We're Not All Surly Scofflaws

When Donald Trump said that Mexico was sending rapists to this country, many people rightly expressed outrage.

Likewise, there would be plenty of righteous umbrage expressed if African-Americans were portrayed as gangsters,  "welfare queens" or even basketball players, just as we would not tolerate a broad-brushed characterization of Jews as money-hungry.

However, I've noticed that--at least here in New York--many people, including news anchors, think it's perfectly all right to characterize all cyclists as surly scofflaws.  I wish I'd recorded the segment in which an announcer on a local all-news station--the one to which most NYC taxi drivers listen--said that cyclists "never" obey the traffic law and that a proposed law would ensure that we do.

By Andreas Kambanis

Granted, there are cyclists who blow through red lights and sideswipe pedestrians and others. I don't have any statistics, but I know they don't constitute "all" cyclists, any more than the attacks in Paris or the World Trade Center are proof that "all" Muslims or Arabs, or people from the Middle East or North Africa, are terrorists.

What people forget is in painting all members of a group with a broad brush, they are further alienating themselves from that group, just as they are alienating members of that group from themselves.  That, in turn, causes some members of the group--whether they're Muslims or black teenagers or cyclists or whatever--to believe that, no matter how well they behave, they are lumped in with the worst members of their group.  So, they figure, there is no point in changing their ways--or they, out of anger, become even bolder or more brazen in their antisocial behavior.

What I heard yesterday on 1010 WINS is not an isolated example, and it is not part of a new trend.  About twenty years ago, a certain local television reporter staged an incident in which he, while crossing a street, was knocked down by a "cyclist".  (I put "cyclist" in quotation marks because, as the incident was fake, I have to wonder whether the person on the bike was actually a cyclist.  Perhaps he was just playing one on TV.)  As we were even more of a minority than we are now, there was even less outcry than there has been over more recent examples of anti-cycling bias.  Then again, the story had a shorter "shelf life" than today's anti-biker screeds.

So, I urge cyclists to be on the lookout for more examples of anti-bike bias in the meida, and to call the television and radio stations, news-papers and -sites, and other media outlets on it.  At the same time, I appeal to my fellow riders to be considerate of pedestrians, especially those who are elderly and disabled--and to obey traffic signs and signals.  After all, cyclists in Montreal and Paris do it, and it doesn't seem to slow them down.

Even Strivers Have To Walk

About two weeks ago, I bemoaned (OK, complained about) a sign ordering cyclists to walk their wheels across a bridge.  After all, it's a long bridge and it leaves you off on Randall's Island, which is about as far as you can get from anything else (Well, OK, there's Staten Island) in the city.

But I guess I shouldn't complain. As cyclists, we aren't the only ones beset by irrational rules.  

Which is more difficult:  walking a horse or walking a bike?  Since I've never walked a horse, I don't know.  

At least this gate faces West 138th Street between Frederic Douglass and Adam Clayton Powell Boulevards in Harlem.  The block is part of a district known as Striver's Row, which boasts some of the most beautiful and distinctive residential architecture in this city, if not the whole country. I ride through it every chance I get.

Dear Motorist: Why We Are In "Your" Lane

Last week, I was riding down Second Avenue in Manhattan.  I'd stopped at 37th Street, where traffic exits the Queens-Midtown Tunnel.  Even the most steel-nerved messengers can't cross that steady stream of cars, taxis, SUVs and livery vans without having green signal or being waved through by a traffic cop.

One of those cops, a young African-American with a boyish face, approached me.  "Miss!"  You're supposed to ride in the bike lane."  He pointed across the avenue to it.  "You'll be much safer there."

As I was focused on getting through that bottleneck--Below 34th Street, there's usually much less traffic on Second--I didn't argue with him.  I've "educated" more than a few police officers and other people in my time; some were receptive but others became more adamant in their assertion that if there is a lane, a cyclist must use it--or, worse,that bikes simply don't belong on the street at all.  

So, I crossed over to the lane and, after I passed the last clump of traffic at NYU Medical Center, I moved back into the traffic lane.

I hadn't been riding that line before I saw the cop because the section of it just below the Queensborough (59th Street) Bridge, which I rode into Manhattan, was blocked off.  And, when it opened again somewhere around 52nd Street, it didn't appear to be in very good condition.  In the last couple of years, there has been a lot of coonstruction along Second, where a new subway line is being built.

Poor surface conditions are just one reason why some of us don't use the bike lanes, at least some of the time.  I found this list of other reasons on NYC Bike Commuter:

The bottom line, dear motorist, is that we are in "your" lane because it's often safer for both us and you to be there.  In their infinite wisdom, the designers of lanes next curbs have--probably unwittingly--made things less safe for you as well as for us.  

Cyclist Fatally Doored In Queens

The stretch of Union Turnpike where a cyclist was struck and killed by a car door

What are the greatest fears of an urban cyclist?

I'd bet that many cyclist would say that getting "doored" is one of them.

It's something we all think about, particularly when we ride between traffic and the parking lane on narrow city streets.  I have been "grazed" or suffered a glancing side-blow from drivers opening their doors.

While my encounters with doors were painful, I escaped with injuries that healed with rest.  However, last night, someone on his way home from work wasn't so lucky.

A 39-year-old lighting technician whose name has not yet been released was riding eastbound on Union Turnpike, a major thoroughfare in central and  eastern Queens.  Although it's not far from where I work, I generally avoid Union Turnpike because it has the worst of two worlds:  highway traffic speeds and a parking lane where cars frequently pull in and out, or weave, as most of the Turnpike is lined with stores.  On the other hand, I can understand why he took the Turnpike, especially if he'd had a long day at work and wanted to get home quickly.  

Anyway, as he was pedaling, a driver opened his door.  The NYPD doesn't suspect any criminality on his part, probably because he remained at the scene after he realized what happened.  But even his action, and the help passerby gave the cyclist, were to no avail.  According to one eyewitness,  who said the Lord's Prayer over the victim, "The handlebar went right through his jugular" and "The blood was pouring out like a fire hydrant."  


According to Section 1214 (pdf) of New York State Vehicle And Traffic  Law, which regulates the opening and closing of vehicle doors:

No person shall open the door of a motor vehicle on the side available to moving traffic unless and until it is reasonably safe to do so, and can be done without interfering with the movement of other traffic, nor shall any person leave a door open on the side of the vehicle available to moving traffic for a period of time longer than necessary to load or unload passengers.

As police suspect no criminality on the part of the driver, they most likely believe he was acting in accordance with the above rule. I have posted it here, in case you live in New York and are involved in a "dooring" case in which you believe the driver was careless or had malicious intent.