No Idaho Stop In California--For Now, Anyway

Which is worse:

• a stupid, misguided, useless or pointless law that is passed by a legislative body

or

• a well-informed and well-conceived law that a legislative body votes against?

Yesterday's post concerned a mandate that may fit into the former category.  Today, unfortunately, I'm going to write about the latter.

As I've mentioned in an earlier post, way back in 1982, Idaho passed a law allowing cyclists to roll through an intersection at a red light if there is no cross-traffic.  Since then, no other US state has enacted similar legislation , though in 2011 a few Colorado municipalities adopted policies that allow cyclists to, in effect, treat "Stop" signs as "Yield" signs.  And the city of Paris, France has a statute allowing cyclists to do the same as long as they're making right turns, or going straight, through "T" junctions.

From the Portland Mercury

The so-called Idaho stop makes perfect sense because it allows cyclists to get out ahead of traffic and therefore be better seen by motorists, particularly those who are making right turns.  Even the policies of Paris and those Colorado communities are better than most others.

Recently, a bill that, if passed, would have given California cylists the same right that their peers in Idaho have enjoyed for more than three decades came up for a vote in the Golden State's Assembly.  After some intense lobbying (by, I think it's fair to assume, people who don't ride bikes), the bill was tabled.  Assembly member Jay Obernolte said the bill was being held up until the next legislative session so that "concerns" can be "worked out."

The one legitimate "concern" he mentioned came from groups representing the visually impaired, who say that people with vision problems could have difficulty hearing cyclists "whizzing by", as Sacrament Bee reporter Alexei Koseff put it.

That, in spite of researchers in the US and UK, working independently of each other and several years apart, coming to the conclusion that cyclists as well as motorists are safer when the "Idaho stop" is allowed.  Part of their research, of course, included a survey of Idaho's experience with its law.

The Idaho Stop: A Women's Issue (Or: Does Obeying The Law Kill Us?)

I learn some interesting things from my students.

From one of them--a criminal justice major--I learned that the vast majority of crime is committed by males between the ages of 15 and 25.  After that age, the crime rate plummets, and there is an even more significant difference between the lawlessness of males and that of females.

Or, to put it another way, females are more law-abiding than males.  Of course, that usually works to our advantage, but there are instances in which it doesn't.

One of those areas in which it doesn't is in traffic law, as applied to cyclists.  In most municipalities, the law requires cyclists to stop for red lights, just as motorists do.  Of course, such laws are not evenly enforced:  A state highway cop in a rural or suburban area is more likely to give a summons for running a red light than an urban police officer, and in cities, Black or Hispanic cyclists are more likely to get tickets (or worse) than a White or Asian person on two wheels.

But, according to studies, women are, proportionally, far more likely than men to be run down by heavy transport vehicles while cycling in urban areas.  As an example, in 2009, ten of the thirteen people killed in cycling accidents in London were female.  Of those ten, eight were killed by "heavy goods vehicles", i.e., lorries or trucks.  That year, about three times as many men as women cycled in the British capital.



That stark reality reflected conditions described in a report leaked by The Guardian's "Transport" section.  According to that report, 86 percent of the female cyclists killed in London from 1999 through 2004 collided with a lorry.  In contrast, 47 percent of male cyclists killed on London streets met their fates with a truck.

In unusually blunt language for such a study, the researchers concluded, "Women may be over-represented (in collisions with goods vehicles) because they are less likely than men to disobey red lights." (Italics are mine.)  They, therefore, confirmed what many of us already know:  We are safer, particularly in areas of dense traffic or in the presence of heavy vehicles, if we get out in front of the traffic in our lane rather than wait for the green light--and run the risk of getting smacked by a right-turning vehicle.



A DePaul University study of Chicago cycling and traffic patterns made use of the British study and came to a similar conclusion.  More broadly, the DePaul researchers concluded that it would be more practical and safer to mandate the "Idaho stop" for cyclists.  

In essence, the "Idaho stop" means that cyclists treat red lights like "Stop" signs and "Stop" signs like "Yield" signs.  It allows cyclists to ride through a red light if there is no cross-traffic in the intersection.  

Believe it or not, Idaho enacted that law all the way back in 1982.  Since then, no other state has adopted it, although a few Colorado municipalities have enacted stop-as-yield policies since 2011.  Interestingly, a 2012 decree allows cyclists in Paris to turn right at--or, if there is no street to the right, to proceed straight through-- a red light as long as they excercise prudence extreme and watch for pedestrians. Three years later, that policy was modified to allow cyclists to treat certain stop lights (designated by signage) as "yield" signs as long as they are making right turns or going straight through "T" junctions.

The funny thing is that you don't hear or read the kinds of flat-earth rants about cyclists in the City of Light that we regularly find in American discourse.  And, it has seemed to me, cycling is generally safer than it is in New York or just about anyplace else in the US I've ridden.

Now, back to my original point:  Allowing the "Idaho Stop", or even the policies of Paris or those Colorado municipalities, is not only a cycling or transportation issue.  It's a women's issue!

The Little Man On The Little Bike That Didn't Fold

In Brooklyn, there's a bike/pedestrian separated from the Belt Parkway only by guardrails (and, on two bridges, not even that) and Jamaica Bay by thin strips of sand and, in places, by small dunes, shrubs and, believe it or not, a few cacti.


About twenty-five years ago, when I first started riding there, I saw a little man on a bike that, to my eyes, seemed too small even for him. He'd stopped to pick some prickly pears and other fruits I didn't even know could be picked from plants that grew so close to cars and urban sprawl.  He motioned for me to stop and share one of those culinary treasures.  It was surprisingly sweet and tasty.


He didn't say much. He never did--not even when, even more to my amazement, he showed up on some organized ride or another that started at Grand Army Plaza.


I haven't seen him in a long time.  However, I still recall his small stature, silence and his bike: a small-wheeled, non-folding bike.


Probably the closest such bikes ever came to the mainstream market in the US was when they were marketed as "polo bikes."  I think that was during the early 1960's, or possibly even earlier; I know that it predated my active cycling life.  In any event, a few years later, in the middle of my childhood, bikes with similar dimensions appeared with "banana" seats and all manner of scaled-down race-car accessories.


But that man's bike looked like a grown-up's utility bike built for a dog or cat.  It even had a rear rack built into its frame, fenders and a rather sober paint job. As I recall, the rack even had pegs for a pump. I used to see bikes like it strapped to the bumpers of RVs in Europe 30, or even 20, years ago.  


I'm not sure of the wheel size:  It looked something like the size that was sold as 20 inches in this country, but with somewhat narrower, lower-profile tires.  However, the tires seemed more like smaller versions of the old French demi-ballon tires than what came on the Raleigh Twenty and Peugeot folding bikes.


Not long after I first met that man, I found a bike like his in some curbside trash.  After rescuing it, I gave it to one of my riding buddies who was something of a tinkerer and liked novel machines.  (If I remember correctly, he owned some version of the MG car that was never sold in the US.) I don't know what he did with it:  Not long afterward, he moved to Idaho or some such place.


Somehow I imagine him the way I always imagined that little man on the little bike I met so many years ago:  in his own world, making his own way on his own little bike that doesn't fold.