Comment 71491

By moylek (registered) - website | Posted November 21, 2011 at 16:38:18

I cycle to work every day; I run most of my errands in the West end by bike.

Nearly every day I see

  • cyclists blow through stop signs when there are cars waiting for their turn
  • cyclists hook left or right onto a sidewalk to avoid waiting at a light
  • cyclists turn without signalling when signalling would have been helpful to cars or pedestrians waiting an opportunity to move forward.

And when I say "nearly every day" I mean "every day almost without exception." This is not the same as drivers who make rolling stops or who forget to signal or accidentally run a stop sign: this is quite clearly a deliberate disregard for the traffic laws and common sense by a significant minority of cyclists.

The behaviour is galling, sows chaos and is sometimes just plain dangerous. And it helps turn cyclists into the enemies of drivers.

But let us - we the defensive cyclists; we the unsympathetic drivers - separate the two issues. On the one hand, there are cyclists who cycle with little regard to rules and mutual consideration (and there are lots of them); on the other hand, there is this proposal regarding behaviour at stop signs and red lights.

We should not conflate these two types of behaviour to score "so there" points. But we should also realize that to many drivers, the cyclist who runs a four-way safely at moderate speed looks just like the jerk who blows through without stopping when a driver has the right of way.

Comment edited by moylek on 2011-11-21 16:39:13

-- Kenneth Moyle Hamilton, Ontario

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