The Rules

[lordofthemark]

Suppose you come to a stop sign at a three way intersection. For example there is a road north, a road south, and a road west, but none going east. You are riding a bike northbound. There is no possible cross traffic. The stop sign for the NB lane is there to make sure motorists stop for traffic that is coming east and turning left onto the NB lane – thats the only thing that could conflict with a NB motorist. But you are on a bike, and riding to the far right (lets assume thats safe here) and a left turning car should easily pass to your left. Is it legal to do an Idaho stop at such a place?

Now lets modify it and say you are in a NB bike lane (which proceeds on the N side of the 3 way) So a left turning car really, really shouldnt conflict with you?

Now lets modify it the other way. There IS an EB exit from the intersection, but it enters a private business (IE not a public street) – and its a day the business is closed, and there is almost never traffic entering or exiting it. ???

Cause I am pretty sure I’ve seen all the above. Its hard not to think the stop sign really is not appropriate for bikes at such locations.

In lieu of an Idaho stop law, it should be possible to have signs at specific locations saying “bikes may treat stop sign as yield”. Is that done anywhere? Anywhere around here?

[mstone]

@lordofthemark 82979 wrote:

In lieu of an Idaho stop law, it should be possible to have signs at specific locations saying “bikes may treat stop sign as yield”. Is that done anywhere? Anywhere around here?

I’ve only seen stop signs with a subtext that says “except turns (then speed around the f’ing corner as fast as you want, pedestrians think that’s hilarious)”. Nothing specific to bikes.

[dasgeh]

@mstone 82970 wrote:

Umm, because they don’t move when cyclists show up? Unless you’re doing figure 8s in the intersection, this isn’t analogous.

But the driver is moving and, in single-direction cycletracks, is moving the same direction as the bikes, probably faster than the bike, so unless the bike is coming from a garage, there shouldn’t be conflict. A better analogy might be a bike lane: do you think drivers should be allowed to drive in the bike lane when there are no bikes to be seen, and no mid-block curbcuts? If not, why not?

I keep coming back to two arguments: 1) a respect for law and 2) because the driver could be wrong about there not being any bikes around. Both of those would argue for bikes stopping at red lights (with some exceptions — like when the light isn’t going to turn green, but even then, in VA at least, you can satisfy #1).

I see stop signs as different animals, since the idea is stop-and-then-proceed. So I can see how slowing to [insert appropriately slow speed], such that you could stop, and certainly stopping if you don’t have right-of-way, respects the spirit of the law and the safety issues.

[lordofthemark]

@dasgeh 82985 wrote:

But the driver is moving and, in single-direction cycletracks, is moving the same direction as the bikes, probably faster than the bike, so unless the bike is coming from a garage, there shouldn’t be conflict. .

Are there really single direction cycle tracks as wide as a standard width lane? A motorist on a cycle track with a plastic bollard type buffer may endanger the bollards. One on a cycle track buffered by parked cars (or in a door zone bike lane) may risk side swiping the parked cars.

Another problem is that on a track like L Street, where motorists turn across the track, the motorists turning are not expecting a vehicle moving faster than a bike. So at the very least, the driver would have to go no faster than cyclists on the track go.

Also Im not sure I see a rationale. The times when cycle tracks are empty are typically the times when the general travel lanes are uncongested. Only exception might be times of particularly severe weather. So little benefit to offset the costs. Contrast that to riding through a red light, where there are benefits that offset the concerns you mention.

I still don’t ride through reds (except the ones you note above, where the light won’t change, and even then I will press a beg button if its not too much of a hardship). My view with respect to riding through reds doesn’t impact how I ride, so much as it impacts my view of “scofflaw cyclist” discussions. “I don’t do that, BUT the folks who do are NOT the reckless jerks you think they are …”

[rcannon100]

[DismalScientist]

@dasgeh 82985 wrote:

do you think drivers should be allowed to drive in the bike lane when there are no bikes to be seen, and no mid-block curbcuts? If not, why not?

Cars turning right should turn from the bike lane, not across the bike lane. Turns across the bike lane set up right hook collisions. The dash lines indicating that right-turning cars should take the bike lane are designed as too short if they exist at all.

I’ve noticed that many “cycling advocates” like to introduce red herrings into these issues. There is more of a difference between blowing through a stop sign than slowing for a stop sign and yielding (Idaho stop) than between a Idaho stop and putting one’s foot down. True Idaho stop behavior doesn’t really cause anti-cyclist rage.

Similarly, there is a big difference between not stopping for a red light at all and stopping and proceeding when it is clear that a light will not cycle for bicycles. Similarly, no one cares if cyclist ignore no turns on red if one yields to traffic and pedestrians.

[lordofthemark]

@DismalScientist 82991 wrote:

True Idaho stop behavior doesn’t really cause anti-cyclist rage.

