A quick word before I leave

I’m going to be hitting the road in a few, but I had a quiet moment to sit down and share with you. Recent days have been stressful, and the next few ain’t looking so balmy either. But today, 4 years ago today, I moved this blog from MySpace to this provider. I took a tremendous hit loss, as my daily hit count went from 800-1000/day to an average of about 75 to be totally honest, with another 500 or so getting the RSS and FB reader feeds. I don’t do it for the adulation and to be brutally honest the groupies are best left in a nightmare, the ghouls. But there are some of you that I can help, a group that rolls through and back out again enlightened in the ways of not getting killed while riding on a bicycle. That group now numbers in the tens of thousands. Those people are the reason why I do this. The daily readers and RSS followers are already enlightened and just looking for more information to use in their local efforts to secure proper bicycle infrastructure, or for something else that I provide without even knowing I provide it. The people that come in and read for a month or two, or a week or two and then move on with the knowledge they need to not get killed are my reason to get up in the morning and sit down at the keyboard and monitor and read all those stories about people getting killed or injured or seriously injured and suffering for days or weeks to finally die from the injuries, when all it takes to prevent it all is a little concrete, asphalt, paint, and laws. My ultimate mission in life is to get that little concrete, asphalt, paint and laws finished, so that nobody has to die in a horrible manner just to get from A to B or Z by B through Y inclusive.

PSA, Opus

Last post for a while, and the Feed

As much as I hate to do it this blog will go silent until I get back from taking care of my father’s estate as the Internet has already been turned off at the house meaning even though there will be lots of links to share I won’t be able to get to them or this blog to share them with you. I will be off tomorrow because I will be actually sharing time with the part of my family that lives in Texas (or came to Texas from Scotland to share Thanksgiving with us), so no hiding in the office with the computer tomorrow, and I’ll be on the road starting Friday. So family time first then travel to an Internet Black Hole for an unknown amount of time, then travel back, then sleep, then blog. No blog until after I sleep in my own bed.

An IL cyclist is killed in a SWCC. CL man killed while riding bike on Route 14 The point of impact and the cyclist’s location on the roads make me strongly suspect a hit-from-behind wreck by a driver not paying attention to anything smaller than a car on the road, but on the off chance that the report is accurate make sure you can actually get across the road before you enter it to cross. If you can’t see move to a location where you can see before you cross.

A cyclist died of massive head trauma in far West Canuckistan. Name of cyclist killed in collision released Nothing on the mode of the wreck in the link except an implication that the cyclist was responsible for the head injury because he wasn’t wearing a helmet when he was hit at well over 20km/h (upper limit for the helmet to prevent skull fracture). Please wear a helmet when you ride, not because it will do any good if you get hit by a motor vehicle but because when “they” Monday morning quarterback your decisions to decide how much was “your fault” your heirs will have “he was wearing a helmet” as a counter. Infrastructure done right would have prevented this wreck.

Just down the street from WoaB World HQ we finally get a solution that has been known about and in use for decades in the more enlightened parts of the world. Dallas Bike Lanes Are Turning Neon Green — A Few Feet of Them at Least Yep they are making the few feet prior to an intersection bright green to prevent cars from encroaching on the bike lanes, a standard treatment in Denmark and the Netherlands (actually theirs is red, and a permanent part of the pavement).

The cost of bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure, compared with the costs of other transportation infrastructures of similar throughput. Ladue installs a new sidewalk–and is it worth the investment? A cost comparision of sidewalks vs roads The headline is “Sidewalks vs Roads” but the actual article includes several different kinds of bicycle infrastructure as well as dedicated pedestrian infrastructure.

And those are all the links that I could find about bicycles. Giving me fits or not failed to enter into the equation… 😉

Billed @$0.02, Opus

Not sure if I’m crying because of allergies or what, and the Feed

I’m experiencing something I never did before. My eyes will start watering uncontrollably, but I’m not experiencing any particularly strong emotion at the time. I have all the physical manifestations of crying, but none of the emotional ones. It’s really weird, I get tears or something like them, runny nose, red eyes. and I’m just not doing much of anything real emotional. Last night it happened while I was working with Mentor’s Circle to help get next Sunday’s morning and evening services assembled on the subject of “thankfulness”. It also happened a couple times while I was composing yesterday’s blog post. The closest I came to any strong emotion when I was doing the blog post is Righteous Anger, which for me is about a 3 on a scale of 10 as far as my emotions go. Someone at Mentor’s Circle last night asked if it might be a reaction to stress, which is a good possibility as things have been very stressful lately. Dad dying is only the most recent and most public of the stressors I have been facing. Incidentally the only time I ever hit 10 on the emotional scale of intensity was the time I was hit by the pickup truck passing me on the right as I rolled to a red light.

