Cyclists' lives matter

Last week,I was reading the forum thread that started from the crash that occurred when a woman turning left cut off a cyclist who was going straight.

Nice bright morning, no visibility impairments, cyclist is in the bike lane....

As the thread slowed down, people fell back on the statement, “everybody needs to pay more attention on the road.”

That’s when it hit me. Hearing people say that “everyone needs to pay more attention on the road” is like the people who say “All lives matter.”

It’s not an incorrect statement, but it dismisses the problem that is being shouted from the rooftops.

Another statement that might help is this: “Cyclists don’t take their life in their hands when they ride, they put their life in your hands when they ride.”

We all should pay attention on the road. This will never be in question.

Focusing our senses on the road is what we’re taught before we get on the road.

Kids are taught to look both ways when crossing the road, drivers are taught to shoulder check.

What we “should” do is not the same as what we “are” doing right now.

Looking at the newsworthy accidents here in Kelowna shows that in the majority of occasions cyclists are being injured more from driver distraction than anything else.

Even cities like Toronto have the same trend.

Drivers like to say that cyclists have to be very careful because in any crash, the cyclist loses.

What I see is a “might makes right” outlook. But this rule continues, “With great power comes great responsibility.”

Bringing up the idea that drivers have the greatest responsibility on the roads is met with the idea that all road users are equal.

Yet, drivers are the first to complain if a cyclist slows them down because the cyclist couldn’t stay in the bike lane for a reason that might not be apparent to the driver.

Sure, there are plenty of cyclists who don’t ride by the rules of the road, and when questioned, it’ll be due to their convenience (i.e. not stopping at a stop light) or it’ll be that they do not feel safe on the same roads with cars.

Pedestrians were provided with sidewalks and crosswalks because they are safest when they have separated infrastructure because they’re vulnerable to being squashed by cars.

Cyclists are safest when separated from pedestrians and cars. Still they must interact with other users at intersections.

And while cyclists (and more than likely pedestrians, too) would love Kelowna to adopt the Dutch mentality of cycling getting the importance that they feel it deserves, there is the reality that the car lobby will get most of the money now and in the near future.

State Farm Insurance documented the animosity between drivers and cyclists.

Drivers feel the “invasion” of bicycles on the roads, reacting to two-wheelers flouting the rules of the road.

And the cyclists, who are shown to despise drivers just as much, feel threatened and belittled by people who are legally their equal, but by the nature of physics have the upper hand in any altercation.

Thankfully, it’s pretty much an even hate so no side can claim the high ground.

Something that came out of the discussion on the forum last week were some questions from drivers who wanted to know better how bike lanes affected right turns and rights-of-way.

This is one element of the discussion that we need to be having so drivers can live with cyclists on the road, and cyclists can live, period.

Though while some cycling proponents listed things that have been hurting/killing cyclists, drivers were listing the things that cyclists do that annoy them.

That is not what I would consider comparing apples to apples.

On a slightly troubling note from the thread, cyclists talked about behaviours of drivers that hurt and kill people on bicycles.

Drivers talked about the behaviours of cyclists who inconvenience or annoy people in cars.

It’s not quite the same from the different camps.

In a perfect world, everyone would pay attention to the road and not their phones.

They would know the rules of the road and how those rules apply to their mode of transportation.

All road user would fit into the “morality” of road rules people are taught to get their licence.

Instead we have drivers answering their phones and reading texts while driving. There are cyclists who are going the wrong way in the bike lane and coming out of nowhere to startle drivers.

The dismissal of the cycling issues by people in cars is similar to the way that it’s always said that cyclists need to wear helmets.

That’s a smokescreen; helmets will help any cyclist, but that’s because it just makes sense.

If we were really worried about head injuries why wouldn’t we have pedestrians and drivers wear them?

The highest rate of brain injury is in cars, second highest is walking, and finally there is cycling.

Is focusing on cyclists wearing helmets going to solve anything?

A great comic showed up on my twitter feed that shows how things are.

Cyclists are getting hurt and, sadly, for a mixed bag of reasons.

There will be no magical solution — we need to talk about real expectations.

We need to ensure vulnerable road users feel safe enough to not do strange things out there.

Cyclists shouldn’t be reacting with anger from fear and drivers shouldn’t be worrying about things they can’t control.

Let’s keep the discussion going. I’d love to see us get together where we can discuss this face to face and see that we’re all real people just trying to get from point A to point B. If you’re interested please send me an email.

If I receive enough interest I’ll set up the venue and let everyone know when and where it’s going to happen.

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.