Cyclist nearly takes out a kid while running a red light

[lordofthemark]

@jrenaut 159095 wrote:

My understanding is cyclists can go on the LPI no matter what. I suspect the law just doesn’t consider a scramble intersection. #VisionZero

The only scramble intersection I know is the one in Chinatown, and any time I have been there (on foot, I have never biked through it, I think) there are loads of pedestrians crossing in all directions. Which I would think means that the proper Idaho thing to do is to stop. I have always assumed the right to proceed at an LPI meant effectively the right to do a “proper Idaho” – which still means yielding to peds in the crosswalk. Now a ped in the perpendicular crosswalk at a conventional LPI would be jaywalking, but it is still the legal obligation to yield to them after they have entered the crosswalk, IIUC.

[Crickey7]

I proceed on LPI in the District. That’s not running a red light.

Whether or not I think Idaho Stop for red lights is a wise target for bike advocacy in the DC region is irrelevant. It’s not the law.

[lordofthemark]

@Crickey7 159099 wrote:

I proceed on LPI in the District. That’s not running a red light.

Whether or not I think Idaho Stop for red lights is a wise target for bike advocacy in the DC region is irrelevant. It’s not the law.

But I said that one reason I support LEGALIZING Idaho stops, is so WABA could teach proper ones. To which you responded that there is no proper way to “run a red”. If what you meant is “there is no proper way to run a red where it is illegal” that would seem to be a non sequitur to my hypothetical about legalizing the Idaho stop.

Perhaps you were responding to someone else? One advantage to the quote feature is clarifying to whom we are responding.

[lordofthemark]

By the way, let me point out that there is a proper way to exceed the speed limit in a car. Doing so by less than 5MPH, on an interstate highway, where that is the prevailing speed of traffic, is, IMHO, eminently proper. Doing so by 15MPH, on an arterial in Alexandria, where there are pedestrians and cyclists, not so much.

There is also a proper way to jaywalk. Crossing at midblock, with good visibility, and no traffic visible for blocks, is proper (though illegal) Doing so with moving traffic close by, or where visibility is poor, is not.

This isn’t about privilege for cyclists. Its about using common sense about how people use our streets and roads.

Maybe someone should come and lecture the people who jaywalk crossing to the bus stop here
https://www.google.com/maps/@38.835352,-77.1033971,3a,75y,6.44h,62.15t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sjt9F3t5ulAA6A46d3XfMBw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!6m1!1e1

Again, I have seen far more cyclists stop at red lights at empty intersections, than I have seen pedestrians actually walk to the crosswalk to cross to get the bus there.

I am also surprised (though I suppose I should not be) that I came to this thread to wag my finger at a reckless cyclist, and to push back against someone saying its the pedestrian’s fault, and now I appear to be the poster child for scofflaw biking. If I had a dollar for every time someone rode through a red I was stopped at (and seriously, I need the momentum a lot more than most of those people), I would spend it all on a road bike and have some $ left over. (heck, if I had a dollar for for every time I was stopped at a red light and a PEDESTRIAN proceeded to jaywalk across in parallel, I could treat everyone on this thread to coffee, for sure).

Maybe saintliness is not the right word, but expecting more than one person in a thousand to obey the absolute letter of the traffic law at all times in all modes is so strikingly unrealistic, I find it to have no place in any reasonable discussion of transportation policy, or of transportation behavior. I see it used almost (?) exclusively with regard to cyclists. At least when it is used in bad faith by bike haters I understand the motivation.

[KLizotte]

@annoyedindc 159053 wrote:

There are sidewalks on either side of this intersection with curb cuts. Neither side of the street has marks for crossing Cherry St. though. So, if it isn’t a cross walk then there’s no way to cross Cherry St. at all.

VA law says you don’t need a crosswalk to legally cross a street so long as it is at an intersection of some sort (2-way, 4-way, whatever). About the only thing VA law forbids is crossing mid-block without some sort of pedestrian light (like a hawk signal) or crosswalk. I’m too lazy to find the actual text.

[Steve O]

Back to the original video.

The pedestrian was crossing ON THE GREEN. All this discussion about crosswalks is mostly irrelevant at a signalized crossing in a neighborhood, which is what this is.
Here’s the street view.
Anyone with the red light must stop. Where right-on-red is allowed, a driver may proceed to turn right only after coming to a complete stop and ascertaining that there are no persons crossing and there is room to turn safely. The pedestrian is under no obligation to yield to anyone. On the contrary, all others must yield to her.
That said, it’s prudent to look out for other oblivious or aggressive road users, but it saddens me that one cannot walk across a 2-lane street on a green light without fear.