Up first and the only non-UK link so far today is a report on a cyclist that ran a red light in CA. Injured Bicyclist I trust this reporter assuming this is the same Urban Hikers that regularly comments on Streetsblog. The report is the cyclist entered the intersection after the light had changed, as recorded on video from a nearby store camera that had a clear view of the intersection and the lights. Obviously to avoid a wreck like this use intersection protocols, especially the one about not running the red or yellow. I’m not sure infrastructure could fix this one, as what would be in place in this location would be a cycle track with a separate light phase for bicycle traffic. This cyclist ignored the red light when there were cars coming, I don’t think that a separate light phase for bicycles would garner any more compliance.

Grim statistics from just down the road in Austin. Auto-pedestrian deaths in Austin reach a record high They’re mowing down pedestrian and cyclists at rates not seen since the Great Depression. As I keep telling people, the reason that driver and passenger deaths are going down is because of better cars, the drivers are still wrecking as much as always but the cars make what had been deadly wrecks something you can walk away from now.

A fatal wreck that is still under investigation in the Great White North. Cyclist Killed in St. Clair Township Many local LEO are still woefully unprepared for investigating a bicycle/motor vehicle wreck. As of now they still don’t know the direction of travel for the cyclist, and so don’t know the mode of the wreck. Until they get that figured out I can’t tell you how to avoid this kind of wreck.

Another mass batch of links to the cyclist hit by a truck in Enn Zed. Dunedin cyclist named and Uni lecturer killed in Dunedin also Cyclist killed in Dunedin named more Students mourn lecturer killed on bike and finally Cyclist killed outside Dunedin Hospital named Nothing new on the wreck, but tons of info on the victim.

A link that I still don’t understand how it got in the Feed but is pertinent to this blog because it is about a major fuel source for cyclists on the roads. Twinkies Good, Unions Bad, The Whole Story Yes those little lard bombs are vital for a long-distance cyclist to maintain energy levels at a minimum of digestive issues (but more digestive issues since they started using HFCS as a sweetener instead of pure sucrose), and I have consumed many a Twinkie as I crossed the highways of north central and far north Texas.

And those are all the bicycle links that gave me fits today.

Billed @$0.02, Opus

Getting ready to bury my Dad, and the Feed

Well some good news, Dad was meticulously prepared for his own death, so basically all we need to do is pack up the house and sell off the accumulated possessions we don’t want to keep for ourselves. Then we have about 90 pages of paperwork we need to sign off on to transfer assets to my brother and me (and my kids, they all get small parts of the estate as the surviving heirs since my brother decided not to have kids). My brother is handling most of this stuff as he is there and I’m in Texas.

In the meantime though people still have to eat, so I’m still fixing beans and rice for dinner tonight.

Up first a 12YO boy in CA is hit by the trailer being towed by a truck. 12-year-old boy hit by trailer, killed on Elk Grove street At this point I can’t say the mode of the wreck as it was not stated if the motor vehicle was turning or going straight. I suspect a right hook from what little information I got, but can’t say for certain. The report that the kid was trying to ride a bicycle between the truck and trailer is pure poppycock.

A SWSS fatality in the most deadliest state to walk or ride a bike 8 years running. Bicycle rider struck, killed on Gandy Blvd. in Pinellas County Classic SWSS narrative compounded by the fact that the driver was merging onto surface streets from an Interstate highway. Hit-from-behind protocols to avoid, and get the infrastructure right so that cyclists are sharing the roads with motor vehicles that are still being driven by drivers with “highway hypnosis”.

