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Union Station's Chutzpah

Like many people these days, I am concerned about the environment, and I try to do my part to reduce my environmental impact. I recycle, and my garden consists of native plants. Instead of driving from my house on Capitol Hill to my job in Silver Spring, I ride my bike to Union Station and hop on the Metro.

Unlike the bikes being rolled out in the SmartBike DC program [Metro, Aug. 13], my bike is old. I bought it used from a bike store a few years ago, and it has certainly seen better days.

But it functions just as it should, taking me from point A to point B. So imagine my shock and sadness when I got off the Metro after work Tuesday and my bike was missing from the bike rack outside Union Station.

I went to the nearest security guard to report the apparent theft, and he promptly retrieved my "stolen" bike. As it turned out, my bike had been judged to be "unsightly" by Union Station standards and had been impounded. They had cut the lock and confiscated the machine, obviously without bothering to verify whether it was abandoned or just a little beat up.

Are they serious? Is this a message the District wants to send? Is this how the nation's capital is promoting sustainability? Is the city going to confiscate old cars that function perfectly well? Are banks going to reclaim houses that show some peeling paint? Give me a break . . . and a new bike lock while you're at it.

GEORGINA ARDALAN

Washington

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WABA to Meet with DC Police; Witnesses to Crash Sought

On Friday, August 15, the Washington Area Bicyclist Association (WABA) will meet with the DC Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) to express concerns over recent actions by the department that are contributing to the sense that bicyclists and pedestrians are not being adequately protected on Washington, DC's roadways. These actions include:

• the failure to provide information about the investigation into the death of Alice Swanson;
• an ill-timed enforcement program targeting cyclists; and
• the failure to cite a driver for fleeing the scene of a crash.

Six weeks ago, Alice Swanson, a 22-year old cyclist, was killed at the intersection of 20th and R Streets NW. Aside from an interim report issued by the department, no additional information has been provided by the department that might help prevent such tragedies from occurring in the future. WABA has been trying to get more details from the Major Crash Investigation Unit but repeated calls to the unit have remained unanswered.

WABA also has serious concerns about the poorly timed and poorly informed recent sting operation against cyclists near 16th and U Streets NW. With the timing of the enforcement stings so close after the death of Alice Swanson, the department appears to be blaming the victim and the tragedy of Ms. Swanson's death deserves a much more comprehensive approach involving stronger enforcement of traffic laws, and education efforts aimed at ALL roadway users.

WABA is also very concerned by the department's recent response to the incident involving a pedestrian who was struck in a crosswalk on K Street in downtown DC. As widely reported in the news the driver was cited $50 for failure to yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk - with no arrest or penalty associated with the fact that he had also fled the scene of this crash. Under Title 50, section 2201.05 of the DC Code, the driver, if found guilty of fleeing the scene of a crash, would be subject to fines of not more than $500, or imprisonment of not more than 6 months.

Since the death of Ms. Swanson WABA has been working with the District Department of Transportation on designing improvements to the intersection where she was killed and also with the DC Council on legislative changes that would better protect those that walk and bike. However, without better enforcement of traffic laws and better understanding of the laws by police and cyclists, the effects of these efforts will be minimized. At the MPD meeting WABA will be specifically asking the police for the following:

1) detailed information about the investigation into Alice Swanson's death
2) better training of officers in bike and pedestrian laws
3) distribution of WABA's "Pocket Guide to DC Bike Laws" to all law enforcement officers
4) increased enforcement of traffic violations
5) support for increased fines for drivers that strike cyclists or pedestrians

It is the policy of the District of Columbia to promote safe walking and biking and MPD's role in that policy is critical. WABA will be sure to inform you of the results of the meeting. If you have any questions or other concerns that you feel need to be addressed please email waba"at"waba.org

Witnesses to Alice Swanson Crash Sought

The family of Alice Swanson is seeking to gather information about the circumstances by which Alice was struck and killed by a truck on the morning of Tuesday, July 8, 2008. If you, or anyone you know, has information about this, please contact James (Rory) Kelly, an investigator working on behalf of Alice's family. He can be contacted at (202) 661-0948. Please contact Rory and he will meet with you promptly.
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You Can Ride One of Mayor Fenty's Bicycles (But not the really good one)

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Tomorrow, D.C. transportation lords will unveil their long-awaited Smart Bike program (like the one Paris uses, and Barcelona and Oslo), making Washington the first major American city to provide this kind of grab-and-go bicycle for public use on short urban hops. (It's amazing that we beat Seattle or Portland to this particular Edge City punch.) The first 100 bikes at 10 automated racks around the city won't be officially available until Mayor Fenty snips the ribbon Wednesday, but I begged my way onto a list of beta testers who got access in advance. Last Thursday, I spent a few hours taking a city bike ride on a city bike. ...

