Yesterday was the 13th anniversary of my death, but to use another Python quote “I got better”, so hence the blog. Seriously I do this blog so that nobody else has to go through what I went and continue to go through. The small community that has sprung up around this blog is enough for me to keep going even when it’s obvious that I’m attempting to demolish a concrete wall by banging on it with my forehead. I regenerate (slowly) but any damage I can inflict on the wall remains. Like rain eventually made the Grand Canyon, if I keep persevering long enough that wall will come down. I will have a flat forehead and a terrible headache, but the wall will be no more. And I know that is a terrible metaphor for what I’m doing, but after all this time banging my head against that wall, I can’t think of anything better. Besides, do you know what kind of abs banging your head against a wall gives you? 😉 Titanium Nitride abs (abs of steel is so 20th Century). Now we have a lot of links to cover, so let’s get busy.
But before “getting busy” a quick note about the U.S. holiday today. We celebrate Labor Day on the first Monday in September because there was “too much Communist involvement” with the rest of the world’s celebration on May 1st. As we go into this celebration of American Labor this year the median CEO wage is more than 52 times the median worker wage and more than 350 times the minimum wage. To place that in perspective there are a few hundred people in the US who make more in a week than half of the rest of the population makes in a year, and nearly as much in a day as the low rung on the totem pole make in a year. I’m not going to make any judgment on the morality of those ratios, but the ratio of the incomes of the French nobility to the median French income just before the French Revolution was somewhere around 40:1…
Up first by way of most links (barely) is more on the cyclist left-hooked in Seattle. Cyclist killed days before city to upgrade notorious bike lane and Bicyclist killed in collision in downtown Seattle also Dead cyclist was new mom, well-regarded attorney also this Memorial grows for cyclist killed in Seattle accident still more Woman hit and killed by truck was well-known attorney and not least but last link Cyclist killed in Seattle was ACLU lawyer I’m going to be honest here, I normally shed no tears when lawyers get killed, but this lady was one of the good ones. Maybe not “good” in terms of number of cases won, but definitely “good” in terms of the cases she worked on and won. And she didn’t have to die, the markings and signal lights that would have prevented the left hook were delayed by a sphincter of a city council member for over a year…
Down the road from that Seattle wreck an idiot takes the life of a cyclist in OR. Texting driver arrested, bicyclist killed on Highway 30 identified and Cyclist killed in reported hit-and-run on Highway 30 near Rainier also Driver in fatal hit and run with cyclist near Rainier identified by Oregon State Police The cyclist had no time to react when the driver went off the road and onto the shoulder at speed making protocols moot. That only leaves infrastructure with any chance at having any effect on this wreck. That and crushing the cars of people who have wrecks while texting, my opinion of drivers that text is only slightly higher than DUI because they are both about as deadly as the other…
UK reaction to the LACSD killing of Milt Olin. LA sheriff to face internal investigation after hitting and killing cyclist while typing on mobile computer Their reaction is similar to US cyclists. And even gear-heads are unhappy about this driver getting to text and kill. Outrage: Cop Who Killed Cyclist Not Facing Charges Granted they are a green gear-head blog, but still more tilted towards driving than to cycling.
A driver in VA that has killed behind the wheel once already finally gets some serious prison time. Woman convicted of reckless driving in incident that hurt cyclist Charges are still pending on the hit-and-run portion of the wreck. The narrative of the wreck is just so hard to read as the injuries were so very similar to my wreck 13 years ago…
Hit and run in the Great White North. Cyclist remains in critical condition after Saturday crash The wreckage of the bike shows the cyclist was hit from the right, indicating one of the vehicles was running the red light (or the cyclist was caught by a stale green and the driver failed to yield). So intersection protocols to avoid or reduce damages, and get the infrastructure “up to Dutch” to prevent.
Another hit and run in Canuckistan this time. Hit and run leaves cyclist seriously injured It is fortunate that the sidewalk cyclist was not seriously injured in this wreck, but aside from that there was just so much wrong with this wreck I scarcely know where to start. Cyclist position, riding the sidewalk, wrong. Since sidewalks are not bicycle infrastructure drivers are not expecting to see cyclists on the sidewalks (particularly in Canada where most sidewalks are prohibited to cyclists). Driver failing to yield to traffic on the sidewalk, wrong. Even when someone is technically in violation for being on the sidewalk that still does not relieve the driver of the obligation to yield to traffic on the sidewalk. Both operators leaving the scene, wrong. Even though the cyclist left the scene to seek medical attention he still should have hung around for LEO to report the wreck and make it official that he needed medical attention.
UK readers have you seen this low-life? E-fit released after road rage driver targets cyclists in Knockholt This driver has been identified as deliberately using his vehicle as a weapon against cyclists (and possibly pedestrians). He is considered armed and dangerous, as long as he is behind the wheel.
