added.


I got a stock "thank you we'll investigate" response. Two weeks later, I asked for an update. I got a stock, "We'll ask the 'responsible party'" response. Two weeks later, I again asked for an update. I got a stock, "We'll ask the 'responsible party'" response. Two weeks later, I again asked for an update, but I asked for an actual status report, not just another message that they'll ask "the responsible party." A few days later, I got this response:


I was hoping for an actual apology, but this will do. I thought about doing a public records request to get the actual documents from the driver's personnel file, but I decided to let it drop here.

One lesson is that we shouldn't stand for unsafe driving from professionally-driven vehicles. Yes, private cars are a problem, but there's no boss we can appeal to for them. Companies need to know when their drivers are unsafe. And when a bus driver sees a cyclist, I want him to be afraid that the cyclist will file a complaint.

Bekologist

congratulations on your perseverence in this matter. I remember your original post about the incident, and I wondered if anything was going to result from your report.

Absolutely, professional drivers should be held to a higher standard. Unfortunately, I see as much ill will towards bicyclists from "professional" drivers compared to private drivers.

LittleBigMan

I report 'em when I'm driving, too. They are usually very swift to get back with me and assure me action was taken.

Most transit operators are excellent, but I've seen some dumb stuff, too, like a driver who simple ran a red light when he thought the intersection had only a cyclist approaching (me.)

MrCjolsen

Now if they could only place undercover observers in the back seats of people's Ford Excursions, that would be great.

Roody

That was great, and inspiring.

I imagine the same approach could be tried with truck drivers. Here in Lansing, we have hundreds of trucks operated by one company. They rush automobile sub-assemblies and parts from plant to plant for "just-in-time" delivery. Most drivers are competent. However, truckers are like us in one regard. They hate to stop for red lights, especially on hills. The next time I see one run a light and almost hit something, I'm going to get the number and report the incident.

cooker

Good work.

scottmorrison99

I called in a complaint on my local bus company and got a stock answer of we'll investigate. Didn't even get my name or number. I think next time I'll have to stick with it and follow through.. I was in the left turn lane and almost hit by a bus coming into my space with no signal, and I was driving my minivan! I hadn't considered what if I'd been riding. I will be a pain in the *ss if I have to, I t beat becoming a road stain.

bullethead

Thank you for the update and your perserverance.

Helmet Head

What do you (or anyone else) think the bus driver did wrong?

If you were riding on the right side of the right lane, then you were yielding the remainder of the lane to others. You were also positioned such that it would be reasonable for anyone to treat you as if you would be slowing down and turning right at the intersection you were approaching. If you weren't turning right, what were you doing "on the right side of the right lane"?

Did you expect the bus driver to slow down and not pass you in the first place? By keeping to the right, you were choosing not to communicate to him that you were going straight. Why make him responsible for figuring out what the heck you are doing? He made the reasonable assumption, perhaps subconsciously, that you were turning right, or, in any case, that you would continue staying out of the way of motor vehicles, as your yielding position indicated you would do. So he passes you, slows, and then begins his turn. Now you want him to stop mid-turn so you can continue going straight from the right side of the road, passing the bus on its left (Edit: I mean RIGHT) side?

Is this a trick post?

Daily Commute

Helmet Head: No, it's not a trick post. I was in the right side of the right lane, but not the right edge. The bus still had to pull partly into the left lane as it started to pass me. The bus never got fully past me. But bus drivers shouldn't cut off curb huggers either. When the drivers do that, they should be reported, even if the cyclist should have been farther left.

But you're correct, I should have been farther to the left. Lesson learned (or reinforced). I thought about mentioning that in the original post, but then decided that I wanted to present this as a how-to-complain thread, not a VC thread.

Bekologist: This is a new incident. I complained about another driver last year. Then, they were much, much quicker to respond.

atbman

Is yours a trick post Helmet Head?

Your argument is bizarre. I communicate my intention to ride straight on by not signalling right or not signalling left. By not signalling any intention to change direction, it should be clear to any other road user that you are not changing direction. He should not have been overtaking a non-signalling road user while turning.

His position on the road did not, repeat not, show that he intended to turn right. As for being on the RH side of the right lane, he had every "right" to be there. The only grounds for (very) minor criticism would be if he had been riding in the gutter and nothing in his post says that.

As for you arguing that the OP was expecting him to stop in mid-turn so that he could then pass the bus on its left side, no such intention was described by the OP and would have been physically impossible.

