--A response to a published editorial in the Burnaby NewsLeader and Surrey/North Delta Leader by Paula Carlson, editor
It's time to end the free ride for motorists. As a car-free person and cyclist by choice, I am constantly being forced to subsidize a motoring lifestyle that is rapidly destroying the public environment for private benefit, which in turn serves to destroy my own, and my neighbours' health and well-being.
Whenever I see "free" parking, I pay for that. Every time I see an obese smoker idling in traffic inside a ton of useless metal, with three empty seats beside her, I think, 'there is my tax dollars subsidising an unhealthy lifestyle enabled by motoring,' and I will pay for that for years to come. Your auto insurance subsidy, your gasoline subsidy, your parking subsidy, the brown haze of pollution, I pay for that.
Police services that assumes I am at fault in any collision, and that laughed in my face when I asked about the liklihood of my stolen bike being returned, I pay for that. Yet I see a large publically funded bait-car campaign with a great deal of advertising. I pay for that.
Without any public consultation, the federal goverenmnet has seen fit to buy 12% of a failed foreign car company, and will guarantee warranties on poorly built products. I pay for that.
Cyclists are not some strange invasive species. They are your friends and neighbours, your doctor and your postman; they are homeowners, business owners and sometimes motorists and yes, they are already taxpayers, just like you.
Unlike many self-serving lobby groups, the future that cyclists desire is a benefit to everyone--clean air, a clean and healthy food and water supply, communities and streets that are safe for all users. Instead of attacking bicycle riders, you should be thanking them for trying to bring a healthier and more livable future to the Lower Mainland.
Showing posts with label frustration. Show all posts
Showing posts with label frustration. Show all posts
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Open Letter
--an open letter to the motorist who nearly killed me last Friday morning, from a bicycle rider
Dear Ma'am,
We first met at a four way stop in suburban Burnaby. It was Friday morning and, I guess, we were both on our way to work. As I was to your right, I proceeded to turn right, while you waited your turn and proceeded straight. We were both headed down the hill, we both had to stop at the bottom to wait for traffic to clear. I was in front of you, but surely not blocking your view. You could not have failed to notice there were cars parked along both sides of the narrow street, allowing a space where only one vehicle could safely travel at a time.
When you leaned on your horn I was not too upset. Sadly, this is an all too common occurrence, usually a sign of ignorance and impatience, no matter what vehicles we choose to drive. However, when you revved your engine and proceeded to illegally pass me within four inches of my elbow, that is what upset me. Your choice to dangerously pass me was as much a threat as you pointing a gun out your window. Your choice to deliberately endanger my life raised my anger. Go figure.
Perhaps you were unclear about why I was in the middle of the travel lane. As I cannot trust that people will look before opening their doors into traffic, I cannot be as close to the parked cars as you might like. Should someone fail to check and open their door in front of me, my choice is to crash into a hard sharp metal object and the person exiting their vehicle, or swerve out into traffic, right in front of you. Sorry, but neither of these is good, so I will always choose the third option--to be in the middle of the street where I can see and be seen, where a car door heedlessly swung open will have no effect upon me.
I am not in the middle of the lane to show off the beauty and superior efficiency of my vehicle. I am not there to deliberately slow you down. My reason for being there is purely selfish I will admit, it is for my own safety. I am in the middle of the road because it is not safe for you to pass. When it is safe, I will most certainly pull to the side to allow you by. Until then, please be patient.
If you would have exercised two seconds of patience, I would have turned left at the next intersection. I did not want you tailgating me any more than you wanted me slowing your progress. Maybe you were running late, but if I ended up under the wheels of your truck due to your reckless negligence, what delay would that have caused you? Would you have even stopped?
If you had exercised two seconds of patience, we would have both arrived at work happier people, instead of being angered and frustrated for the duration of our commute and beyond.
When you stopped and rolled down your window, I enquired if you were deliberately trying to kill me. From my perspective this is what you were attempting to do. I seriously doubt this was your intention; I'm sure friends and family regard you as a nice person. However, for a lack of two seconds of patience, you could have negatively changed both our lives forever.
Your only reply was, "Share the Road." Perhaps you are confused about what this means. It does not mean I should cower in the gutter and allow your environment killing dinosaur to roar by heedlessly. It does not mean I should put my safety in jeopardy so that you can arrive at the next stop sign two seconds earlier.
Bicycle riders have no choice but to share the road, so this is mostly a plea to motorists. Just because you choose the most selfish of transportation options does not mean your time is more valuable than mine, it does not mean you have any more right to the road than I do, and it certainly does not give you any right to deliberately endanger my life.
yours,
on two wheels,
David
Dear Ma'am,
We first met at a four way stop in suburban Burnaby. It was Friday morning and, I guess, we were both on our way to work. As I was to your right, I proceeded to turn right, while you waited your turn and proceeded straight. We were both headed down the hill, we both had to stop at the bottom to wait for traffic to clear. I was in front of you, but surely not blocking your view. You could not have failed to notice there were cars parked along both sides of the narrow street, allowing a space where only one vehicle could safely travel at a time.
When you leaned on your horn I was not too upset. Sadly, this is an all too common occurrence, usually a sign of ignorance and impatience, no matter what vehicles we choose to drive. However, when you revved your engine and proceeded to illegally pass me within four inches of my elbow, that is what upset me. Your choice to dangerously pass me was as much a threat as you pointing a gun out your window. Your choice to deliberately endanger my life raised my anger. Go figure.
