...to make bike lanes safer.
By painting a stop bar and a stop sign stencil at each intersection (controlled or not), many of the egregious design faults of bike lanes could be minimized. Right hooks and left crosses would now have a designed-in counter measure to protect the not-so-Swift cyclists from the unexpected.
After all, bike-lane cyclists never run stop signs.
Hat tip to LAB Bicycle Friendly Community Flagstaff, Arizona (which has a law requiring bicycles to yield to oncoming "real" vehicles) for this great idea.
9 comments:
Please identify the ordinance number or other clear documentation of the Flagstaff law. If you go to the Flagstaff City site, there is no mention of what is alluded to, either in this post OR in the recent Bike League LCI list discussions.
Indeed, read
http://flagstaff.az.gov/index.aspx?NID=1876
and the proposed changes are ones of which I think any reader of this blog would approve. In the meantime, perhaps we should consider this an unproven urban legend in the same category as Obama is not really a US citizen.
If Flagstaff is worse than Hunter Point Village, surely someone should be able to do more than whine. Actually, strike that last sentence since I am not permitted to use that "w" word any more.
You missed the point of the post, Steve.
It doesn't matter whether such an ordinance exists. But here is what was cited.
"Section 9-05-001-0015 Right of Way At Intersection: Upon approaching an intersection, any person riding or operating bicycles in a bicycle lane shall yield the right of way to all vehicles within or approaching such intersection; except, that all vehicles which must stop or yield before entering an intersection because of a stop or yield sign and all vehicles making a left-hand turn at an intersection shall not proceed into such intersection nor make such a turn without first yielding the right of way to all bicycles within or approaching such intersection, and shall proceed only when it is safe to do so."
"It doesn't matter if such an ordinance exists?" Would PM be so sanguine if someone were to say that "It doesn't matter if PM committed the crime?"
Call me old fashioned, but facts DO matter, which is why I have sent off an inquiry to the City Attorney of Flagstaff, Arizona. If I receive a response, I will post the inquiry and response, IN FULL, on my blog. If I receive no response, well, I can be pretty hard to ignore as many know full well. And THAT will be reported as well.
Indeed, if YOU go to the link I cite, you'll find it does not connect to the ordinance cited. It is a dead end. Where is Snopes when we need it?
Me bad. The link I provided is a good one. Among other things, it DOES cite the reference to which PM refers. It also recommends it for repeal since it is discriminatory and violates normal rules of the road. Might it be more productive to castigate somewhere that was NOT on a positive legislative path (no pun intended)?
I expect the City Attorney will simply agree it is a bad law which is why Flagstaff is dumping it. If I were her, I'd suggest that the greatest scorn should be held for the unrepentant sinners.
Steve, bike lanes themselves violate "normal rules of the road" in a far more deadly way than Flagstaff's law does.
So look at my proposal again, look at the inherent problems of bike lane (dangerous crossing and ROW conflicts), look at the supposed benefit/purpose of bike lanes (to prevent overtaking vehicles from running over bicyclists by giving them their own lane), and then look at the solution I propose: mandatory stops at all intersections. As a traffic engineering problem and solution, it has merit, as it mitigates against the inherent design problem of bike lanes. That's the point of this post.
BTW: Flagstaff is right in being concerned about ROW issues involving bike lanes, but wrong if they extend that beyond the bike lane (which, IIRC, are mandatory in Arizona). Kudos to them.
I did get a response from the City Attorney for Flagstaff. It is what you'd expect from a lawyer...
Steve, Could you please post a link to your blog so we can read the response from the city attorney? I'm just curious.
Tricia, Steve's blog is in the right hand column under "Community Links", and the link is "DFW Point to Point."
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