Here is the best idea of the week.
Police should have a monetary incentive to ticket bikers. Some reason for them to give a ticket to every bike they see cutting across the street without a signal, riding without lights, going the wrong way on the street or running a stop sign.
Here is how you do it.
Anyone over 18 on a bike who commits a road violation has to pay double the fine. That extra money goes directly to a 50/50 split. Half to the city and half directly to the police department for increased Police patrols. Now that would be awesome. If the police made more money and could use that money to write more tickets what a great day it would be.
Lazy ass bikers (AKA MOST OF THEM) would soon be taking Tri-met, Max or walking.
I love the idea that everyone attacks my poor command of the English Language but no one challenged me on my number of bikers with lights on going over the bridge? Wow I wonder why people who tell me that bikers breaking the law is a myth don't want to take up that challenge? Do they really think more bikers would have lights? I still say cars will beat them hands down.
Interesting emails this week. Getting called all sorts of names and one threat. Sorry I had to come to your country and take your jobs. Maybe if you were not showing up late for work because you are on a bike I would not be doing your job.
The real point is many of these idiotic detractors just what to jibber jabber. None of them have any real points.
Two Emails I get the most.
1. Your kind of talk is not going to open a dialog
and
2. the Die Bitch Die
Some times it's in the same email.
My problem is how can you start a dialog with a side that believe that they alone are going to save the world and you are on the side of killing the world with gas cars.
Where is the middle ground? where could you start there?
How can you start a dialog with people who excuse every violation by stupid bikers with what amounts to nothing more then an updated version of "he who smelt it, dealt it?" (Thanks to my wonderful boy friend for that one.
Just like "he who smelt it dealt it" they are trying to excuse their many transgression by pointing back at those who challenge them and saying "look you did it" or "It's your fault"
You cannot have a dialog with that person at all. Cannot be done.
Some take offense to my use of Bikenazi. I think it's great, I love it. Sure I come from a nation that fought with the Axis so I know a little bit about Nazi's. I also lived in a country where Bikes are every place (Holland) My Dutch friends came to visit last Christmas and we drove around town. They thought Portland bikers were awful based on what they saw. Prompting one of my favorite lines "Don't they know they could die?" All I could do was shake my head.
When the Dutch are on your case about your biking you are low on the food chain.
While in Holland I can only remember maybe three times in two years having an issue with a bike I thought was risky or dangerous. I get that in a month in Portland.
It is the arrogance of Portland bikers that makes them believe that Right of Way is more important then surviving.
It is the apologist for anything Bikers do wrong.
It is those that believe that biking is a crusade to save the world and that all who oppose them are morally wrong. (Sort of like a religious war lead by ST. Trek)
It is those that respond to any criticism with a counter attack to justify their breaking the law in great numbers.
The above people are those that scream for "dialog" and "Compromise" and "Lets talk this out"
These are just gifted children who need to be spanked and put to bed...(not in a good way)
They fear any voice that challenges the orthodoxy of their religious belief in bikes as the holy savior of human kind.
This week I will bike to work and keep track of all the bad biking I see.
I hope you all survive the next week, If you get hit, oh well you have it coming. Keep an eye out for red bikes.
hahahahah
Posts
10 comments:
Hi Myra,
One has no obligation to engage in polite dialog on the Internet. You're expressing your frustration, and that's fine. And your English isn't perfect, but I haven't had any difficulty understanding you. Do they expect you to write to an American audience in Finnish?
You've expressed your feelings for everyone to take in, think about, and respond to. So I'm going respond now.
I'm curious to know, do you think a bicyclist running a red light or blowing a stop sign deserves to die because she is breaking the law, or because she is slighting so many motorists who don't do such things? Do you know that the U.S. state of Idaho -- with its share of urban, suburban, and rural areas -- permits bicyclists to do just those things? Now, did such a bicyclist cease deserving to die the moment the law permitting her to run stop signs and red lights went into effect? Or does she still deserve to die because, even though she is obeying the law explicitly, the law is unjust, being unfair to motorists?