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Will Car-Free ‘Summer Streets’ Work?

By Sewell Chan

The city’s Summer Streets program will have its debut Saturday morning. The Bloomberg administration plans to bar motor vehicles from a 6.9-mile north-south route in Manhattan for six hours each on three consecutive Saturdays. In an interview this morning with Fox 5, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg expressed hope — but not certainty — that the event would be a success:

Cars are important, but streets are there for everybody. And we’re going to try, for three days in a row – three Saturdays in a row – to see if the public wants to go out in the streets and reconnect with each other and bicycle and skateboard and walk and kibbitz and maybe a lot of restaurants will put tables out – something different.

He added, “This has been done in Bogotá for 30 years. They love it. It’s phenomenally popular and it probably will work here. If it doesn’t, at least we’ll have tried.”

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New York City Art & Design - Bike Racks?

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In recent years his [David Byrne] interest in bicycles has expanded from riding them to thinking seriously about the role they play in urban life, as he has started making connections with politicians and international design consultants keen to keep cars from taking over the city. So when the Department of Transportation asked him to help judge a design competition for the city’s new bike racks, he eagerly agreed — so eagerly, in fact, that he sent in his own designs as well.

They were simple shapes to define different neighborhoods around the city: a dollar sign for Wall Street; an electric guitar for Williamsburg, Brooklyn; a car — “The Jersey” — for the area near the Lincoln Tunnel. “I said, ‘Well, this disqualifies me as a judge,’ ” he recalled, “but I just doodled them out and sent them in.” He figured maybe they’d be used to decorate the contest Web site, nycityracks.wordpress.com.

...on Friday nine racks made from his own whimsical designs were installed around the city. “They immediately responded, saying, ‘If you can get these made, we’ll put them through,’ “ he recalled. “I was kind of shocked.”
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Driver picks the wrong pedestrians to go after with his truck

After jumping out of the way, the four off-duty cops call 9-1-1 and have the driver arrested

By Lee van der Voo The Lake Oswego Review

In the end, hitting the gas may have been a very bad idea.

But a Portland driver who allegedly gunned his three-quarter ton truck at four pedestrians in a Lake Oswego parking lot is now in the Clackamas County Jail.

Turns out the joke’s on him.

Richard J. Halley, 55, is accused of racing his vehicle toward four men in the parking lot of the Albertson’s store at 11 S. State Street.

It happened at 12:20 p.m. Wednesday as the four men walked across the parking lot onto the sidewalk after just having lunch at the Subway.
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He was charged with four counts of menacing, one count of reckless driving and one count of recklessly endangering. He is being held in the Clackamas County Jail on $45,000 bail.
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Schools move to eject cars from campuses

By Gwen Purdom, USA TODAY

High schools and colleges are steering students away from cars to save money on gas, save the environment and promote physical fitness.

This fall, Ripon College in Ripon, Wis., is offering freshmen free mountain bikes, helmets and locks in exchange for a promise not to bring a car to campus. The $300-per-student cost is funded by private donations.

The college's president, David Joyce, says the project was meant to avoid building a parking garage, but its side effects are beneficial: less pollution, more exercise and savings on gas.

The timing was right, Joyce says: "We were either extremely brilliant or extremely lucky."

About 60% of the school's 300 incoming students have signed up.

"Today's teenagers deserve a lot of credit. They're socially aware, they're environmentally conscious," says Mike Martin, executive director of the National Association of Pupil Transportation. "When the price of gasoline takes effect, they're smart."

On other campuses: ...

"We have over 100 million bikes that are sitting around in garages and basements and back porches," Blumenauer says. "When people start to use them, it can be transformational."

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My hurry matters more than your hurry

[An article about hostile motorist/cyclists interactions]

By JAN HOFFMAN - New York Times
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“We’ve had a car culture for so long and suddenly the roads become saturated with bicyclists trying to save gas,” Mr. Cooley said 10 days after the attack, still feeling scrambled, in pain and traumatized. “No one knows how to share the road.” He doesn’t plan to bike to work again this season.

