Who Wreaks More Havoc?

 

Photo by Owen Zwiliak, Chicago Sun -Times

A few of my recent posts have dealt with drivers' and cyclists' attitudes about, and perceptions of, each other.  As I've described, irate motorists see us as over-privileged scofflaws who endanger the public order.

At least one person perceives otherwise.  James R. Anderson, a Chicago cyclist, wrote a letter to his hometown newspaper, the Sun-Times about drivers who behave badly.  As he correctly points out, they are a more egregious danger to cyclists and pedestrians than we can be to them in part because they are driving two to four tons of metal, often at two to four times the speed at which we ride (not to mention how much faster and more massive they are than pedestrians). But he makes another point:  Too many motorists (including drivers of pickup trucks and SUVs) are looking at their screens rather than their surroundings; they, and other drivers sometimes block crosswalks or bike lanes and blow through red lights, seemingly oblivious to the fact that they've done anything wrong.

Oh, and he also brings up another little-discussed fact:  That most fatal crashes are caused by drivers, not cyclists or pedestrians.  For one thing, even in cities like Chicago and New York with large numbers of cyclists, we are far outnumbered by drivers.  And a driver's error or carelessness can be magnified to a much greater degree--because of the vehicle's speed and mass--than any misjudgment a cyclist or pedestrian could make.

To spare you from having to navigate a paywall, I am reproducing Anderson's letter here:

I have seen letters to the editor recently from car drivers complaining about “sharing the road with bike riders while bike riders break all kinds of laws.” The letter writers say they’ve seen bicycle riders run stop signs.

My question is: Have they seen the behavior of car drivers? Last week on Hubbard Street, I was stopped at a stop sign — because it’s a stop sign and because there was a pedestrian in the far crosswalk — and three drivers buzzed around me to blow the stop sign and endanger the pedestrian.

Drivers in giant SUVs and pickup trucks, with no idea what’s happening around their vehicles because they’re too busy playing with their phones to have a look or check their mirrors, run red lights with alarming frequency. I don’t mean they just missed the yellow; the light was red, and they decided to go anyway.

Drivers turn right on red without stopping or looking for pedestrians on the right, often in contravention of “No turn on red” signs.

Drivers block bike lanes and crosswalks and fail to stop for pedestrians in crosswalks, with no idea they’re doing anything wrong.

By the way, it is drivers, not bicycle riders, who usually cause car crash fatalities, including more than 1,300 in 2021. Plus, they inflict injuries great and small, plus cause billions in property damage.

Bad bicycle riding is inexcusable, but its impact is microscopic compared to the harm of bad car driving. It’s like the difference between a nuclear missile and a fly swatter.

James R. Anderson, Near West Side

Why Did She Halt Congestion Pricing?

There are two benchmark prices in New York City: the subway or bus fare and a slice of pizza.  Those two prices are usually equal, or close to it. At this moment, the transit fare is $2.90 while in most pizzerias, a slice (without pepperoni or any other toppings) will set you back $3.00-$3.50.

If a mayor or New York State Governor does anything to cause an increase to the fare or the price of a slice, it can cost him or her votes—or an election altogether.

So, in that sense, when Kathy Hochul halted congestion pricing in New York, it could be seen as a shrewd political move—at least if her rationale for it is not specious.  

She is now saying that implementing congestion pricing—in other words, charging drivers $15 to enter Manhattan south of 60th Street—would make a slice of pizza more expensive.

There is, perhaps, a certain logic to her assertion.  After all, almost no Manhattan pizzeria owners or workers actually live in the borough. Also, nearly all of the supplies and ingredients for pizza-making come from factories and warehouses in Brooklyn, the Bronx, Queens, New Jersey or even further away. It will therefore cost more to transport those goods—and, in some cases, for owners and workers to transport themselves (many live in transit “deserts”). Hochul asserts—perhaps correctly—that those costs will be passed on to customers.

Image by James Andrews

Hochul had been, until recently, in favor of congestion pricing because the money would help to improve the city’s and region’s mass transit. (The Metropolitan Transit Authority, which includes regional commuter railroads in the immediate suburbs as well as New York City’s buses and subways, is a state agency that reports to the Governor.) But her support generated backlash in the outlying neighborhoods and suburbs, where she hasn’t been terribly popular.  

Much of that backlash has come from the kinds of commuters and suppliers I’ve mentioned. But I am sure that it also has come from people like contractors, who often have to bring large loads of supplies and tools from the outer boroughs and New Jersey into Manhattan. 

