SClaraPokeman

The Mercury reports that police have found the 14 year old girl killed last year at Jefferson/Alameda De Las Pulgas intersection was at fault. I'm beginning to wonder when a driver is ever at fault. It seems apparent that the police bias is unless the driver is drunk, or flees the accident (or both), then the bicyclist is to blame.

I've been trying to visualize this accident. It seems to me that at some point the pickup driver probably passed the girl and then began his RH turn. As soon as passing her, did he, as often seems to be the case with most drivers, promptly forget of her existence on the street? Did he make a sharp turn and cut her off? (I don't have all the facts, is there a traffic island there, or is it a stop sign?)

It's possible the girl's riding skills weren't as heightened as the could have been due to her inexperience, but for me as a driver that's all the more reason to be cautious and always be thinking about where a recently passed bike is.

The sad thing is that some parents will regard this as all the more reason to never let their kids ride a bike on a public roadway.

https://www.mercurynews.com/san-mateo...sh-that-killed

cthenn

I agree. There's no way the girl was "gaining" on the pickup, so he obviously passed her at some point. At that point, as the driver, it SHOULD be your responsibility to locate the cyclist on the road and make sure there is room to make a right turn without cutting off (or hitting and KILLING) the rider. This happens to me all. the. time. I ride at a decent speed, and I think most drivers don't realize how fast I will gain on them if they are slowing to turn. Even if they pass me, it's like they are in a hurry to get by me and whip around the corner so they don't have to slow down and be "inconvenienced" for 5 seconds. If it wasn't so dangerous, it would be hilarious. The sound of a car turning way too fast, screeching tires as they desperately try to get around the return and not have to SLOW DOWN! Oh the horror...3 seconds of your day gone because you had to slow for a bike...how will you ever get that back?!

This was a 14 year old girl for crying out loud! Do drivers have zero tolerance even for young kids riding their bikes to school? I don't care about the letter of law, this a$$hole should have SLOWED DOWN once he passed her, and made sure she was clear before just going ahead and blindly turning into her And this article seems to have been written by the "Angry Driver/Blame the Cyclist-Cop" coalition. Road bicycling really is the wild wild west...as the rider you have to approach every situation as if drivers don't see you, don't care, or would mow you down if they could. And don't ever rely on cops to do anything in favor of a bicyclist.

Meanwhile the SF bicyclist who killed the ped is getting top story status on every freaking newscast, and riders who get killed by cars almost daily get nothing, except blame.

scrubbo

Seems like the city also took down the white bicycle memorial they had set up for her on the corner. And somebody put up a sign saying "THANK YOU RWC!" after they took it down. Nice.

DiabloScott

I don't know, if this was a school drop off area the girl may have been passing (on the right) a whole string of vehicles that were essentially stopped or moving very slowly. And she did pull a stupid move by trying to take the inside line around the corner. I don't blame her for the tragedy, but it seems like there's enough going against her that the driver may not need to be prosecuted as a murderer.

scrubbo

I ride and drive by this intersection all the time. Jefferson is a downhill corner to that stoplight, so it's very easy to have decent speed on a bike heading into that corner, and since there is a stoplight there, it's very easy to pass a long line of cars stuck at the light. She could easily have been overtaking traffic between 7-8 in the morning. There is not a bike lane on Jefferson, but there is on Alameda, which is the street she was turning onto. I avoid being on that stretch of Jefferson as it's 4 lanes of cars and parked cars on the side on a road that's not wide enough for the traffic it carries. I would rather ride down Woodside road than Jefferson.

SClaraPokeman

Thank for for the comments all. My understanding wasn't that complete perhaps. It sounds like she was in a dicey area that would be a challenge for any cyclist to safety navigate on a regular basis. So tragic and depressing--if only she was advised of a better route or simply dismounted and hoofed it in this area.

TheHen

Okay, it's a lousy road to ride on. Okay, she was a fourteen year old girl who likely lacked the knowledge and skill to properly take the lane. Okay, she likely was passing on the right. Does all of this excuse the motorist? That depends on how one looks at it. If we, as a society, accept the current norm that anytime a motorist manages to stay on the asphalt they are driving properly, then we will continue to live in a cyclist/pedestrian beware world complete with wholesale slaughter on our roadways.