A regular poster and logger on BikeJournal.com is killed while riding his bike. Cyclist killed on highway loved to ride The cyclist was killed in a hit-from-behind wreck while riding the hard shoulder. The driver faces no criminal charges for leaving the road and killing a human being.

Charges are expected to be filed against the driver that killed a cyclist in a hit-and-run wreck in MA. Wellesley Police expect fatal cyclist accident case to go to grand jury soon This case has been shrouded under a blanket of secrecy, with little to no news about the suspect in the wreck.

Lots of links to a report of a cyclist hit in Enn Zed. Cyclist killed in Dunedin and Cyclist killed after being hit by truck also Cyclist killed after colliding with truck more Male cyclist killed in Dunedin and Cyclist killed by truck outside Dunedin Hospital and last link Cyclist killed; call to improve safety At this point the wreck appears to be very much like the cyclist killed recently in Chicago where avoiding the door prize results in a truck running you over, AKA as streets designed for cars with “bicycle infrastructure” tacked on later wherever it fit or didn’t fit as in these cases. Reality at the moment is wrecks like this are not avoidable by human beings unless there is actual room for the cyclist to evade the door i.e. riding outside the “door zone”. This is an infrastructure problem that can only be fixed by altering the infrastructure and taking space away from motor vehicles.

From Oz, a driver that appeared to deliberately run down a cyclist has been declared nuts. Motorist who killed cyclist ‘mentally ill’ IMNSHO this could be equally applied to 50% or more of the driving public.

Infrastructure! news from the nation’s capitol. Cyclists weary over Penn Ave.’s unprotected lanes What good are bike lanes if you still have to dodge motor vehicles crossing them unpredictably?

Infrastructure from the UK. Motorists and cyclists? Two pitbulls. One bone Actually the situation in this case is more like a pitbull and an insane chihuahua fighting over a bone, with motor vehicles as the pitbull. In a “war” for the roads cyclists are like foot soldiers armed with Nerf Guns fighting tanks. The conflict must be averted by proper infrastructure design, not aggravated by bad design.

More infrastructure news from the UK. UK cycling – how bike safety can be improved

And those are all the bicycle links that gave me fits today.

Obituary for my Father, Wreck-Free Sunday

OK, this is a tough one to write. Just a couple of hours ago my father left this world for the next. Basically he started dying when he totaled out his beloved Caddy this Spring. He mostly stopped eating and drinking and he lost tons of weight he really did not have to spare and eventually just did not have the energy to live.

My father, John Delore Clary was born in 1935, at the height of the Great Depression. He had a checkered academic career through the ’40s and joined the Navy during the Korean War. He was assigned as a cargo handler in the Philippines then was moved through different MOS until he became a Communications Technician, Operations in the very early 1960s, becoming part of the Naval Communications Security Group, Supplementary Radio, keeping Navy Intelligence in communication with the Pentagon using the latest technology of the day. He stayed with SecGru for the rest of his military career retiring after 22 years in 1972.

Along the way while he as in the Navy he met and married my mother during the Suez Crisis of 1956, when most of the wedding party was confined to base at the beginning of the crisis. This put a slight damper on the event, as you can imagine. They managed to stay married until my Mom died in 2005.

After leaving the Navy in 1972 he initially took a teaching job as Assistant Naval Science Instructor at the NJROTC unit at Cottonwood High School in Salt Lake City UT, where I went to school. After politics from his Navy career caught up to him he lost his teaching certificate and went to work for Lien Chemical servicing restrooms (and making more money than he did teaching). Eventually he got tired of the near-theocracy in Utah and moved to be closer to my Mom’s family in TN, finding a house in LaVergne, and a job not far away that he managed to keep until he retired in 1995. He enjoyed his retirement immensely until this year.

That was the chronology, the easy part. Now comes the hard part, the emotional part. What my Father meant to me. I can honestly write that the hardest thing that ever happened to me was watching my Dad decline so precipitously this year, from a man that could literally throw around a ton of cargo nearly bare-handed, to a frail shell that I could pick up with one arm. I spent hours trying to get him to eat, to take in water or other fluids, to just make the effort to survive. I managed for a while to keep him going, but eventually the battle must be lost, as nobody lives forever.

