Regrettably, there are many things that drivers frequently do that make things very unsafe for people on bicycles, but of course that isn’t the full story.
The bad driving can include:
- Passing too close when passing a bicyclist (and no, despite some states’ new rules, a mere three-foot gap is often nowhere near enough for safety — see Three Feet is Too Close to pass a Bicycle – See the UK Way! );
- Failing to see nearby cyclists because of not looking properly, especially where vehicle blindspots are involved;
- “Dooring” a cyclist by opening the door of a parked vehicle into the immediate path of the bicycle.
All of these actions can and frequently do prove fatal to the cyclists concerned — even dooring can make a rider swerve or fall into the path of another, moving vehicle! But equally, all of these incidents can be avoided by thinking enough and looking properly.
Another significant issue is that of road rage from drivers, some of whom astonishingly even believe that cyclists have no right to be on the road. Believing such nonsense is one thing, but when those drivers then start to display road rage and endanger the riders, it becomes quite another.
Now, having said all of that, we cannot ignore the fact that some cyclists give all of their colleagues a bad name by acting as though they are somehow immune from all of the road laws and common sense or common decency.
Just this morning, I saw a very valid meme online, complaining that while cyclists want to be treated as though they were in a motor vehicle, some of them then go and break the rules for:
- Stop lights and signs;
- Yield signs;
- One-way streets (see the “Do Not Enter” photo, below);
- Failing to yield to pedestrians at crosswalks;
- Forcing their way unsafely through intersections;
Using lanes incorrectly;
- Endangering pedestrians by riding on sidewalks;
- Unsafe passing;
- Not using lights, front and rear, at night;
- Riding side-by-side where it is unsafe to do so;
- Riding on the wrong side of the road, into the oncoming traffic.
The series of three photographs, within this article, were taken by me very recently, during the lunch break on one of our advanced driving courses in Washington DC, and show just one example of how cyclists not only get themselves a bad reputation and annoys pedestrians who are lawfully crossing the road, but also take risks that could end up getting themselves hurt or killed.
So, cyclists, just as we at Advanced Drivers of North America [ADoNA] will always speak out against people who drive badly and thereby jeopardise your safety, so — equally — we will always speak out against those individual cyclists who ride badly and jeopardize themselves or others as a result.
It is an obvious but all-too-often neglected fact that a bit of mutual respect goes a very long way.