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Slowing the nominal top speed by 25% would do more for safety than any number of harassment laws.

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@Rootchopper 24213 wrote:

This whole 4-way stop thread has me thinking that many of these intersections would be better served with roundabouts.

People in the US aren’t any better at those than 4 way stops. Even the traffic engineers seem confused–I’ve even seen stop lights in circles.

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Alternatively, you could just slow down. No offence, but when people routinely exceed the speed limit by a significant margin (which does statistically kill people) and then complain that speed cameras make things less safe or are a money grab, it’s BS. The problem is that it’s a cultural norm to ignore speed limits (and kill people) and it’s hard to change that culture.

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@dbb 24196 wrote:

I do so because I think my body provides a bit of extra shock/vibration damping for the laptop I carry. When the pack gets funky, I empty it, wash it down and hang it to dry in the sun (sequence is critical for this operation). The back pane on the REI Osprey pack seems pretty funk resistant.

forget funk–I need air. the laptop can sit in a little cozy on the rack.

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@Terpfan 24187 wrote:

Maryland law is weird. About a decade ago, shoot maybe it was late 90s, I was driving down Georgia Avenue after a horrible thunderstorm had knocked out of all of the powerlights. The traffic was absolutely miserable, but I stopped at a non-functioning stoplight near Leisure World. A cop was too my right and instructed me to roll down my window. She told me that she understands why I stopped and that it’s noble, but the smaller road must yield to the bigger road and I should not stop. I asked are you sure and she said definitively. Ever since then I have quizzed every officer I know or come across and gotten a multitude of different answers. It’s one of those things where they need to uniformly just say this is the rule/law, no if, ands or buts.

The first cop was probably correct. In the absence of any law that a vehicle must stop for a dark signal, the situation falls back to the general rule that vehicles must yield to traffic in the intersection. (This, of course, means that cars trying to enter or cross a busy street could wait forever.) The reality is that there is no good way for 8 lane roads to intersect without some kind of traffic control, whether a stoplight or a traffic cop. We just don’t have the resources on hand to manage the infrastructure when this sort of event happens.

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@Rootchopper 24184 wrote:

Since I started this thread, I should point out a couple of things. I have never ever seen so many drivers completely ignoring the rules of the road. After an hour of this, it occured to me that there really was no reason for me to be in a hurry. After all, I was in an air conditioned car and my house was an oven. No rush to get there.
The other point I want to make is that it may be the treat the dead-light-as-a-stop-sign rule is not a law. It’s a custom. Does anybody know if this is true?

code of virginia, § 46.2-833:

C. If the traffic lights controlling an intersection are out of service because of a power failure or other event that prevents the giving of signals by the traffic lights, the drivers of vehicles approaching such an intersection shall proceed as though such intersection were controlled by a stop sign on all approaches. The provisions of this subsection shall not apply to: intersections controlled by portable stop signs, intersections with law-enforcement officers or other authorized persons directing traffic, or intersections controlled by traffic lights displaying flashing red or flashing amber lights as provided in subsection A.

DC (like most places) is similar. MD has recto-cranial inversion in this area of law (unless they’ve finally passed the bill that’s been stalled for years), though MDOT pretends there is legal backing and advertises that people must treat dark signals as stops.

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@creadinger 24131 wrote:

Well said. Maybe we could add a quantifier word in front of the word scofflaw, like momentum. You become a momentum (mass*velocity) scofflaw when you do certain dangerous-to-others things with high levels of momentum.

newtonian scofflaw?

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@eminva 24126 wrote:

CORRECTION: It was NOT a four-way blinker. It was blinking red for traffic coming off I-66, and blinking yellow for traffic on Lee Highway. Thus, motorists coming off the interstate thought they had a four way stop and the folks on Lee Highway thought they could go through, with caution. Luckily when I went through, it was all jammed up and nobody was moving, but that should get changed to a four-way red blinker, pronto.

Well, it’s a four way blinker, just not a four way red. I noticed that it was yellow for Lee, but the traffic volume was low enough that it just wasn’t an issue early. (One of the reasons that is such an obnoxious crossing–most mornings you just sit there staring at an empty street waiting for the signal. If they’re going to put in a push-to-cross button, it should have some affect on the signal timing when the traffic volume is low.)

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@jrenaut 24120 wrote:

I think what you meant to say is that the Lee and Lynn signals have power. “Working” implies that they are controlling traffic in a safe and orderly manner . . .

Lee & W&OD at Falls Church was a 4 way blinker this morning. Not a problem before 7 (actually kind of nice–the wait was very short), but I can’t imagine what it was like later.

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The killer is turning left from the bridge, more than turning right & merging

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It still wouldn’t help much, because coming from the bridge you just can’t see left. If anything, you’d probably be worse off if you came to a complete stop and then tried to start blind into the traffic. Maybe one of those big mirrors?

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They’re even more obnoxious when empty car lanes get green arrow cycles. What I really hate is that there’s no way to tell if a given button is one that you need to press, or whether pressing it is a waste of time (because the cycle is timed and pressing doesn’t change anything).

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I just use disc brakes and don’t worry about wearing through my rims. They sometimes sound like all the demons of hell when first starting out wet, but that burns off fairly quickly.

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@DavidAsch 23731 wrote:

How’s this for a twist! I commute regularly on the path through Rock Creek Park and always ding my bell when I pass runners. Yesterday when I dinged my bell, the runner said, “That was completely unnecessary.” I slowed down and asked what she meant. She said, “I am here. You are there. The bell is an annoyance.”

Simply explain that you are meeting your obligation to signal the pass. If she wishes to opt out, she should wear a large sign on her back indicating that she does not want to be so notified–otherwise it is impossible for a cyclist to guess that.

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@creadinger 23452 wrote:

Did you knock on the door, or just hang out on the porch and they noticed you?

I knocked a couple of times, no answer. Dogs started barking and then someone came out an investigated. A bit awkward. I would have picked anything public if I could find it, but all I saw were the big power lines I was riding under.

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