Dad taught me the meaning of the word “craftmanship”, as he taught me to work with tools and make things. For a while I actually thought I could do anything I wanted if I could just get the right tools to do the job because of what Dad taught me. He built an actual ocean-going boat with his own hands during the late ’40s that was still going as late as 1966 when I saw it. I don’t remember too much about it because of that being a rather busy time in my life but I do know I saw the boat in the water sometime in the fall of 1966, that my Dad had made with his own hands before joining the Navy in 1950. Inspired by his example, I have been making things my entire life.

About the only thing my Dad couldn’t do was cook on a stove. Those rare times when Mom wasn’t around to cook we had mostly TV dinners when Dad was in charge of the menu. He could grill the heck out of a steak, but had little clue when it came time to use pots and pans. Actually after I got the cooking merit badge in Scouts I did most of the cooking when Mom was away. This was another reason why I used to think I could make anything given the right tools and raw materials…

I learned much from Dad. How to be stern, when to be merciful, and when to be merciless. How to love. How to be a complete human being.

I will miss him, but thanks to my brain damage I don’t miss him very much. I think that is about the only “good” thing about brain damage.

PSA, Opus

Getting ready for another long urban ride, and the Feed

I have another RPG tonight, with another slightly over 6 mile urban bike ride. What makes this a long ride is not the distance (which is piddling) it’s the exposure to idiots (which is major and nearly constant for about 2/3 of the trip). What bodes well for this trip tonight is since the last game most of my route has been re-worked in the paint and sign portion of an intercity “bicycle highway”. I will actually have the option of riding in a for reals bike lane tonight, the first one made in the Beautiful Suburbs of Hell. Our previous attempts at bicycle infrastructure consisted of a few signs on lesser-used arterials declaring them as “bike routes”. Well the primary reason why those were lesser used as arterials was they didn’t go anywhere most people wanted to go, so they didn’t get used much by people riding bicycles for the same reason. But now we have one route that runs from one city to another right through our downtown. This is still only one route and we still have no master bicycle/pedestrian plan, so right now the “plan” amounts to “ready, fire, aim” throwing paint and signs at roads and hoping it sticks (in some cases literally). Anyway, I’m going to use what we have now and hope it makes a difference in the way I get treated.

Up first a MD cyclist is hit-and-run in a very vulnerable location. Brunswick boy injured after being struck by car The bad thing about bridges is you have no escape route and no real alternative to riding there if your destination is on the other side of whatever barrier the bridge is crossing. Hit from behind protocols to avoid, and this is another wreck that getting the infrastructure right will prevent. Also make hit-and-run a major felony equivalent to assault with a deadly weapon.

From the Great White North a cyclist is hit by a driver that was either out of control, or trying to kill him. Cyclist, 70, injured in North York When the driver hits the cyclist first and the pole second that is a solid indicator of target fixation and not clearing the background, to use a shooting term. This is where the shooter is so focused on hitting the target that they ignore everything else.

And as hard as I find it to believe, those were all the bicycle links that gave me fits today. I mean seriously 2 links and not even one link to something cutesy or stupid.

Billed @$0.02, (and I feel like I’m overcharging) Opus

Just another busy day, and the Feed

After yesterday’s grocery run, I had my gig listening to a woman complain about her life, job, and now ex-boyfriend. I used to listen to her cry about her dead husband until she got the new boyfriend, now I get the dirt on the shortcomings of the former new now ex boyfriend. The amusing thing about all this is what makes me look so attentive to her stories is the same thing that gives me so much trouble in other social situations, the aphasia caused by my brain damage. Well after I listened to her she went to bed and didn’t wake up to take me home until almost 1100 because of her pain meds that she has to take to be able to sleep. Since we talked (she talked, I listened) until almost 0300 it wasn’t like she missed out on any sleep. As soon as the cream cheese softens I am supposed to bake some cream-stuffed muffins from a mix while I compose this post, and the GPoA second practice is currently on the tube. So I have many things competing for my attention.

Up first is an update on that hit-and-run of a cyclist in the most deadliest state to walk or ride a bicycle for the last 8 years running. Man Riding Bike Killed In Oakland Park Hit-And-Run This was the hit-from-behind wreck I wrote about yesterday, and now that I can see the bike it’s quite obvious that this was a buzz job. The bike is barely scuffed in the wreck that left the rider dead at the scene. As I wrote yesterday, hit-from-behind protocols to avoid and the real problem is the infrastructure creating a wall to the passage of non-motorized traffic.