It's understandable that cyclists' exceptionalist behavior leaves you feeling slighted as a law-abiding motorist. We all have our pet peeves that make us a bit angrier than they reasonably should. But wishing death upon someone just for violating traffic laws is a bit extreme! Be angry if you're angry, but at least recognize on an intellectual level that such extreme passion is not justified here. Jesus Christ, Myra, they're not mass murderers! (Speaking of that, isn't evoking Nazism a little tasteless?)
Also understand that poor bicyclist behavior is a broad American phenomenon. Portland has the best-educated cyclists in the country. I can say that because I've traveled in the U.S. extensively and I've paid attention to how cyclists behave in each city I've been to. Go to New York, Chicago, Boston, Seattle, Austin, San Francisco: You name it. I rarely see anyone else keeping legal. Whatever the number is in Portland -- 60% compliance? -- it's way, way higher than anywhere else in the States.
Now, I commute 30 miles a day by bike. That's by choice. I make twice the median wage for Portland; I can afford to drive. I live near and work near highway off-ramps, so the drive would be 20 minutes each way. It's 70 minutes each way for me by bike.
I do it for my health. I do it for the environment. For some people, not driving is not a realistic option; I do it to make room for them. I do it to encourage others to do the same. Good for me, good for others. What fault can you find with that? --even if I do run red lights sometimes, which is legal in some places. (My colleague does 32 miles a day for the same reasons, and he has a family!)
Bicycling has really taken off in Portland since 2000, but the practical bicycling culture there goes back to the 1960's or '70's. No new age, yuppie bullshit. People gotta go places to survive in a capitalist economy. Society would not be served by jailing the poor, or even the lazy, for bringing 15 pounds of aluminum through a red light at low speed.
But, like you, I see that there's much room for improvement. I hope it gets better out there.
People don't argue with you about the number of people who ride across the Hawthorne bridge without lights because most people don't really want to take the time to sit on the Hawthorne bridge at night and count how many bikers don't have light. You can't really count them durning the day since most bike lights come off so the lack of a bike light during the day does not indicate that that person does not have a light. I don't think your grammer is all that bad, especially if english isn't your first language. Better than a lot of native U.S. citizens.
You make me rather sad. You lump every biker in portland together when they are not all the same. A good portion of portland bikers do follow most of the rules, and are trying to be careful. I bike. Most of the people i know bike. They also, walk, drive and take public transit, and non of them, atleas not that they have made obvious, are over zealous about thier biking or thier reasons. The two people killed by large trucks not to long back weren't doing anything wrong when they were killed. Accidents will happen whether you are following the law or not. And i'm not saying they shouldn't follow the laws. I personally think riding without a light at night is one of the stupidest things you could do on a bike, but there are always going to be people who do it, but there is always going to be someone who is going to risk thier life that way.
Awsome thing is, most people complain about how fat most american's are, and you're chastizing portland bikers for actually doing something healthy? Fine, fight to get rid of bikes, but then don't wine about how out of shape people are.
And finally, you said you were going to ride your bike and count all the supid things bikers did. That means you atleast own or have access to a bike, and you seem to live in portland, so doesn't that make a portland biker? Or are you somehow exempt from the little box you shove portland bikers into?
Thanks for bringing up "Whoever smelt it dealt it." That's a good point. Could you please write more about farts, Myra?
Oh. Here's a hot tip: bicyclists aren't as law-abiding as motorists. Nobody questions that because it's a silly thing to dispute. Of course there are more lights on cars than on bikes. What's your point? The interesting question is "what do we do about it?" I suggest education and smarter laws. You suggest...wait...what do you suggest?
Now. What is your opinion of jaywalking fascists? Can we just agree that those brownshirt pedestrians deserve to be crushed under the wheels bikes, cars, and MAX trains alike?
Hey back off the St. Trek.
Any self serving bike nazi would never ride a bike from anything other than a tree hugging, bark eating, crunchberry manufacturer.
Trek are considered part of the industrial complex by those who know better.
