When was the last time *you* knocked out power to 12000 people for an entire weekend?

[Bilsko]

http://www.cyclelicio.us/2013/santa-cruz-carnage

Quote:

We frequently see reader comments in any newspaper stories about cyclists that bicycles cause more danger and mayhem for other road users, pedestrians and the general public than cars.
I don’t know if the people who write this stuff believe their own hyperbole or not, but when was the last time a cyclist knocked out power to 12,000 people, forcing street closures, widespread loss of business, and weekend overtime for PG&E workers and police to direct traffic?

Maybe its a good thing that the W&OD is bicycling only, what with the dozen or so substations along the right-of-way.

Topic

[mstone]

I’d make a joke about hammer-throwing a recalcitrant bike into one of the substations, but I’d probably get arrested.

[PotomacCyclist]

In a typical year, car drivers cause the deaths of about 32,000 Americans. I can’t find statistics on how many deaths are caused by cyclists, but I know it’s very low. Maybe just a handful nationwide each year, if that. I saw a report from New York State about traffic deaths. Over a 4-year period, cyclists caused fewer than 1 death a year. Given that NYS is a very populous state and that it contains both densely-populated urban areas as well as rural areas, I think it’s reasonable to extrapolate those statistics to the U.S. as a whole.

Cyclists cause so few deaths that bike haters can probably name each single incident (such as “the one in San Francisco!”). Any death is a tragedy, but can anyone actually recite all the driver-caused deaths from last year? No, because there are too many of them. I remember how incensed many commenters were (over on ARLnow) when a cyclist inadvertently killed an older woman last year in Arlington. Cries of “scofflaw cyclists” and “Lycra-clad Lance wannabes” abounded, until it was revealed that the cyclist was himself elderly and lost control on a downhill section of the trail. But later on, after it was pointed out that car drivers kill 30,000-32,000 Americans a year, the “off-with-their-heads” crew quieted down about cyclists somehow being the ultimate menace on American roads and trails. Hopefully at least a few bike haters now understand how irrational their views are about cyclists. Cyclists are far from perfect, but they certainly aren’t the biggest threat on local and national roads.

[Vicegrip]

@mstone 42357 wrote:

I’d make a joke about hammer-throwing a recalcitrant bike into one of the substations, but I’d probably get arrested.

Is a recalcitrant like a recumbent except the bike lays down on you?

[PeteD]

We had a drunk driver take out one of our redundant power and network paths at my previous company. That telephone pole had it coming!

[rcannon100]

@PeteD 42440 wrote:

We had a drunk driver take out one of our redundant power and network paths at my previous company. That telephone pole had it coming!

Scofflaw telephone poles! They dont obey the traffic laws. When the light turns green, they just sit there like nothing happened all day. They pay more attention to the telephone calls they are holding then the do to what is going on around them. They clearly thing that they are above traffic and above the law.

I say all telephone poles have to wear helmets and have licenses – oh yes, and high powered blinking red strobe lights!

[Author]

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