darxus | "start seeing motorcycles" stuff

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"start seeing motorcycles" stuff

http://ruiner.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/howclose.mpg (3.2mB, from http://community.livejournal.com/motorcycles/1370305.html)

I would appreciate you watching this short video. I met at least one person who is now dead because someone failed to see him while he was riding, with no excuse.

I have this kind of problem on a regular basis. If I didn't regularly expect people to be this stupid I would... not be so healthy.
One of the people actually said to me afterward, when I pulled up to them, "I'm sorry, I didn't see you!" Those words... piss me off.

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Welcome to the world. This has been a universal constant. The choice to ride is yours, but you do so knowing that this sort of thing is likely to happen to you. This sort of video is one of the reasons I still haven't bought another bike. Its just not worth it around here. Too many people on cell phones, drinking coffee or doing their makeup. I have enough problems with people not seeing my jeep....

I'm not justifying it, but your choice in recreation puts you at added risk of injury. Its not much different from skydiving, skiing or scuba diving really. Speaking of diving... I'm so looking forward to my trip to jamaica..... I'll let ya know if I see any sharks. :)

Hell, we have an underwater camera. I'll try to get pictures.

So, do you not ever cross the stret either, since a pedestrian is even more vulnerable to drivers who can't be arsed to look for things that aren't larger than they are than a biker is?

Not only that, I've built a moat and purchased alligators. I'm still waiting on the vats for the boiling oil to be delivered.

Your argument is a straw man, and a fairly sophomoric one at that.

Do I cross the street on highways where people aren't expecting pedestrian sized things? No.
Am I careful when crossing a busy street? Yes.
Do I expect cars to see me and slow down? No.
Would I like it if people put down their cell phones, coffee, whatever and started paying more attention? Absolutely. Its just not likely to happen.

Why must you attack someone who doesn't share your opinion? The fact of the matter is that you will never change the world to suit your preferences. Knowing this, I made the decision that the risk in the heavily trafficked area I currently live in isn't worth it.

If I ever move back to the country, maybe I'll start riding again. But here, riding in rush hour sucks. Even at night its still fairly far from relaxing.

The moral turpitude of something has no bearing on its continued existence. Ask the women in afghanistan about it. Trying to live in opposition to reality is just asking for problems.

Perhaps a more appropriate analogy would be swimming with whales. Sure, you should be fine, but if you get bumped you're going to get hurt.

For all the ire and righteous indignation that gets expressed about this, what about the bikers that blow by stopped traffic on the shoulder? What about the idiots with no helmets racing, passing cars by riding between the lanes? How bout the ones that like to tailgate? For every stupid car driver, I've seen just as many kids on rice rockets doing some phenomenally stupid things. Things that weren't even remotely reasonable, legal things to do. Bad drivers are bad drivers. It doesn't matter what they're operating. In a high enough population density, you're all but guaranteed to tangle with one on the road.

By all means, continue to drive what you drive. Be aware, be careful and be lucky.

When I ride, I don't expect to be seen - I assume I won't be. But just because I assume inattention doesn't mean my risk won't be reduced if someone occationally reminds people, "Hey, pay attention." Will people forget or ignore the message? Oh hell yes. But if one less accident happens because someone remembered or decided to look twice, then it's worth having someone say, "Hey, pay attention." Sometimes the life that's saved by paying attention is your own (just ask the woman who "didn't see" the dump truck).

I think you're trying to assuage some sort of guilt, either about no longer riding or about accidents that occur due to inattention. Please, for the love of $diety, don't do so in a manner that increases everyone's risk by indicating that drivers are excused from needing to pay attention. We are not perfect, but that doesn't excuse us from striving to be better.

No no, I'm not assuaging anything. People should be held responsible for their actions and their choices.

What I said was that I accepted the inevitibility of me colliding with something possessed of more mass than myself. Based on that, I've choosen a different mode of transportation. I found this choice easier than trying to change my environment to suit my preferences.

I think what made me annoyed was the attitude that only people driving cars do stupid things.

Sorry, can't play that file at work. I'll try looking later.

It's generally not motorcyclists I have the issue with, it's SUVs and idiots in rich cars...but there have been a few idiot bikers acting like assholes and making me want to hit them. But not because I didn't see them. Let's face it--my car's tiny and low, how could I not see them?

The video looked to be edited in some way. In order for that bike to have hit him it would have been going way way over the speed limit. If a few seconds of footage were removed then it would have made more sense. His feild of vision (and ours) was probably 1000 yards or more. 60 miles an hour is 88 feet/sec. Even with a couple seconds of reaction time the bike would have been less than a few hundred feet from the car when he missed seeing it and that would make the idiot behind the wheel a menace to the road. Putting back in the couple seconds of footage that were probably clipped and both riders we not paying attention. The guy in the car is still at fault but the guy in the bike was creamed.