I’m really not sure about that. It would help if raging anti-cyclists would clarify that they understood say, the difference between an Idaho stop and blowing through a stop sign. Or if they were even aware that there are traffic signals that are run by sensors that do not pick up bikes. In the absence of that, its hard to say what behavior is ticking them off.

I recently had a “discussion” with a raging anticyclist. He was all “mixing bikes and cars is a recipe for trouble” (he seemed equally unhappy with vehicular cycling and with on street bike lanes.) He WAS concerned about bike safety – in that he mentioned the conflict with streetcars (but was not interested in a discussion of how to ride across tracks) he also was “streetcars are a 19th c tech” but when it was pointed out that autos also are, he began to discuss auto tech improvements over the last hundred years (but was not interested in street car tech improvements) And if I heard correctly (I was in the next room at that point) he repeated the meme that “CaBi is a private company that was given public space”. I think I had corrected him on that a year ago, but I guess he forgot.

So no, it was all windshield perspective, and general reaction to change, not actual cyclist behavior.

[DismalScientist]

When the anti-cyclist screeds on Arlnow and other internet fora complain about scofflaw cyclists blowing through stop signs and stop lights, I assume they are upset about cyclists blowing through stop signs and stop lights. I would think that blowing through stops signs and stop lights is different than slowing and yielding at stop signs and stopping at stop lights.

[mstone]

Does it ever happen that a car decides to take a bike lane on an un-congested street? No; if the car is in the bike lane it’s because the driver is pulling a dick move and is going to try to cut people off. So the straw man of a car moving blissfully through the bike lane, with no chance of impeding a cyclist, is just a straw man. In reality he’s probably going to end up as a jerk parked in the bike lane.

[jrenaut]

I think it’s funny that a thread started over a blog post devoted to reducing cycling to 15 simple rules has devolved into 3 pages and counting of arguing about rules of cycling.

[dasgeh]

@mstone 82999 wrote:

Does it ever happen that a car decides to take a bike lane on an un-congested street? No; if the car is in the bike lane it’s because the driver is pulling a dick move and is going to try to cut people off. So the straw man of a car moving blissfully through the bike lane, with no chance of impeding a cyclist, is just a straw man. In reality he’s probably going to end up as a jerk parked in the bike lane.

On Quincy Street between Lee Highway and Wilson Blvd, cars drive in the bike lane all the time (and no, I’m not talking about when they’re turning right and legally required to be in that space). They don’t get anything from doing it — they just are driving in the wrong place. They could be 3 feet to the left and not have a problem. Generally, if they see a bike, they get over. On the one hand, no harm no foul. On the other, don’t drive in the stinking bike lane.

[lordofthemark]

@DismalScientist 82998 wrote:

When the anti-cyclist screeds on Arlnow and other internet fora complain about scofflaw cyclists blowing through stop signs and stop lights, I assume they are upset about cyclists blowing through stop signs and stop lights. I would think that blowing through stops signs and stop lights is different than slowing and yielding at stop signs and stopping at stop lights.

Such screeds usually include the statement “almost ALL cyclists blow through red lights”

They are either using “blow through red lights” to include all stopping at a red light and proceeding through the red, or they are lying – since my own observation is that the number of folks who blow through red lights without stopping is quite small. I think the former is the case.

I think something similar is going on for stop signs, though more riders go through stops signs at speed, I suppose, than blow through reds.

[Subby]

I like that list except #5. My *entire* winter was predicated on being stupid about it.

[lordofthemark]

@dasgeh 83004 wrote:

On Quincy Street between Lee Highway and Wilson Blvd, cars drive in the bike lane all the time (and no, I’m not talking about when they’re turning right and legally required to be in that space). They don’t get anything from doing it — they just are driving in the wrong place. They could be 3 feet to the left and not have a problem. Generally, if they see a bike, they get over. On the one hand, no harm no foul. On the other, don’t drive in the stinking bike lane.

see the thing is most of us cyclists are also drivers – so we KNOW if a driver gets anything from doing it or not. In the case of typical cyclist violations, I think most drivers just don’t understand why people do it. I was on the CCT (the Va one) with my wife the other day, the first time she had biked a trail she often walks (in fact her first time on a bike outside a beach town in at least 25 years) and she came to a stop sign – and the crosswalk across the intersecting road was one of those big humps. She was like “damn, I needed the momentum” (for a newb just getting the hang of shifting, even something like that is annoying) a perfect segue for me to lecture on trail stop signs, Idaho stops, etc. She decided she would obey such stop signs for extra safety (a position I mostly agree with) but she understood something she could never have quite realized the same way, till she had actually biked herself.

[cyclingfool]

@jrenaut 83000 wrote:

I think it’s funny that a thread started over a blog post devoted to reducing cycling to 15 simple rules has devolved into 3 pages and counting of arguing about rules of cycling.

This.

[Author]

Posts