Myra,
What do you possibly expect to accomplish with this blog? Do you think you'll change bicyclists behavior, by calling them names? Are you going to arrange an automobile militia, to run them down on the streets? Or, are you worried, that the automobile age is passing.
I'm not here to criticize your grammer, or send random insults. I'm here to point out a couple of facts.
I drive for a living. It's not my dream job, by any means. When I'm driving my truck on the road, I alone, am responsible for what that truck is doing. It's only in my own control. I have to be aware of conditions around me, regardless of who is at fault.
I watch for children, that may dash out from the side of the road, cyclists that behave in a random fashion, and other motorized transport. It is my responsibility alone.
Myra, take out your driver's license. Look closely, it should have your signature on it. that signature is a CONTRACT. You've signed a contract, that requires you to obey the laws of the road, and be responsible for whatever your vehicle does on the public streets.
There is no such contract for cyclists. That is one reason why bicycling is one of the truest forms of democracy. Bicycling offers the freedom from petroleum, from licenses, inspections and freedom of movement for people that otherwise may be unable, or unwilling to drive a car.
As I drive these city streets, I find bicyclists as a refreshing indicator of the health of this fine city. I also thank them, for not taking parking spots, driving up the price of fuel, or taking up one more spot on the freeway, during my drive. I give them room, and maintain an awareness of their presence.
Your blog, appears to be spattered with ridicule, and at best, proves that you're unable to see the bigger picture, as to how transportation is and will continue to be handled in our city. At it's worst, will inspire someone that is less than mentally stable to mow down some bicyclist, or even a child on a bicycle. I hope, for the sake of all of us, that it never happens, with your blog, in their browser's history. For if that is the case, your keyboard will be covered in the blood of the victim.
Perhaps you can still find the courage to stand, face to face with a parent of a murdered cyclist, and see what you're doing in the real light of day.
You don't even have any good ideas. What's the point?
Myra, if I could have a double ticket for every time I see a TriMet bus or car run a red light or stop sign the cops would have a lot of money that way too.
I follow the law whether or not I'm driving or riding to work. I scold both cyclists and drivers for not following the law. I call TriMet every time a bus runs a red or blocks an intersection. I can tell you that TriMet does not like me. Cops do not ticket TriMet buses since they are both city workers.
Cops are lazy, they could ticket a lot more cyclists and vehicles, but they choose their battles. Besides, if they stopped every person every time they could not do their real job.
There will never be a "Care Free Portland" nor will there be a "Bike Free Portland".
I just came upon your blog and can say that your views do irritate me, but everyone has a right to voice their political opinion (see the first amendment), but wishing people to die is low.
you make no sense the reason dutch bicyclists are safer is because the state actually puts money into things like those "stupid" green bike boxes they have freeways dedicated to bikes. As a bicyclist I run into trouble with motorists everyday driving very fast in residential areas and sometimes running red lights. I know that all motorists arent like this but you are generalizing all bicyclists as nazis that dont obey traffic laws but there are "carnazis" out there too that are oblivious and think they are important because they drive a car. If bikes were treated like they are in Holland there wouldnt be such problems between motorists and cyclists and you wouldnt have to deal with them if your tax dollars went to improving bike ways instead of trying to set out to get cyclists and give them tickets. And do you think it is a bad thing not to burn through our ozone layer by riding a bike? Who are you calling cyclists lazy we are the ones that arent driving cars how is it lazy to pedal yourself around town instead of getting in your nice comfy car and just putting down your foot on a gas pedal?
How would you like it if I went and booted your stupid car one day? You have no right to infringe on peoples property shame on you.sw
Proud American....
I hope you are lumping Myra into your horrible, racist laced post. I doubt she is from this country as her grammar is deplorable.
Beyond that, go ahead and run someone over in your Foreign made car, that is powered by foreign based oil, and then I'll watch you become the poster child for the new Vehicular Homicide law that is going to be passed. Oh, and if you didn't know, the cops can look at your computer and trace that post. Good luck defending yourself in court with a post like that.
Post a Comment