Final results in a UK wreck. Lorry driver who fell asleep at wheel and killed two cyclists on charity ride jailed The sentence is a little over 4 years per death, but by UK standards for killing a cyclist this is practically a life sentence. Given that there were sentences of 300 and 160 hours of community service handed down last week for killing while driving distracted (and one for 5 years in prison) 8½ years for killing two at once seems like forever. But also given that he did almost the exact same thing just a few weeks after the fatal wreck, minus the dead cyclists, prison seems the only way to stop him.
And even in the Holy Land, drivers seem to be unable to remain at the scene of a wreck. Be’er Sheva: Bike Rider Seriously Injured by Hit-and-Run Driver Nothing on the mode of the wreck, just noting that another victim had died shortly before this one was hurt…
Infrastructure! news from Enn Zed. The cycleway that hasn’t been built – how slow can they go? One fatality and multiple injury wrecks because of missing infrastructure and they still haven’t built it yet? Is there any mechanism in Enn Zed for prosecuting for deaths due to inaction?
Kinda sorta infrastructure (because the video has been removed leaving only a few lines from the transcript. Firefighter killed on I-84 prompting local cyclist group to take action I don’t know what the problem is, I can’t click on anything that shows the video, and only the first line of the transcript shows when I click that button…
CA infrastructure news. Central Coast Cyclists Ask For More Bike Lanes And I see that the first comment is a demand that taxes be raised on cyclists to pay for infrastructure they should have been getting all along.
These bike lanes would power up your e-assist bike and your iPhone at the same time. These “Power Lanes” Could Charge An E-Bike (And Phone) As You Ride The idea is distributed power would be cheaper than making everyone carry batteries (the suggested storage media is supercaps that weigh about 5 pounds and have virtually no cycle life).
Lifestyle in CA. Memorial for Chula Vista man killed while riding bicycle It might just be me but I think a suitable memorial would be the rotting corpse of the driver welded inside the car that killed the cyclist, but then I’m a bit biased from personal experience.
Lifestyle from Canuckistan. Whyte Avenue memorial honours life of cyclist, while urging people to share the road It really should be up for more than just the day or two…
Just plain fun. “You’re probably going to work and don’t have time to talk.”
And those were all the links I could find on this labor day. Turns out there were a lot of duplicates in the Feed.
Billed @€0.02, Opus the unkillable badass Poet (now we’re cooking with gas, badass gas)
Witch on a Bicycle 
[Monty Python] “I’m not dead (yet)” [/Monty Python], and the Feed
Yesterday was the 13th anniversary of my death, but to use another Python quote “I got better”, so hence the blog. Seriously I do this blog so that nobody else has to go through what I went and continue to go through. The small community that has sprung up around this blog is enough for me to keep going even when it’s obvious that I’m attempting to demolish a concrete wall by banging on it with my forehead. I regenerate (slowly) but any damage I can inflict on the wall remains. Like rain eventually made the Grand Canyon, if I keep persevering long enough that wall will come down. I will have a flat forehead and a terrible headache, but the wall will be no more. And I know that is a terrible metaphor for what I’m doing, but after all this time banging my head against that wall, I can’t think of anything better. Besides, do you know what kind of abs banging your head against a wall gives you? 😉 Titanium Nitride abs (abs of steel is so 20th Century). Now we have a lot of links to cover, so let’s get busy.
But before “getting busy” a quick note about the U.S. holiday today. We celebrate Labor Day on the first Monday in September because there was “too much Communist involvement” with the rest of the world’s celebration on May 1st. As we go into this celebration of American Labor this year the median CEO wage is more than 52 times the median worker wage and more than 350 times the minimum wage. To place that in perspective there are a few hundred people in the US who make more in a week than half of the rest of the population makes in a year, and nearly as much in a day as the low rung on the totem pole make in a year. I’m not going to make any judgment on the morality of those ratios, but the ratio of the incomes of the French nobility to the median French income just before the French Revolution was somewhere around 40:1…
Up first by way of most links (barely) is more on the cyclist left-hooked in Seattle. Cyclist killed days before city to upgrade notorious bike lane and Bicyclist killed in collision in downtown Seattle also Dead cyclist was new mom, well-regarded attorney also this Memorial grows for cyclist killed in Seattle accident still more Woman hit and killed by truck was well-known attorney and not least but last link Cyclist killed in Seattle was ACLU lawyer I’m going to be honest here, I normally shed no tears when lawyers get killed, but this lady was one of the good ones. Maybe not “good” in terms of number of cases won, but definitely “good” in terms of the cases she worked on and won. And she didn’t have to die, the markings and signal lights that would have prevented the left hook were delayed by a sphincter of a city council member for over a year…
Down the road from that Seattle wreck an idiot takes the life of a cyclist in OR. Texting driver arrested, bicyclist killed on Highway 30 identified and Cyclist killed in reported hit-and-run on Highway 30 near Rainier also Driver in fatal hit and run with cyclist near Rainier identified by Oregon State Police The cyclist had no time to react when the driver went off the road and onto the shoulder at speed making protocols moot. That only leaves infrastructure with any chance at having any effect on this wreck. That and crushing the cars of people who have wrecks while texting, my opinion of drivers that text is only slightly higher than DUI because they are both about as deadly as the other…
UK reaction to the LACSD killing of Milt Olin. LA sheriff to face internal investigation after hitting and killing cyclist while typing on mobile computer Their reaction is similar to US cyclists. And even gear-heads are unhappy about this driver getting to text and kill. Outrage: Cop Who Killed Cyclist Not Facing Charges Granted they are a green gear-head blog, but still more tilted towards driving than to cycling.