By the way, the driver's assumption cannot be both "reasonable" and "unconscious"

You also failed to read his post when you say that the bus passed him, then slowed, then began the turn. If you read the original description, he said that the bus was only half-way past him when he began the turn - clearly an offence in either your country or mine

atbman

PS Helmet Head - since when does a cyclist indicate his intention to turn right by not signalling while riding at about 20mph

Your criticism is completely unfounded

Roody

I don't believe I've ever seen a cyclist signal a turn around here. And damn few cagers, including cops. Ironically, bus drivers are usually pretty good about signalling! Not that a signal from the bus would have helped here.

The OP has conceded that he should have been riding more to the left, and I agree with him. However, I also agree that this bus driver pulled a dangerous and boneheaded stunt by starting a turn when he knew (or should have known) that there was a bike amidship.

As with most accidents (or near accidents), either party could have prevented this situation.

Brian Ratliff

Yea, and the driver wouldn't even know they are there .

dan828

If you do, be sure to get both the truck number and his trailer numbers if you can make them out. Also provide a complete description of what happened and why it was dangerous. Having worked both as a truck driver and a dispatcher back when I was in school, I can't tell you the shear number of idiot complaint calls we'd get with no other information then "it was a big grey truck" or some such. Many times we had no equipment that looked even vaguely like they described. Other times they had some number that didn't match up to anything we owned.

And every time I ever got "reported" for something as a driver it was an a-hole car driver that didn't know how to drive that was upset because I didn't bow down to his holy presence and move out of his way so he could continue driving like an idiot (things like being expected to move into another lane to let a car enter the freeway when there was traffic there that made it impossible without running someone over). Picture it-- the car drivers that truck drivers deal with every day for eight plus hours while they are working are the same flipping idiots that we have to deal with while we are out on our bikes. The only difference is that when the idiot car driver causes an accident, the truck driver usually comes out on top. Statistics are that in something like 90+ percent of all accidents involving a truck, the truck driver is not at fault (gleaned from mandatory safety meetings back when I was a driver so don't ask for a source).


Anyways, with the trucking companies, it'll likely take several complaints before a driver is disciplined, unless the police are involved or actual damage is caused. There are just far to many cell-phone talking, BMW driving, latte drinking, I own the road idiots calling in complaints for one call to be taken very seriously.

CB HI

I am glad you stuck with the issue and forced them to give you a response, but sadly the response looks like a form letter. It is written from the point of view that the complaint was made by a bus rider, not a cyclist that almost got squashed.

The Honolulu bus system treated me the same way when I made several complaints. That is until I filed a damage claim and told them I would testify on behalf of a woman that was run over (based on their schedule over safety attitude). That got some attention.

2manybikes

Good job.

Daily Commute

Thanks. I think the key is to keep a level tone. If my complaint had been angry, the bus company almost certainly would have given me the write-off that dan828 described. And if it takes several complaints before a driver is actually disciplined," then at least I have filed number 1.


This is a very good point. If there had been an accident, I think the driver would have clearly been legally at fault. But I could have made the conflict less likely by riding farther left. And even if a driver is legally responsible, you never want to be in a position to have a strong personal injury claim.

Another lesson is always leave an escape route (in this case, a quick right turn).

Helmet Head

As Roody pointed out, cyclists rarely if ever signal, so it's unreasonable to assume one will not turn right simply because he is not signalling right. You might point out that therefore it's also unreasonable to assume that a cyclist will turn right simply because he's on the right side of the lane. Fair enough. But is it unreasonable to just ignore the cyclist riding in that position? We can argue about this for weeks, I'm sure, but no matter what anyone says drivers should or shouldn't do, I expect to be ignored when I'm riding in that position, which is why I eschew and hammer and hammer about how important it is to MOVE LEFT at intersections approaches where you are not turning right. It is precisely to practically (no, not entirely) eliminate the possibility of this type of situation.

I don't disagree that DC had every "right" to ride there, I'm just saying I wouldn't recommend it, and if a bus driver did that to me, I would realize my mistake and not blame him. I certainly wouldn't fire off a letter of complaint to his management. Poor guy. He did not deserve that.

If you want others to know that you're not turning right, MOVE LEFT. And if you choose to stay on the right side, it's just plain silly to be surprised or upset if others don't realize you are going straight, because I can guarantee to you that they won't realize it.


