Bicycle Safety

With a deadline for filing bills in the Legislature for 2010 fast approaching, the California Bicycle Coalition and local advocates are debating what this year's statewide agenda should be. The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition is promoting three ideas they'd like to see become law, according to Program Director Andy Thornley.

A number of Streetsblog readers have noticed a particularly loathsome group that has sprouted up on Facebook and has a legion of fans. As of this writing, more than 32,000 people are fans of "There's a perfectly good bike path right next to the road you stupid cyclist," a group page with a bunch of anti-cyclist screeds and some pretty nasty photos of bicycle crashes and car-on-bike violence. Facebook has concluded that the group does not violate the site's terms of use and will not shut it down.

Christopher Thompson - aka the Road Rage Doctor - was sentenced to five years in prison today for intentionally causing a crash that hospitalized two cyclists on Mandeville Canyon Road in Los Angeles' Brentwood neighborhood.

The driver of a 9-San Bruno Muni bus struck a male bicyclist from behind on Market at Front Street at 10:40 this morning. The bicyclist was removed from the intersection in an ambulance with "moderate injuries," according to an officer at the scene. The Fire Department confirmed that the injuries were not life-threatening. Fortunately, both the bus and the bicycle were reportedly moving at low speeds at the time of the crash.

A 68-year-old Palo Alto man riding his bicycle was struck and killed by the driver of a Caltrans vehicle heading westbound on the Hillsdale Boulevard overpass of Highway 101 in San Mateo this morning. The Caltrans employee was on duty at the time.

Today on the Streetsblog Network, Sustainable Savannah asks the question, "When is it socially acceptable to threaten the lives of innocent people?" The answer, apparently, is this: "When they are riding bicycles."

Thursday was a momentous day for the growing and diverse population of people who ride bicycles in San Francisco, though as I'm about to relate to you, the city still has a steep hill to climb, particularly in the San Francisco Police Department.

DPT crews installed San Francisco's first physically separated bike lane this morning on a westbound stretch of an existing bike lane on Market Street between 9th and 10th, and before workers had even finished putting in the final safe-hit post, some drivers began disrespecting it, rolling into the lane, causing bicyclists to merge into auto traffic.

San Francisco bicycle riders this morning let out a loud cheer, popped open a bottle of champagne and toasted the city's first bike lane in three years: a freshly painted sliver of Scott Street on the Wiggle between Oak and Fell that now serves as a left-turn lane for the thousands of daily commuters traveling by bicycle onto Fell Street.