More on the bicycle/bus wreck in MA. Boston police identify student killed in bike crash and Boston Police Identify Student Hit, Killed by MBTA Bus in Allston Bike Crash even this Cyclist killed in Boston from Taiwan It appears at this point that they know the bus hit the cyclist, but they don’t know how because they lack the experience of the Witch on a Bicycle. The description of the injuries and the lack of damage to the bike lead me to deduce that the cyclist was just passed too close as in a negative clearance distance. From looking at the scene in Google Street View there just was no place for the cyclist to go once the bus encroached his space. This was as much an infrastructure-caused wreck as any other reason.

A wreck that no human being could have avoided. Bicyclist injured after car chase ends in SF and San Francisco: Driver who fled police and struck cyclist has 3 prior DUI arrests, officials say also Bicyclist injured during high speed chase in SF Drunk driver running from the po-po and you get hit by a parked car that was launched when it was hit by the drunk driver’s vehicle. If you can avoid that you aren’t human, you have superpowers.

A cyclist injured in the Great White North. Cyclist injured in hit and run crash The cyclist was doing everything right, lights, reflective clothing (helmet). Hit-from-behind wreck, protocols to avoid and infrastructure to prevent. Confiscating the weapon vehicle in a hit-and-run and destroying it after the court case is over would go miles towards achieving that infrastructure.

A “bicycle safety” school assembly that was almost completely a helmet sales pitch. MURRIETA: School assembly highlights bike safety Nothing about lane position or other ways to prevent a wreck, just endless helmet promotion. I’m not disagreeing that 5th graders need to wear helmets, I’m just disagreeing that helmets are the beginning and the end of bicycle safety. And why no girls? Are girls’ heads not as important as boys’?

From the UK a psychological examination of why drivers hate cyclists. Cyclist hatred is ‘almost like racial discrimination,’ says AA prez So, cyclists are the “New Niggers” (with humble apologies to the group that was the old…)

Infrastructure! news from the Great White North. Councillors consider ways to educate cyclists on dangers of streetcar tracks The reactions of the politicians are easier to understand given the previous paragraph in this post.

And those are all the bicycle links that gave me fits today.

Billed @$0.02, Opus

Yehuda Moon is going away, permanently this time

Rick Smith (artist for Yehuda Moon and the Kickstand Cyclery) is moving to greener pastures come the end of November and will wrap up the web comic 12/31/2012. I assume that his means wrapping up all the unfinished story lines but Rick isn’t letting on about that. All unfinished subscriptions will be pro-rata refunded, if I’m reading the e-mail right (and I apologize if I’m reading it wrong). I hope this ends like Calvin and Hobbes with all the arcs at an end and a universe stretching in front of them, not like Peanuts where the artist died in the middle of drawing a page. However since this is a planned retreat and not the artist dying at the drawing board, I’m going to expect the former style of ending and not the latter.

The word is the buffer is full of completed comics all the way to the final one. Let’s all get together in cyberspace to count down Yehuda, Joe, Thistle and Fizz along with Fred and Fenders down the ramp for their final TT.

PSA, Opus

Solo Mule Day duties, and the Feed

Mrs. the Poet has been feeling a bit under the weather this week so I’m giving her a slight break by doing the shopping by myself this week. I have a cheap calculator I can use to keep track of how much I’m spending, a grocery list and a few bucks. I also have 2 40 pound capacity kitty litter buckets and a surplus army ruck that can carry another 80 pounds. And after that I have the ability to lash one large item to the top of the rack and drape over the tops of the kitty litter buckets. My recent weight loss has allowed an increase in payload without overloading the back wheel. So, haw mule! haw me! 😀

Up first, Ted Rogers over at BikingInLA needs our emotional support. Insurance is handling most of the costs but he could use some messages of good will and positive energy sent his way.