[KWL]

@lordofthemark 159073 wrote:

Note, I have been tempted to mention the universal jaywalking to the bus stop near my building in the context of discussions of “scofflaw cyclists” but then it occurs to me Alexandria Police might actually start ticketing (harmless, safe) jaywalkers there. So I keep quiet.

It is good to keep in mind accusations of jaywalking was a way for motorists to delegitimize pedestrians. http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-76-the-modern-moloch/

[Judd]

@KWL 159119 wrote:

It is good to keep in mind accusations of jaywalking was a way for motorists to delegitimize pedestrians. http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-76-the-modern-moloch/

Yeah! Only a jay would walk out in front of that guy’s bike!

[lordofthemark]

I was not addressing what happened in Falls Church with my reference to jaywalking (as my comments should make clear, I think, based on what I know of the incident, that the cyclist was at fault and should not have ridden in the manner they did) I was addressing the general question of whether it is reasonable to expect 100% compliance with law, even when the law violation is not in fact dangerous.

Where I live 100% of people who walk to that bus stop “jaywalk” (as KWL points out, a concept that came to us with the automobile). I confess to being one of them on days I take the bus. I do not want enforcement against them (what they do is sensible, logical and safe, though not legal). I merely would want to be able to cite it to help non-cyclists (and perhaps a few cyclists) gain insight into the ways real people act with respect to our streets and the law.

[ginacico]

@KWL 159119 wrote:

It is good to keep in mind accusations of jaywalking was a way for motorists to delegitimize pedestrians. http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-76-the-modern-moloch/

Exactly. As continues today, with motorists trying to delegitimize cyclists wanting to use the streets. No question, the idiot behavior of the guy blowing a red light endangers lives. But kowtowing to unreasonable standards of perfect law-abiding behavior (when the laws were written for motorists, and when drivers aren’t held equally accountable) won’t move us forward. It’s a long and stubborn history to have to turn back, if we truly want our streets to be a multi-use environment. We have to keep advocating for our own rights and safety, to undo the revolution that created this car-centric culture in the first place.

“Before the advent of the automobile, users of city streets were diverse and included children at play and pedestrians at large. By 1930, most streets were primarily a motor thoroughfares where children did not belong and where pedestrians were condemned as “jaywalkers.” In Fighting Traffic, Peter Norton argues that to accommodate automobiles, the American city required not only a physical change but also a social one: before the city could be reconstructed for the sake of motorists, its streets had to be socially reconstructed as places where motorists belonged. It was not an evolution, he writes, but a bloody and sometimes violent revolution.” (The book, referenced in KWL’s article above, is a great but exasperating read.)

[baiskeli]

@lordofthemark 159068 wrote:

This reminds me so much of debates I’ve heard in shul. My rabbi emeritus “we are not immigrants any more, we should not be less assertive than anyone else” My child of holocaust survivors wife, “nah, I’m not sure, we need to watch what the gentiles think” (I suspect african americans, gays, etc, have similar discussions) (note also, I have immense sympathy for Muslim Americans whom I imagine pray hard “let it not be a muslim” when they hear of a violent incident, just as I pray particularly hard that it not be a Jew especially for a financial crime)

Its a difficult choice, between realistically acknowledging that small, different, sometimes disliked minorities are stereotyped and judged (unfairly) as groups, and that thus, as a pragmatic matter, the bad or illegal acts of one set back all. OTOH there is also the danger of internalizing the bigotry, and being too inassertive, and legitimizing the stereotyping.

Rest assured that everyone is stereotyped, not just minorities. Christian (or christian-background) white males get it too. They just don’t have as much to lose.

I think there is an intermediate solution. One is to push back against stereotyping in one’s advocacy (and all stereotyping, not just the kind one is a victim of) and to be assertive in pushing for legitimate benefits. While at the same time paying some attention to the optics of one’s own behavior, and reminding others of the pragmatic impact of their behavior.

I personally think the first is more important in the long run.

[Crickey7]

G_d gave us brakes for a reason.

[Judd]

@baiskeli 159528 wrote:

Rest assured that everyone is stereotyped, not just minorities. Christian (or christian-background) white males get it too. They just don’t have as much to lose.

I for one am so tired of the stereotype that just because I’m a 6’3″ white male that I should be paid lots of money and be selected to run things.

[Judd]

@Judd 159540 wrote:

I for one am so tired of the stereotype that just because I’m a 6’3″ white male that I should be paid lots of money and be selected to run things.

And what’s with everyone assuming because I am a white, middle aged male with a beard, that I’m likely a cyclist?

[lordofthemark]

@Judd 159541 wrote:

And what’s with everyone assuming because I am a white, middle aged male with a beard, that I’m likely a cyclist?

Wait what?

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