In other words, I think Hochul realized she’d stirred up, if unintentionally, a kind of class warfare between skilled blue-collar workers—who, probably, would be most affected by an increase in the price of a slice—and those they perceive as “the elites.”

In a way, it mirrors the hostility and resentment they feel toward cyclists, whom they perceive as “privileged “ or “entitled.” And I suspect that perception of cyclists—and bike lanes—has something to do with their opposition to congestion pricing.

It will be interesting, to say the least, to hear and see what, if anything, Kathy Hochul says and does next.

They Make Us Less Human

 Recently, Melissa Harris-Perry recalled cracking open a watermelon and, finding it un-ripe, left it for her chicken to nibble. She watched them from her porch, her hair wrapped in a scarf.  “I was probably somebody’s stereotype of a Black woman,” she quipped.

Had she sported the kind of hairdo Jennifer Aniston wore during her first few years on “Friends” or a designer suit, someone would have accused her of trying to be White.

Likewise, I have been accused of “overdoing “ it when I simply dressed as a woman my age might and condemned for fitting the same people’s stereotype of a trans woman even, if I say so myself, I have done no such thing since the first couple of years of my gender affirmation process.

So, I had a sense of deja vu when I read about an Australian study in which 30 percent of respondents said they saw cyclists as “less human” when they wore helmets, reflective vests or other safety gear

Photo by Robert Peri

Why does this matter? If the history of racism, sexism, homo- or trans-phobia showsl us anything, people are more likely to behave more aggressively toward those they regard as not-quite-human, or less human than themselves. 

In other words, it’s easier to rationalize violence against someone when the victim can be reduced to a stereotype, or de-humanized in some other way.

The findings of the Australian study, however, show (even if it wasn’t the intent of the researchers) that cyclists are in a Catch-22 situation.  If we wear safety gear, we’re less human and violence or simply carelessness against us is justifiable or, at least, excusable. But if we aren’t wearing helmets and day-glo vests (or even if we are), we are blamed even if the driver downed a whole bottle of vodka and drove at double the speed limit.

Who's Paying Their "Fair Share"?

Sometimes a motorist's animosity toward bicycle riders stems from a negative experience with a scofflaw cyclist--or one who is following the safest and most sensible practices but somehow manages to inconvenience said driver.  Other times it comes from our actual or perceived "privileged" status:  While many of us are indeed better-educated and younger (I am, in spirit!) than the population generally, there are also some who pedal because, for whatever reasons, they can't drive.  

Notice a word I used in the previous paragraph:  "perceived".  Perceptions, as we all know, are not the same thing as reality.  More than once, I have had non-cyclists berate me and other cyclists because of inaccurate notions about us.  

I think now of a time when, on a narrow Brooklyn street, a man driving just behind me wanted to park in a space I was passing at that moment.  He leaned on his horn; I glanced back at him and lipped, "Excuse me."  Then he let out a stream of profanities and what sounded like a threat. 

I turned back and said, "Excuse me, sir?"

Then he went into a rant about how careless cyclists are because we "get to use the same streets but don't have to pay for them."  I asked him to explain himself.  "I have to pay all sorts of taxes to maintain these streets."

"I do, too.  We all do, whether or not we drive. All of that is funded from what's deducted from our paychecks--or what you pay if you're an independent business owner."

He had the frustrated look of someone whose anger had, against his will, been defused.  "Yeah, but I'm still paying more taxes than you."

"Probably not.  Do you have kids?  A mortgage? Any loans?"

He looked confused.


"I am a single renter.  And I can't claim the deductions that some people claim. I don't get those big refunds I hear about from other people--if I get a refund at all."

He actually seemed to be listening to me. "The only tax that you pay, and I don't, is for the gas in your car.  But even there, I pay, too, because the price of gas is subsidized.  Why do you think we don't pay 10 dollars a gallon, like they do in France and Germany?"

From there,  our exchange became less acrimonious, and I wished him well.

 

I thought about that encounter, again, when I came across a letter to the editor containing the "If they want to use our roads, let them pay for it!" canard.  It's amazing how the misconception that we don't pay our "fair share" still exists.

What bothered me almost as much is the editor's response:  That Oregon cyclists are indeed paying their share with the bicycle tax that was imposed two years ago.

What was that about two wrongs not making a right?