Interesting piece from PA about the truck driver that assaulted a cyclist, with his truck. The Swerving Red Solo Truck Jagoff I LIKE the suggestion the driver be used as a bike rack for a week. Might be a little rough on the junk after a few days sitting outside in the nude. More Drivers, bicyclists and pedestrians can take the high road to safety

A bike wreck in CA. Police Patrol Car Strikes Bicyclist SWCC on a ninja cyclist. Plenty of blame to go around, but one has to wonder just how observant the LEO is to “not see” the cyclist behaving illegally. Infrastructure to prevent, as is the case more than 90% of the time.

Update on a WA fatality. No arrest following fatal truck-bicycle accident in Marysville To remind you this was the buzz job wreck by a pickup truck that never stopped.

From the most deadliest state in the US to walk or ride a bike for the last 8 years running, another dead cyclist. Bicyclist killed in hit-run collision on Oakland Park Boulevard This was another one of those cases that had bad infrastructure as a factor in the wreck as the cyclist was riding parallel to a major obstruction to cycling in the area, an Interstate highway. The wreck appears to be a hit-from-behind, apply those protocols to avoid, and get the infrastructure right to prevent. Also make Hit-and-run a capital crime when the victim dies.

A lawsuit was required to get justice for a woman killed by a bus while she was taking her bike from the front mounted bus rack. CTA settles suit over bike rack death Just think of how much time and money could have been saved had the driver been looking out the front of the bus at the woman standing in front of him, because the settlement is just the tip of the iceberg on this one, usually about twice the settlement is spent on legal fees for both sides which the loser in this case will have to pay.

Infrastructure! news from MO. “Share the Road” sign put up at location where man was killed on bicycle I would prefer a “(bicycle symbol) may use full lane” sign rather than a “share the road” because many drivers view of “sharing” is “get the hell out of my way”.

And more infrastructure from the Great White North. Provincial News: NDP urges Liberal government to release long delayed bike strategy As more people are killed funds are just sitting for bicycle infrastructure that needs to be built.

More on the Ghost Bike that was removed in MA. Wellesley police ordered Ghost Bike removal

Last link, if you saw a warning sign about a wandering gorilla somewhere in NoCal last week you can breathe a sigh of relief. Weird News: Loose gorilla alert? Electronic road sign hacked

And those are all the links that gave me fits today.

Billed @$0.02, Opus

My new piece of winter gear is almost finished, and the Feed

I have been building a piece of gear that will both keep my face warm and keep my glasses clear when I’m riding this winter. Since I be P’ (too impoverished to buy a vowel to be po’) I only had one shot at making this right. I think I have a workable device now, or will have as soon as I find something to use to install the baffles into the mask. One of the people at church has a cement that supposedly sticks to plastic and PU foam and has a fairly good bond strength and long life so that should work for keeping the baffles in place. What I was doing last night was adding some color to the mask to make it less frightening. Mrs. the Poet said I look like a low-rent version of Darth Vader, while some of the people at church said it makes me look like Hannibal Lecter from Silence of the Lambs. So to dispel any more movie villain comparisons, I added some simple painted decorations to the severe-looking solid black. I went with a flame motif, that I was so warm that I was breathing fire, and had flames from where my mouth and nose are under the mask. The nose flames I made look like a wild moustache, while the mouth flame looks more like a goatee. From a few feet away they look quite nice and not at all like Mike Meyers, Hannibal Lecter, or Darth Vader. After I get the mask finished I will get some pictures made and posted in a Sunday post.

Up first a cyclist is hit-and-run by a dump truck in Seattle. Cyclist critically injured by hit-and-run truck The description of the wreck makes it possible to be either a buzz job or a right hook. Intersection wreck, use the protocols to avoid and get the infrastructure right so that a man on a bicycle isn’t forced to contend for road space with a dump truck that weighs more than 10 tons empty. More SPD Detectives Search for Dump Truck That Critically Injured Cyclist This Morning This link makes it quite plain that the cyclist was right-hooked.

Another blind WA driver kills another cyclist. Bicyclist killed in crash with truck in Marysville Cyclist riding legally in the road gets hit from behind by a driver that wasn’t looking where he was going and they don’t even give the driver a ticket? TANJ!

