I-Like-To-Bike

Not likely when the ambulance driver, or anybody else has the green light.

I-Like-To-Bike

What "default law" are you referencing? Is it applicable in N.J., Jersey City or anywhere in the U.S.?

I-Like-To-Bike

Not so. He was wearing sandals, he survived the crash; ergo the sandals saved his life!

JW Fas

Regardless of fault, that isn't how this works.

https://traffictickets.com/new-jerse...-129-2c12-1-1/

There is obviously property damage. It's uncertain as to whether the cyclist has injuries.

curbtender

They left the audio out, but the cyclist has a video...

livedarklions

Horse crap--you don't leave the scene of the accident if you hit someone, fault has nothing to do with it.

work4bike

They're rallying the troops and making the case that she went to a police station and reported the accident...She's fairly powerful in local politics and she has a father that's also fairly powerful. Seems like the police are playing ball

REDMASTA

even though he didn't stick the landing i give him a solid 7 for the side flip and hang time

3alarmer 

...I have driven all sorts of emergency vehicles. It doesn't matter if you have a green light, it doesn't matter if you have lights and siren going, it doesn't matter if you have a clear right of way by the vehicle code. You hit somebody like that, and you're gonna have a problem with your employment.

I-Like-To-Bike

Did you slow down when you were driving in an emergency situation as you approached every intersection even when you had a green light and an apparent clear right of way? How slow did you go? How long would you have remained employed as a driver of an emergency response vehicle once the family of any of your passengers reported you for doing that?

3alarmer 

...sweet Jesus on a bicycle. You insist you must know something about this, even if you've never done it. There's a lot of this on teh Beikforums, so I guess you're not lonely. It's presumed you have full control of the emergency vehicle in question at all times, when it is moving and you are behind the wheel. Clearly, "full control" means not running into other vehicles, pedestrians who might step out, or mysterious cyclists who are wearing earbuds and appear to be colorblind. And yes, I did cut back on the throttle when approaching every intersection. The guy riding shotgun looks for clearance in his direction, as the driver, you look in yours. But if he ****s up, you're the one who gets interviewed and has to fill out all the paperwork.

There's an unfortunate situation where motorists hear a siren, cannot figure out where it's coming from, and try to clear a lane for an emergency vehicle they think might be behind them. Sadly, it sometimes puts them right in the line of fire, if you're approaching from a perpendicular street.

I managed to remain employed through retirement, although not all that time was spent driving. I did it by not running into anyone..

People do stupid stuff on the roads all the time. That's one of the reasons we have emergency vehicles in the first place. It's not a license to endanger the public, it's a responsibility to perform as quickly as you can in an intelligent and controlled manner.

I-Like-To-Bike

What speed did you slow down to in order to assure that you wouldn't have to answer for possibly having any possible contact with something/anything that might come from somewhere/anywhere?

tungsten

Emergency vehicles around these parts displaying lights and sounding sirens crawl through arterial intersections dead slow while craning their necks because the only thing you can count on motorists doing consistently is driving too fast following too close and generally NOT PAYING ATTENTION!
You're joking, right?
How long would an emergency vehicle driver remain employed if they gave their passengers the Philly paddy wagon treatment?
Nobody ever got sanctioned for not having a wreck.

3alarmer 

...sadly, he is not.

3alarmer 

...approximately 32 furlongs per fortnight.

livedarklions

Are you the least observant person on the planet? I see emergency vehicles slow at intersections all the time, especially ambulances. You really think the ambulance driver wants to risk having to choose between the requirements to stop when they hit someone and getting their passenger to the emergency room in time to help them?

Please find a record of anyone complaining officially about an ambulance driver being too cautious at intersections, and no, pinheaded social media posts don't count.

livedarklions

The speed of a question riding on the back of a straw man moving goal posts.

I-Like-To-Bike

No need because I have never seen that happen except for a few blue haired old people driving Buicks, and they were creeping along before they even approached the intersection and decided to go even slower; in fact the occurrences of anyone else slowing down (just in case) as they pass through intersections with a green light and a clear right of way can be fit on the head of a pin. Guaranteed rear end collisions if done often enough.

The question still stands - how much should drivers slow down when approaching and passing through every intersection with a green light and a clear right right of way?

I-Like-To-Bike

Crawl though green lights? Not likely!

Any driver without flashing lights and sirens crawling through intersections dead slow even though they have a green light and a clear right of way can count on being rear ended by one of those other motorists driving too fast following too close and generally NOT PAYING ATTENTION!

Any bicyclist who rides through intersections with an expectation that approaching motorists with a green light will slow down is likely to get unpleasantly surprised in quick time.

livedarklions

Look at you shifting the goal posts back. I agree that drivers generally don't slow on a green at an intersection, but in the midst of that assertion, you said something stupid about emergency vehicles, which someone who actually drove the things corrected you on. Your reaction to this is to get snideand double down on the "I never see this", imply in a question a straw man assertion that he was slowing to a speed that provided perfect protection from everything unforeseen, and do anything but concede on this one very peripheral point that you were talking through your helmet.

I live in an urban neighborhood with two hospitals. I can tell you that the ambulances with sirens on routinely slow at intersections. I have no idea whether that practice would have prevented this particular cyclist from being hit. Answering that requires way too many counterfactual assumptions to be anything but pointless speculation.

I don't think it's really controversial that cyclists should not run red lights at busy intersections, but I think you should stay in your lane and not try to lecture about the practice of driving emergency vehicles to someone who actually has done that. The councilwoman probably would have been fine if she had remained at the scene (presuming she wasn't dui--the 6 hour wait before reporting herself is pretty suspicious), but that has nothing to do with how an ambulance driver would approach that intersection.

I-Like-To-Bike

Who really gives a darn what emergency vehicle drivers do or don't do, since none were involved in this or any other bicycle incident on this thread?

The peculiar "assertion" about them was made way back by an A&S commentator about motorists' behavior and traffic etiquette who posted "but even ambulance drivers slow down at intersections with their sirens blaring"; implying that somehow the motorist in the OP was at least partly to blame for not slowing down when approaching and/or passing through an intersection with a green.
Bottom line: Some bicycling safety advocates have unrealistic expectations that motorists will do/should do whatever the advocate would like them to do, even if when there is no requirement or credible reason to expect such unusual driver behavior.

curbtender

In driver safety class we were taught to wait two counts before entering an intersection when the light had changed. That car had a full green and there was an illegally parked car blocking sight lines. Not sure if speed was a factor, but the cyclist looks distracted by something on his left. Bad move. Cyclist should have waited and the car should have stopped after the fact.

3alarmer 

.
...just for the record, I have never owned a Buick. My old man did own a DeSoto, back in the day.

3alarmer 

....beats the hell out of me.

3alarmer 

...perspective is everything in life.