Sorry, I meant to say that he appeared to be expecting the bus driver to stop in mid-turn so that he could then pass the bus on its RIGHT side. I still don't understand what he (or you) expected the bus driver to do. Slow down and drive behind the cyclist? That would be ideal, to be sure, but to expect him to do so is living in a world where disappointment or much worse is virtually guaranteed.


I said subconscious, and why not? People make subconscious assumptions all the time - assumptions - that is, that they are not conscious of making. Heck, especially in driving. Or riding bikes. For example, do you consciously analyze every potential obstacle to decide whether you need to avoid it or not, or do you rely on your subconscious assumptions about them? I don't know about you, but my conscious mind does not work nearly fast enough for that kind of processing. I rely on my subsconcious mind, which makes quite reasonable assumptions.


Here's the problem. If you're not controlling the lane, then you're sharing the lane. If you're sharing the lane, then you're responsible for allowing others to use the space to your left in that lane. IF DC had in fact been turning right, there would have been little if any problem - so far as I can tell. By the way, John Franklin, author of Cyclecraft, recommends staying centered in the lane even when turning left (he's a Brit) precisely to reduce the possibility of someone doing even that. The key is that you need to convey to others, with lane position, that you are not allowing them to pass.

Daily Commute

HH, as to the driver's mistake, he violated one very clear rule of driving--you don't overtake unless you can get around the other vehicle safely. Period. He deserved to be reported. Period.

As to my "error," ironically, if the the bus company blamed me for anything, it would probably be for being too far to the left. (I think they'd be wrong, but I think that's what they would say.) There was a wide curb lane here. I was probably 5-6 feet from the curb.

sbhikes

Bus drivers must be held to a higher standard than other drivers because they are entrusted to care for their passengers and they are wielding a much larger vehicle. They should not do anything at all that could involve them in a preventable accident. It's pretty standard that most cyclists will ride hugging the curb and that driver should have expected that.

I had a friend once who bumped her head on the school bus mirror when doing the pre-flight inspection. She was given an immediate drug test, failed and lost her job. And she wasn't even driving the bus.

Helmet Head

The plot thickens. Is it wide enough for cars to share side-by-side? If a through car is stopped, can another car squeeze in on the right and turn right? Is it wide enough for that?

In any case, riding 5-6 to the left of the curb in a 16 foot WCL is still yielding 10-11 feet to one's left. It's also riding in the right turn zone of the lane...

Where was your position relative to where you would ride on a low power motor scooter here?

Daily Commute

There would not have been room for a bus to turn right even if I had been on the left side of the lane because busses require a giant turning radius. I don't know where I'd been in a motor scooter, having never driven one. But, as I said, I now ride farther to the left.

And Diane is right, bus drivers must be held to a very high standard. Fortunately, they generally are.

I think we have exhausted the VC debate. You and I agree that I should have been farther left. We disagree about whether the driver should have yielded, although I suspect you might be alone in the belief that the driver did not need to yield. If you don't think bus drivers should yield to cyclists (even the curb-hugging cyclists that Diane mentions) before turning, then I don't know what I could say to persuade you otherwise.

Now, back to the advocacy part of this thread. Part of advocacy is tuning your message to your audience. In the complaint and my subsequent correspondence, I worked hard not to sound aggressive either in my tone or in the description of the facts.

Being on the right side of the road is less aggressive than being on the left side, and I wanted this to be a complaint from a cyclist who was "just riding along" against an aggressive bus driver. I also knew that the bus company would not cite Forester back to me to try to justify the drivers' actions, so there was no point in addressing the subject.

ItsJustMe

That still looks like a boilerplate response. Note that the wording throughout implies that you were a bus RIDER complaining. They could have written that letter without having even read your original complaint, just knowing that you were asking about a safety complaint.

Did you double the post, or was it like that when you got it? If the latter, definitely a boilerplate response.

ItsJustMe

The argument that riding to the right gives other lane occupants the right to right-hook you is ridiculous.

As long as you're within the lane at all, you're a legal occupant of the lane. Just because another vehicle can squeeze by within the lane (not even the case with the bus) doesn't give it the right to cut you off. Riding to the right is only to allow them to pass going ahead; it is not tantamount to yielding all right-of-way.

It can be argued whether riding to the right or left is a good idea in practice. However, it's pretty clear to me that the bus driver was legally wrong in this case. He passed and then cut off a vehicle which was in the lane and not signalling a right turn. In the absence of signals, he must assume the driver is not turning. Pretty straightforward IMHO.