Insult is added to injury as the driver of the vehicle that hit-and-run a cyclist also takes his bike. Cyclist injured in Presidio hit-and-run also loses mountain bike The weapon vehicle is reported to be a black Porsche Cayenne SUV. “If caught, the driver could face felony hit-and-run and theft charges since the bike is still missing“. The irony in this is that the driver could be facing a steeper sentence for driving off with the bicycle than he does for leaving the scene of the wreck.

Also in CA the parents of a 12 YO cyclist who was killed riding in the street are suing to get the infrastructure right. Ratliff family files claim against Novato for daughter’s death What should be a peaceful residential street is filled with road-raging drivers that routinely exceed the speed limit, text, talk on their cell phones, and do other activities than driving while they are supposed to be driving. The family is also suing the driver, the owner of the vehicle, and the company the driver was working for at the time of the wreck as it was on company time. At this time this is the only way to get people to drive like they have a brain, sue them until you hit pocket lint.

As demonstrated by the gentle caress on the wrist given to this killer CA driver. Driver gets probation, community service for death of Pasadena bicyclist Originally charged with manslaughter the driver will never see the inside of a jail cell for this crime, ever, and will have to endure no loss of driving privileges either. TANJ! TANJ! There Ain’t No Justice!!

A NJ cyclist is left-crossed. Asbury bicyclist badly injured in Greenwich collision The cyclist had a reflective vest but no light, so some responsibility there is on the cyclist as the vehicle was not properly equipped. At this point I don’t know if the cyclist would have been in the lights of the weapon vehicle before it started to make the left turn as the cyclist’s lane position has not been reported. Anyway intersection wreck, use the protocols to avoid and get the infrastructure right to prevent, with special attention to the infrastructure as the road the cyclist was riding used to be one of those quiet low-speed country roads that cyclists are “supposed” to be restricted to, that was changed to a highway without accommodation for other than motorized transport many years ago.

A PA cyclist is hit in what may have been a deliberate assault. Bicyclist Hit By Truck, Injured In Squirrel Hill “We saw the red truck swerve to actually intentionally hit this biker,” said Walko. “There was plenty of room for both the bike and the car to be traveling through the intersection.” Not to mention a serious violation of the PA 4-foot passing law.The only thing I can say that would have avoided this wreck or prevented it would be to get the infrastructure right, including getting the idiots driving motor vehicles off the roads and riding bicycles where they can do relatively little damage. More Injured Bicyclist: No Way It Was An Accident

Many links to the cyclist hit by a bus outside Boston story. BU student riding bike killed by MBTA bus OK this was just a smear piece on cyclists, there was no indication that the cyclist killed was running a red light since the impact seemed to be from behind. If he did then the bus was running the same light. BU student riding bicycle, struck, killed by T bus also BU student hit, killed in Allston This was the wreck that I had previously described as a buzz job after looking at the victim’s bicycle and seeing almost no damage to the bike except a few scuffs. The bike could have been ridden away from the scene. Infrastructure, infrastructure, INFRASTRUCTURE! Get the infrastructure right and there won’t be any wrecks like these. Oh and the majority of the comments to the last link were left by congenital idiots apparently pounding their keyboards at random.

A cyclist in the Great White north is severely injured just a short distance from where bike lanes are being removed. Woman seriously injured in collision with garbage truck and Cyclist critically injured after collision with garbage truck at Yonge and Gerrard I hesitate to call this a right hook because the weapon vehicle ran over the cyclist from behind, judging by the reported damage to the weapon vehicle and the damage visible on the victim’s bicycle. What made this similar to a right hook was the cyclist proceeding straight through the intersection and the weapon vehicle turning right. I doubt intersection protocols would have helped much in this wreck as there was no escape route for the cyclist because of tall curbs and the width of the weapon vehicle. I’m going to tag this one with the “blind driver” tag because of hitting the cyclist squarely from behind while the driver was supposed to be slowing for the right turn. To prevent a wreck like this in the future get the infrastructure right instead of tearing out what little infrastructure you have.

A “safety” campaign in the UK has resulted in the taking down of at least one web site and one ad company worker going into hiding… Karmarama ‘enormously distressed’ after campaign sparks fury from cyclists The company claimed the ads were the result of a “rogue operator” in the company. Right, and I’m a millionaire.

And those are all the bicycle links that gave me fits today.

Billed @$0.02, Opus