Another Rear-Ender on GWP

[JimF22003]

About 4:45pm I crossed the George Washington Parkway at the Memorial Bridge. There was a stopped police car and two smashed cars off the road. Looks like somebody stopped for a biker or pedestrian and got rear-ended for her trouble.

How many of these kinds of accidents is it going to take before they add some kind of signal that crossers can activate?

[MCL1981]

That highway terrifies me as both a cyclist and motorist.

[pfunkallstar]

They were still there at 5:20 or so, looked like a pretty solid collision. I’ve been extra, super careful to dismount before crossing, contributory negligence sucks.

[Subby]

I was crossing Lynn St. in Rosslyn this morning to get over to the Key Bridge. I had the signal and a car that was turning right towards the bridge stopped to wait for me (I had the signal). They almost got rear-ended and then the offending vehicle laid on the horn in the off-chance he hadn’t won ass-clown of the morning already.

No point to this story really, but its amazing how much more aware I am of my surroundings when I bike or run in.

[Brendan von Buckingham]

I cross GW @ MemBr daily. I’ve started gliding to a stop well back from the crosswalk (about 30-50 feet back) rather than pull right up to the road way. I figure I can see gaps better and approach when it’s safest for cars to yield to me. But you know what? Even that far back cars yield to the crosswalk to let me cross. In fact, they seem to do it more reliably than when I pull right up to the crosswalk.

My guess is that I’m in a better spot in the drivers’ cone of vision. Not only does the first car see me, but the 2nd and 3rd cars too.

This works best inbound in the a.m.: I have space to hang that far back and a.m. cars are commuters (they’re almost all in their normal routines and know about the crosswalk). P.M. not so much: only about 15 feet of space so no room to hang back 30-50 feet and p.m. cars are a mix (commutters, errand runners, tourists, cabs, etc.) They’re out of their routine, more likely to not know about the crosswalk, and are much more unreliable on their yield.

Also too, many cars double the speed limit and tailgate, so f that really. And by f I mean fix.

[Brendan von Buckingham]

BTW the solution is to realign GW with a sharp bend which will force even the worst speeders to slow down to the speed limit. [ATTACH=CONFIG]619[/ATTACH]

[elbows]

I had to temporarily give up bicycling to work since my agency moved to a LEED building that so far at least makes it very hard to bicycle but has plenty of auto parking (thanks for letting me rant), but as someone who used to go through here every day and saw a number of accidents, I just don’t like the signal to cross solution. It will probably make drivers less likely to be rear-ended, but will cost crossers a lot of time and law-breaking will be rampant. What about more communication to drivers about an upcoming crosswalk and the rules (which still aren’t clear to me and I’ve read hundreds of comments about this intersection). When I rode through this intersection at night, I even turned my lights off to prevent the possibility of someone seeing me, stopping for me, and one of us getting hit. I’d rather just wait for a gap.

[americancyclo]

@Brendan von Buckingham 13554 wrote:

BTW the solution is to realign GW with a sharp bend which will force even the worst speeders to slow down to the speed limit.

I was under the impression that most of the accidents at the GW parkway crossing were at the southern most circle in my picture.
[ATTACH=CONFIG]620[/ATTACH]

[Terpfan]

@MCL1981 13522 wrote:

That highway terrifies me as both a cyclist and motorist.

I second that comment.

[DaveK]

@elbows 13555 wrote:

I had to temporarily give up bicycling to work since my agency moved to a LEED building that so far at least makes it very hard to bicycle but has plenty of auto parking (thanks for letting me rant)

That’s my #1 complaint with LEED certification. Low-flush toilets and whatnot are fantastic, but if everyone has to drive to get there, it’s far from environmentally friendly. Until they address that it’s just greenwashing.

[pfunkallstar]

@americancyclo 13556 wrote:

I was under the impression that most of the accidents at the GW parkway crossing were at the southern most circle in my picture.
[ATTACH=CONFIG]620[/ATTACH]

That is where I have seen the majority of them, people are going WAY too fast there and the signs notifying drivers that there is a crosswalk there ironically block drivers from seeing those who are trying to cross. I’m not sure why the NPS seems to think that people actually go 25 mph there – there is nothing “parkway” about this highway.

[jabberwocky]

@DaveK 13568 wrote:

That’s my #1 complaint with LEED certification. Low-flush toilets and whatnot are fantastic, but if everyone has to drive to get there, it’s far from environmentally friendly. Until they address that it’s just greenwashing.

Thats a failure of the environmental movement in general, IMO. They promote stuff like hybrid cars without really paying a lot of attention to getting people to simply drive less. I got into an argument with a coworker at my previous job who was berating me for driving my WRX (mpg=20 on a good day) and proudly stating that she was going to get a prius to consume less gas. I pointed out that I biked to work 90% of the time, and even if I was driving a hummer I’d be consuming far less gas a month than her. She said she couldn’t bike because she had a bad back. :rolleyes:

I call it eco-fashion, though greenwashing is a good term as well.

[dcv]

@DaveK 13568 wrote:

That’s my #1 complaint with LEED certification. Low-flush toilets and whatnot are fantastic, but if everyone has to drive to get there, it’s far from environmentally friendly. Until they address that it’s just greenwashing.

I’m curious, why do you think LEED certification makes it harder to bike to work?

[Greenbelt]

“One Less Prius” — best button I saw at Interbike.

[creadinger]

@jabberwocky 13571 wrote:

Thats a failure of the environmental movement in general, IMO. They promote stuff like hybrid cars without really paying a lot of attention to getting people to simply drive less. I got into an argument with a coworker at my previous job who was berating me for driving my WRX (mpg=20 on a good day) and proudly stating that she was going to get a prius to consume less gas. I pointed out that I biked to work 90% of the time, and even if I was driving a hummer I’d be consuming far less gas a month than her. She said she couldn’t bike because she had a bad back. :rolleyes:

Wow, that’s a bold statement but I think there are initiatives out there to get people to drive less – like the 2mile challenge etc. Unfortunately people like yourself, and many others in this forum don’t understand how extremely lucky you are to be able to bike to work most of the time. I did it for 5 years in Montgomery county and even though it wasn’t easy, it certainly was better than driving or metro most of the time. For the vast majority of people though, it is simply not an option on a daily basis for a variety of reasons; therefore the need for fuel-efficient cars. It’s sad because if more people actually tried it they’d probably like it, or at least realize that it gets their sedentary fat asses some exercise. The fact remains though that humans are going to rely on cars for a long long time. The only thing that will change is the fuel.

[Author]

Posts