Every year, the war of the wheels breaks out in the sweet summer months, as four-wheelers react with aggravation and anger to the two-wheelers competing for the same limited real estate.
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Like Mr. Cooley, the newbies are lured by improved bike lanes as well as the benefits of exercise, a smaller carbon footprint and gas savings. But talk about a vicious cycle! With more bikes on the road, the driver-cyclist, Hatfield-McCoy hostility seems to be ratcheting up. Cycling: good for the environment, bad for mental health?
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Psychologists and traffic experts say the tension rises from many factors, including summer road rage and the “my hurry matters more than your hurry” syndrome, exacerbated when drivers feel captive to slower-moving cyclists.

And then there’s old-fashioned turf warfare.
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The ability of drivers and cyclists to trash talk and then disappear into the anonymity of traffic further poisons the atmosphere. Dave Schlabowske, the bicycle and pedestrian coordinator for Milwaukee, recalled a car pulling alongside as he pedaled to a meeting: passenger, a child of about 6, rolls down window. No seat belt.

Driver, male, fixes Mr. Schlabowske with a glare, and then gives instruction to small child. Obediently, child complies: he flips Mr. Schlabowske an obscene gesture, shouts complementary epithet. Looking triumphant, driver peels off.

To some extent, the hostility is a byproduct not only of the abdication of common sense, but of widespread ignorance of state and local laws. In every state, cyclists have the same rights and responsibilities as drivers of motor vehicles. But in the particulars, state vehicle codes and municipal ordinances vary. Consider the frustrated driver who shouts to a cyclist, “Get on the sidewalk!”
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The anticyclist hostility even follows riders into court. Just ask a bike lawyer. For as surely as night follows day, with more riders on the road, there is a small but growing peloton of lawyers specializing in bike law, usually representing injured cyclists.

Gary Brustin, a cyclist and California bike lawyer, said anticyclist fervor makes jury selection daunting. “They are white-hot about us,” Mr. Brustin said. “They are seething.” In California, bicycle plaintiffs lose two out of three cases that go to trial.

The anger has not gone unnoticed by officials around the country. A dozen states now mandate at least a three-foot passing gap. In June, South Carolina passed an antiharassment law to protect cyclists. ... Complete Streets bills seek to require that roads be designed for all users.
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Poor behaviour on the road is a barrier to cycling

[Excerpts from Getting Australia Moving]

“We…have created an environment that makes it very convenient for people to be inactive, and subsequently develop unhealthy behaviours. The only way to combat this is to make it equally convenient for people to become active, and moreover, easier for them to inherit a better quality of life”.
Libby Darlison, Chair, Premiers Council on Active Living, NSW.

SOME KEY POINTS:
  • The more cyclists there are, the safer it becomes.
  • Motorists behaviour largely controls the likelihood of collisions with people walking and cycling.
  • Comparison of pedestrian and cyclist collision frequencies between communities and over time periods need to reflect the amount of walking and bicycling.
  • Efforts to enhance pedestrian and cyclist safety, including traffic engineering and legal policies, need to be examined for their ability to modify motorist behavior.
  • Policies that increase walking and cycling appear to be an effective route to improving road safety.
A Victorian Parliamentary inquiry into violence associated with motor vehicle use received a large number of submissions from the cycling community reporting instances of road violence. Several submissions suggested that the presence of cyclists on the road was a trigger for road violence against cyclists (Drugs and Crime Prevention Committee, 2005). Driver knowledge of the road rules as they relate to people on bicycles has been found to be generally poor. Only one in five (19%) of drivers knew that it was legal for cyclists to ride two abreast, 44% that cyclists were allowed to ride along a clearway, and 63% that cyclists were allowed to occupy a whole lane (Rissel et al, 2002). Importantly, this lack of knowledge regarding vital aspects of the road rules has been found to be associated with a negative attitude amongst motorists towards people on bicycles (Rissel et al, 2002). The hostile reception reported by bicyclists from motorists is a consistent theme when surveying people who ride bicycles. Daley et al (2007) found that many occasional and regular riders perceived the average Sydney driver as impatient and intolerant. Some thought drivers were more likely to respect cyclist’s safety and rights if bicycles were more frequently encountered on the roads and this is supported by Robinson (2005) who found that the more cyclists there are, the safer it becomes. Riders described altercations where motorists took out frustrations on them, often triggered by the motorist’s view that their journey was delayed by the rider. Riders felt there was a skewed driver perception that a cyclist held up traffic, rather than seeing them as a legitimate part of the traffic system. It is this lack of acknowledgement towards people on bicycles that has been found by Greig (2001) to be a significant deterrent towards regular cycling.

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