The alternative is to require motorists to be attentive and not drive along in a stupor. Really, how hard is it to see a cyclist coming up on the right side? Cars have mirrors for a reason, and it's not so that it is easy to put on one's make-up while driving. We are allowing tens of thousands of people per year to be killed by scofflaw motorists. The odds of being injured by a law-breaking motorist in an average lifetime is just about 50%. Have you gotten your injury yet?

Wouldn't it be nice if the penalty for a moving violation was a six month suspension? How about a decade off for a second violation? I suspect we would all drive with a lot more care if that was the case. It would be a totally different world if people didn't feel afraid of walking and cycling. Catch-22 though. We can't force motorists to be responsible road users as long as the overwhelming majority of people drive everywhere they go, and we won't get people out of their cars until motorists begin driving in a safe manner.

murdockspencer

That's a two way street, if you want DL suspensions for moving violations, than it's only fair that bicycles should be impounded for the same. Unless you are one of the few cyclists that stops at every stop sign, stops for every right turn red light, never rides in crosswalks, or on the wrong side of the street, obeys every speed limit on bike paths, etc...., I don't think you would enjoy this scenario. When you ride a bike, you have to get in where you fit in, because in most scenarios, you are invisible, and in most scenarios, it doesn't matter if you are right, you are still dead. I think being a driver makes me a better cyclist, it helps me understand traffic flow, where to be and where not to be, and where I can't be seen from a driver's perspective. Someone who's 14 doesn't understand those things (presumably), and unfortunately this one ended bad for the cyclist.

blt

If you a stopped at a light, first in line, looking to turn right, assuming that you haven't passed the cyclist already to be aware she is there, do you really look behind you to see if someone will try to pass you on the right or turn with you as you make a right hand turn? I make sure there are no pedestrians who will want to step out either direction from the corner, but I don't think I have ever once in my life, when I haven't passed a cyclist, worried about whether there is a cyclist who came up from behind that I might hit when making a right hand turn.

I fully agree with all of murdockspencer's comments. This was very sad, but without knowing anything more, I can imagine this wasn't an unreasonably inattentive driver.

And it does piss me off when drivers are not being attentive. The most pissed I've been recently did involve a car making a right turn on a red light, but in that case, I was going straight across with the green. Fortunately, I am pretty cautious going through intersections even when I have a green light, so I saw her and was lucky enough to be worried as she approached the intersection that she was either drunk, distracted, or simply not quite sure which way she wanted to go, and worried she would look right past me. I slowed down because I initially wasn't sure if she was turning right or not, and I didn't know if she might blow right through the red while making a right hand turn, and if she did that without me slowing down, I'd be toast. She did slow way down before finally deciding to turning right, although she never came to a complete stop. Because she did slow down, I was right in front of her as she started her turn. As she headed straight towards me, I veered to the left and yelled pretty loudly. Unfortunately, I couldn't get out of the way quickly because I had slowed down out of concern for where she was going. She stopped in time to avoid hitting me, but only because of how much I was able to veer left. She gave me the old, "sorry, I didn't see you" line, which set me off more than I have been set off on a bike. "You didn't see me because you weren't looking where you were driving, I was right in front of you!!" I don't think she was drunk (in our "conversation" she didn't seem drunk, and it wasn't prime time for drunk drivers, about 9:30 a.m. on a Saturday), but whatever caused it, I was not happy about her not seeing me in front of her. That is not being attentive for whatever reason.

But when it is a bike you never passed coming from behind on the right when you are first in line at a light? That IS really hard to see, and I have trouble blaming that on an inattentive motorist.

Oddly, I find I often end up annoying drivers when I am trying to avoid commiting moving violations. Many, many drivers are very friendly, and want to give a cyclist the right of way even when it legally belongs to the automobile, and it can sometimes annoy them when I want to at least come close to obeying the traffic law by, say, at least slowing way down at a stop sign, before taking that right of way.

TheHen

First off, just because I think that people who are operating demonstrably deadly machines should be expected to suffer significant consequences when they violate the laws governing the operation of those deadly machines does not mean that the consequences should be the same for those operating machines that are many orders of magnitude less lethal. Come on, tens of thousands of Americans are slaughtered every year by scofflaw motorists and the odds of being seriously injured by a car in an average lifetime are right around 50%. When a collision involving a cyclist has a death associated, it is news for months. Apples and watermelons comparison here.