Perhaps you were unclear about why I was in the middle of the travel lane. As I cannot trust that people will look before opening their doors into traffic, I cannot be as close to the parked cars as you might like. Should someone fail to check and open their door in front of me, my choice is to crash into a hard sharp metal object and the person exiting their vehicle, or swerve out into traffic, right in front of you. Sorry, but neither of these is good, so I will always choose the third option--to be in the middle of the street where I can see and be seen, where a car door heedlessly swung open will have no effect upon me.
I am not in the middle of the lane to show off the beauty and superior efficiency of my vehicle. I am not there to deliberately slow you down. My reason for being there is purely selfish I will admit, it is for my own safety. I am in the middle of the road because it is not safe for you to pass. When it is safe, I will most certainly pull to the side to allow you by. Until then, please be patient.
If you would have exercised two seconds of patience, I would have turned left at the next intersection. I did not want you tailgating me any more than you wanted me slowing your progress. Maybe you were running late, but if I ended up under the wheels of your truck due to your reckless negligence, what delay would that have caused you? Would you have even stopped?
If you had exercised two seconds of patience, we would have both arrived at work happier people, instead of being angered and frustrated for the duration of our commute and beyond.
When you stopped and rolled down your window, I enquired if you were deliberately trying to kill me. From my perspective this is what you were attempting to do. I seriously doubt this was your intention; I'm sure friends and family regard you as a nice person. However, for a lack of two seconds of patience, you could have negatively changed both our lives forever.
Your only reply was, "Share the Road." Perhaps you are confused about what this means. It does not mean I should cower in the gutter and allow your environment killing dinosaur to roar by heedlessly. It does not mean I should put my safety in jeopardy so that you can arrive at the next stop sign two seconds earlier.
Bicycle riders have no choice but to share the road, so this is mostly a plea to motorists. Just because you choose the most selfish of transportation options does not mean your time is more valuable than mine, it does not mean you have any more right to the road than I do, and it certainly does not give you any right to deliberately endanger my life.
yours,
on two wheels,
David
Monday, October 20, 2008
Couldn't Have Said it Better
Craig McInnes
Vancouver Sun
Thursday, August 11, 2005
VICTORIA - Dear motorist:
Excuse me for not addressing you by name, but given your rage the other day when you wanted to talk to me about my riding habits, I thought it best to press on rather than exchange formal greetings.
My first inkling that you were somewhat irate came when you stomped on the gas as you squeezed by me going down the hill on Fort Street across from the Royal Jubilee Hospital.
I didn't realize your anger was directed at me, however, until you narrowly avoided being run down by that pickup truck after running out on to the road, where I heard you explain heatedly to the driver that you were trying to get to the cyclist who was taking up most of a lane coming down the hill.
As I left the scene of your narrowly avoided accident, I was sorry that we could not have chatted, since although I suspect something else was going on in your life to leave you so tightly wound, you are not alone in your misunderstanding of the rights and responsibilities of bicycle riders with whom you reluctantly share the road.
In fact your reaction reminded me of the caution in the excellent primer on cycling in traffic contained in the British Columbia Bicycle Operator's Manual, which is available on the web at www.bikesense.bc.ca.
"Be prepared for the occasional frustrated driver who is not familiar with the safe and legal operation of a bicycle."
Before you fly off the handle again at what you may perceive will be another attack on drivers, let me add that there are as many cyclists who are ignorant about the safe and legal operation of a bicycle as there are motorists.
That shared ignorance is not helped by grey areas in the law where what is safe and what is legal are not always the same.
The first thing you should know is that under the B.C. Motor Vehicle Act, "a person operating a cycle on a highway has the same rights and duties as a driver of a vehicle." So whether you like it or not, bicyclists have a right to use the road. They also have a responsibility to obey all the rules of the road that you do, in addition to a few others.
For example, they can't pretend to be pedestrians. They can't ride on the sidewalk or across crosswalks. They can't ride side by side, blocking the road. They have to wear a helmet, even though police in Victoria appear to ignore bareheaded bikers, and they have to keep one hand on the handlebars.
Unfortunately, the situation in which you and I first met is one of those grey areas I mentioned.
The Motor Vehicle Act requires a cyclist to ride "as near as practicable to the right side of the highway." If we had been in Vancouver, we would have also been subject to a bylaw that requires slow-moving vehicles to drive "as close as possible" to the right hand edge or curb. Under that bylaw, bicycles are always considered slow-moving vehicles, even when they are not.
Hence the conflict between safety and the law. At times, such as when you found yourself behind me, they travel at or near the speed of cars. Regardless of how the wording of the Motor Vehicle Act is interpreted, it is a violation of my law of personal survival to hug the curb when I am flying down a hill at or near the speed limit.
It may be counter-intuitive to you -- it was to me at first -- but there are times when riding at the speed of other traffic, it is safer to be out in the middle of the lane where other motorists can see you and will be less tempted to squeeze by when there is really not enough room.
Finally you can be sure that if it comes to a choice between claiming my rights or staying alive, you will always have the upper hand. I hope, however, with a little civility on both our parts, as fellow commuters we can learn to share the road.
Sincerely yours,
Craig
© The Vancouver Sun 2005
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