The second shot where you can actually see the bike would still give both the driver and the biker a lot of time. If I were in a car with a 1000 yards of warning I would have slowed down if some idiot pulled out into traffic against my right of way. Everyone needs to drive defensively, ep in Boston.

A better video would have shown people changing lanes without looking; while talking on the phone and eating a big mac. I regularly have someone riding in my blindspot. You would think that anyone, whether they be in a bike or a car, would think about if they are visible in the mirrors of the car beside them. I don't ride for this reason. Yes I would have the law on my side but not inertia. You have to assume that people will have accidents that they caused due to being an idiot.

I regularly see mothers jamming their baby carriages into oncoming traffic in Harvard Sq. to stop the cars. Who would be repsonsible for the kid when it gets run over one of these days. Pedestrians only have the right of way in crosswalks (and then only if they are crossing with the light) I keep slow while going to H.S. for just this reason, many people do not.

My big beef with bikes is the assholes that split lanes, never use turn signals, and ride up the double yellow line. If you are on a bike then you need to follow the rules of the road. If I'm stopped at a light in the right hand lane and I'm starting to make a legal right hand turn there is no exuse for a biker to try and pass me on the right. It has happend to me and frankly if I took him out I wouldn't have felt remorse over it.

It has happend to me and frankly if I took him out I wouldn't have felt remorse over it.

Sweet of you.

Would you do it on purpose? Would you open your car door into a bike riding down the breakdown lane in highway traffic?

What about bicycles in the city? Would you "take them out" too? They're supposed to follow the rules of the road just like cars and motorcycles.

No I wouldn't do it on purpose. You a mearly presenting this quote out of context to draw a certain expected response.

If people drive their cars, motorcycles, bikes, whatever in a way that is against the law they cannot expect to be safe. It's just that simple. If someone hit a bike that was driving the speed limit in a way that was consistant with the laws of the road then they are not paying attention and probably shouldn't be driving. If the bike was speeding at twice the speed limit weaving in and out of traffic and they get hit then it's a different story.

I spend more time that I should have to looking out for other drivers. I do this because I want to be safe. I have seen people jump up over the curb to pass people on the right and almost take out the pedestrians that the original car was waiting for. It matters not that they were an asshole in a car or an asshole on a bike. In that case it was a car. I don't look for cars driving on the sidewalk and if I accidentally hit one when I was turning right I would not feel that it was my fault in the least.

Irrelevant to the point you're making, but I was told that it's legal in California for a motorcycle to ride up between a line of stopped cars, as long as there's room. At a stop light, though, you run a high risk of getting creamed by a red-light runner if you're the first off the line at the green. (A co-worker who lived and rode in CA told me this when he described how he beat a red-light runner through an intersection on his green and how the runner beat him another time, leaving him to miss the guy by inches. He stopped riding after that.)

Considering this post originated in Boston, I will defer from commenting on CA. In MA a motorcycle cannot pass another car in the same lane.

Chapter 89: Section 4A - Driving vehicles in a single lane; motorcycles, riding and passing Section 4A. The operators of motorcycles shall not ride abreast of more than one other motorcycle, shall ride single file when passing, and shall not pass any other motor vehicle within the same lane, except another motorcycle.

As I said, it was irrelevant to your point. I brought it up because I felt it was an interesting data point, and it's certainly something of which to be aware for those who drive there, even just sporadically or as a visitor/vacationer.

Lanesplitting is, in fact, legal in California.

What kind of car do you drive? I want to know to avoid you like the plague, because if I happen to piss you off for some reason (like I need to swerve out of the way of a long patch of sand and happen to go over the double yellow to do so, or I "lane-split" just before a light because everyone else is turning left and I want to turn right) you'll feel no remorse in injuring me. You must not be in Boston, because I've seen cars regularly pull all the "asshole" shit you describe (including lane-split past me), but that's perfectly alright according to road etiquette around here.

Brynn, you damn well know what I meant and you certainly know that I'm in Boston since I live in your old room :) I would feel no remorse for hitting somone who deliberatly put themselves in harms way against the law. If I hit someone due to my own fault or inattention, of course I would feel remorse. People have to swerve to avoid things all the time that is not the issue. What I'm taking issue with is that people somehow feel no matter what they were doing on the bike they are somehow exempt from the laws if physics and of the land. I'm not saying that you or Darxus or any of the other bikers on this thread are a part of this class.

In MA it is illegal to pass a car in the same lane, it doens't matter if you are in a motorcycle or a car. This is what I was referring to as lane splitting. I could care less if two bikes shared the same lane. If someone does it in a car and gets hit they will be as at fault as the motorcycle would be. If I did it in a car and got hit I would not be blaming the other car since I shouldn't have been there in the first place.

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