Secondly, yes, as a matter of fact, I do obey all of the traffic laws when I ride my bike, just as I do when I drive a motor vehicle. It's really not that hard to do. It is disturbing that in spite of the continued introduction of safer cars the operators of them seem to be getting worse almost as quickly. There's no excuse for the overwhelming majority of the deaths and injuries on our roadways, but people keep accepting B.S. about how unreasonable it is to expect motorists to obey the law. I find it barbaric. YMMV.

TheHen

Yes, I do check for overtaking cyclists and runners when I am stopped (or slowed in traffic) and preparing to make a right turn. In fact, this is one of the points that is checked on a commercial driving test. Perhaps we need to have motorists retake the driving portion of the license exam in order to renew their licenses. Checking for all possible conflicts is good driving/riding practice and is commonly known as situational awareness. The opposite is either known as SMIDSY or "He came from out of nowhere."

blt

Keep in mind we're talking about wanting to turn right at a signal light and being the first car in line at the light. In that situation, perhaps checking for overtaking cyclists is checked on a commercial driving test, I don't know, but non-commercial? No one cares, no one does it, no one tests for it, in spite of being a cyclist, I wouldn't even think about a need to do that. I have never heard of the concern expressed in any driving course. My son just got his driver's license last July. I asked him if that issue was ever mentioned in any of his course materials, any of his tests, the answer was no.

When you say "overtaking" runner, I'm not sure that should be a big concern for a commercial or non-commercial vehicle, either, depending on what you mean by "overtaking." If I am turning right on red and there is a runner heading in the same direction as I was heading, which is what I would think of as "overtaking," then the runner should not be crossing the street on red. In general, I am not looking out for a pedestrian that is going to run out on the red. On the other hand, once the light turns green, I do need to be aware of any pedestrian, runner or not, "overtaking" or not, that may wish to cross the street. If I am turning right on red, I should be aware of pedestrians that want to cross on green in in front of the direction I have been heading, but I don't think of them as "overtaking," they may have been heading my direction and be turning left, or they mave have come from the right and be going straight, but I don't think of that as "overtaking." One needs to watch out for pedestrians in situations where pedestrians have the right of way, absolutely, which includes "overtaking" runners and otherwise, and I am careful about that (I am also careful as a pedestrian to make sure a driver sees me when I go in front of him -- unfortunately, many drivers who are turning right don't see the pedestrians going in front of them, the only good news is that drivers turning right aren't going too fast so that if they see a ped at the last second, they can usually stop, the ped usually can get out of the way, and when a collision happens it usually isn't deadly).

But honestly, I can't say that I am ever careful about the idea that a cyclist may illegally be trying to pass me on the right when I am turning right, or may try to come up alongside me and turn right with me. After this incident, it may cross my mind now and then. There is a lot of illegal activity I do watch for when I drive. When a light turns green, I make sure no one is about to run a red light before I enter the intersection. But I have never looked for a cyclist making an illegal, suicidal maneuver on my right as I turn right, the law doesn't require that, and I have never heard of anyone being trained to watch out for that.

It is correct that when the operator of a vehicle violating the vehicle code kills another, a cyclist killing another will make more news than the operator of a motor vehicle. But you ignore the flip side of this, the fact that cyclists get killed due to their own violations of the vehicle code, and that doesn't make lasting news. I don't know all the facts, but it sure sounds like the death of this girl who started the thread resulted from a cyclist violating the vehicle code. The majority (not nearly all, but the majority) of cyclists in and around my local area who have been killed or seriously injured have been violating the vehicle code and the operator of the motor vehicle that collided with the cyclist was not. So we get absurdly harsh on motor vehicle operators because their violations kill others as well as themselves, while cyclists violations mostly kill themselves? I suppose you could make that argument, as well as the argument that a license isn't required to operate a bicycle, but given the consequences of death that can arise from the wrong violations of the code, I'm not sure it makes sense to be too much more lenient on cyclists than on operators of motor vehicles. I'm OK with harsher penalties for everyone if there is a reasonable safety purpose to it, but I'm not sure that a 6 month suspension of a license for a car only slowing down to 2 mph at a 4 way stop instead of coming to a full stop would be the punishment fitting the crime, and you'll drive a lot of cyclists crazy if you want a foot down or a track stand every time at every four way stop.

Dchiefransom

When I'm making a right turn in a vehicle, there's usually no room for a cyclist between me and the right edge of the road way. Maybe it's time to get rid of the Federally mandated distorted mirror on the right side and go back to having a regular one there.