A driver in VA that has killed behind the wheel once already finally gets some serious prison time. Woman convicted of reckless driving in incident that hurt cyclist Charges are still pending on the hit-and-run portion of the wreck. The narrative of the wreck is just so hard to read as the injuries were so very similar to my wreck 13 years ago…
Hit and run in the Great White North. Cyclist remains in critical condition after Saturday crash The wreckage of the bike shows the cyclist was hit from the right, indicating one of the vehicles was running the red light (or the cyclist was caught by a stale green and the driver failed to yield). So intersection protocols to avoid or reduce damages, and get the infrastructure “up to Dutch” to prevent.
Another hit and run in Canuckistan this time. Hit and run leaves cyclist seriously injured It is fortunate that the sidewalk cyclist was not seriously injured in this wreck, but aside from that there was just so much wrong with this wreck I scarcely know where to start. Cyclist position, riding the sidewalk, wrong. Since sidewalks are not bicycle infrastructure drivers are not expecting to see cyclists on the sidewalks (particularly in Canada where most sidewalks are prohibited to cyclists). Driver failing to yield to traffic on the sidewalk, wrong. Even when someone is technically in violation for being on the sidewalk that still does not relieve the driver of the obligation to yield to traffic on the sidewalk. Both operators leaving the scene, wrong. Even though the cyclist left the scene to seek medical attention he still should have hung around for LEO to report the wreck and make it official that he needed medical attention.
UK readers have you seen this low-life? E-fit released after road rage driver targets cyclists in Knockholt This driver has been identified as deliberately using his vehicle as a weapon against cyclists (and possibly pedestrians). He is considered armed and dangerous, as long as he is behind the wheel.
Final results in a UK wreck. Lorry driver who fell asleep at wheel and killed two cyclists on charity ride jailed The sentence is a little over 4 years per death, but by UK standards for killing a cyclist this is practically a life sentence. Given that there were sentences of 300 and 160 hours of community service handed down last week for killing while driving distracted (and one for 5 years in prison) 8½ years for killing two at once seems like forever. But also given that he did almost the exact same thing just a few weeks after the fatal wreck, minus the dead cyclists, prison seems the only way to stop him.
And even in the Holy Land, drivers seem to be unable to remain at the scene of a wreck. Be’er Sheva: Bike Rider Seriously Injured by Hit-and-Run Driver Nothing on the mode of the wreck, just noting that another victim had died shortly before this one was hurt…
Infrastructure! news from Enn Zed. The cycleway that hasn’t been built – how slow can they go? One fatality and multiple injury wrecks because of missing infrastructure and they still haven’t built it yet? Is there any mechanism in Enn Zed for prosecuting for deaths due to inaction?
Kinda sorta infrastructure (because the video has been removed leaving only a few lines from the transcript. Firefighter killed on I-84 prompting local cyclist group to take action I don’t know what the problem is, I can’t click on anything that shows the video, and only the first line of the transcript shows when I click that button…
CA infrastructure news. Central Coast Cyclists Ask For More Bike Lanes And I see that the first comment is a demand that taxes be raised on cyclists to pay for infrastructure they should have been getting all along.
These bike lanes would power up your e-assist bike and your iPhone at the same time. These “Power Lanes” Could Charge An E-Bike (And Phone) As You Ride The idea is distributed power would be cheaper than making everyone carry batteries (the suggested storage media is supercaps that weigh about 5 pounds and have virtually no cycle life).
Lifestyle in CA. Memorial for Chula Vista man killed while riding bicycle It might just be me but I think a suitable memorial would be the rotting corpse of the driver welded inside the car that killed the cyclist, but then I’m a bit biased from personal experience.
Lifestyle from Canuckistan. Whyte Avenue memorial honours life of cyclist, while urging people to share the road It really should be up for more than just the day or two…
Just plain fun. “You’re probably going to work and don’t have time to talk.”
And those were all the links I could find on this labor day. Turns out there were a lot of duplicates in the Feed.
Billed @€0.02, Opus the unkillable badass Poet (now we’re cooking with gas, badass gas)
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Tagged anti-bike blatherings, blind driver syndrome, blind drivers, can you top this, cycling life, cyclist injured, cyclist killed, Dead cyclists, death day, Don't read the comments, Enn Zed, ghost bikes, hit from behind, hit-and-run, infrastructure, Jolly Olde, Left cross/right hook, really stupid driver, really stupid politicians, red light runner, Seattle, signs of the apocolypse, smart LEO, smart politicians, Something smells, stupid cyclist, stupid drivers, stupid LEO, stupid politicians, UK media wreck articles suck, updates, waste of human skin