Getting the facts straight

The tragic car-bike crash that ended Jen Futrell's life gave a glimpse into some of the factors that impede progress in improving bicycle safety and traffic safety in general. The hackneyed and defeatist "tragic accident" language came up repeatedly, even among some people grieving Jen's death. Of course, the motorist didn't mean to hit and kill someone. Nonetheless, he chose to pass a bus on a busy road without being able to see whatever was on the other side of that bus - in this case, a law-abiding bicyclist. That was a foolish, reckless choice, not an accident.

Another impediment that arose predictably after the crash is the familiar blame-the-victim mentality: "Everybody knows it is too dangerous to ride bicycle on Bardstown Road" so we bicyclists should stay off it for our own good. The drivers whose incautious, impatient decisions make it dangerous don't need to drive differently, because "everybody knows" that they never will. Instead, bicyclists need to stay away from their chosen destinations on Bardstown Road or find a less direct route to them in order to leave Bardstown Road to the motorists. This infuriating argument also came up after the death of Chips Cronin on the Clark Memorial (2nd Street) Bridge last year and the death of Vance Kokojan on Outer Look in July. In all three cases, the motorist undoubtedly caused the crash - yet people blame the bicyclist simply for being there.

A more subtle obstacle to improving safety also appeared in these three car-bike crashes, and many more: the near-impossibility of getting good information about what happened. If the public would receive clear, validated information about the circumstances and causes of a crash, people could learn from the experience and change their behavior. Even if very few people in the general public would take advantage of this information, those of us who work to improve traffic safety could use it to focus our efforts and develop effective campaigns to curb the most dangerous driving and bicycling behaviors.

The crash that killed Jen offers a better than usual example of how hard, and how important, it is to do this. Media reports and e-mail messages circulated by friends at various points gave incorrect information on her age, which vehicle struck her, and even when she died. (The memorial demonstration and placement of a ghost bike took place two days before her death.) Retellings of eyewitness accounts and descriptions of a security-camera video of the crash disagree on whether the motorist passed the bus on the right or on the left. I have yet to hear an explanation of the lanes in which the three involved vehicles were traveling, and the presence or absence of on-street parking nearby. One story makes the motorist's driving sound wildly reckless; another makes it sound ordinary, though ending with a tragic bit of bad luck.

LMPD apparently awaits toxicology results to determine if the driver was under the influence of any drugs at the time of the crash. Even when they complete their investigation, though, they do not ordinarily release any details about a crash. News outlets might report any charges filed (say, DUI), but they rarely learn or publish details that could help us understand what actions could make a similar crash less likely in the future. We need clear information from the law enforcement agency conducting the crash investigation. Only with such information can we make good choices on how to invest public resources to reduce crashes.

One cyclist dying, another injured

Jennifer Futrell, the 27-year-old woman struck by a minivan on Bardstown Road on Tuesday is close to death of her injuries. An e-mail message circulated this morning prematurely announced her death. I was with her and her father in her hospital room a few minutes ago. She never regained consciousness after the crash. Her family and the medical staff expect her to die within hours due to brain injuries sustained in the crash. She would be the third bicyclist killed by a crash with a motor vehicle in Louisville thus far in 2008. This would match Louisville's worst recent one-year bicyclist death toll. At least two of these bicyclists were killed while doing nothing wrong. I feel terribly sad, but anger will rise to the top soon.

Yesterday at about 6 PM, another driver struck another cyclist from behind, this time on East Broadway. To the extent that one can find good news in such a story, this latest incident has some. According to the Courier-Journal report, the bicyclist's injuries appear not to be life-threatening. In spite of fleeing the scene, the motorist was apprehended by police and charged with DUI, leaving the scene, and drug-related and other offenses. The involvement of alcohol, drugs, and hit-and-run make this driver easy to arrest and prosecute. Kentucky law specifically allows police officers to arrest people for DUI or hit-and-run without having witnessed the incident. This driver will not likely escape punishment.

Jennifer's family has had good legal help since immediately after the crash. They will choose whether to file charges against the driver who hit their daughter. A security camera video and numerous eyewitness accounts provided enormously more information than usually available about a traffic crash. While respecting their choice and the choices of other grieving families of crash victims, we need to reform the attitudes and legal structures that fail to hold impatient, distracted, incautious drivers accountable for their deadly actions as long as they commit them while sober. Lives are on the line, every day.

Crash update

The woman struck from behind by a car on Bardstown Road on Tuesday remains in the ICU with multiple skull fractures. I have not heard her prognosis. Close friends are visiting her room, though she remains unconscious. My heart goes out to her family.

I heard today that alcohol was not involved in the crash. Instead, the cause appears to have been impatience: a motorist who refused to believe that the TARC bus ahead of him or her had a good reason not to drive in the right lane and not to drive faster. A colleague pointed out that a driver following the bus at a safe distance could have seen the bicyclist in the right lane in time to avoid hitting her. The creepy raw video footage from the TV traffic helicopter showed the van stopped perhaps a hundred feet beyond where the smashed bicycle was propped against a tree. This gives me the impression that the driver went a significant distance after hitting the bicyclist before bothering to stop. This suggests that she or he was going faster than 35 mph (52 feet per second) or wasn't paying attention to driving, or both.

This crash and two of the four most recent fatal car-bike collisions in Louisville have involved motorists hitting appropriately visible bicyclists from behind. Though statistics show that most car-bike crashes involve motorists turning across the path of cyclists, the relatively infrequent car-hits-bike-from-behind crash is more deadly because the motor vehicle is more likely to be moving fast. This gives an explanation for the observed effectiveness of on-street bike lanes at reducing bicycle crash deaths.

I wish I could think about crash probabilities and driver education and street design in abstract terms, but I can't. There is innocent blood on the street. It makes me sick to see the inevitable come to pass. Impatient drivers taking unnecessary risks every day in often-futile efforts to save a few seconds. We now have a young bicyclist clinging to life because one of those drivers didn't get away with the impatient maneuver. The wrong person is suffering for it.

Creepy crashes

Halloween is 30 days away, but yesterday was the creepiest day of the year for me in terms of traffic crashes. On my regular route to work, I pass through the intersection of Liberty Street and Baxter Avenue, just after passing under the railroad overpass. Yesterday morning, at the exact location where I would typically stand at the traffic signal waiting to turn right onto Baxter Avenue (heading toward downtown), I needed to change lanes to avoid a minivan stopped across the median and sideways into my normal lane amidst crash debris. Another involved car was stopped nearby, along with a police cruiser. I have no idea how the northbound van ended up sitting in the westbound lane, but I was mighty glad that I hadn't been standing there astride my bicycle when it arrived.

In the afternoon, a friend informed me of a crash that had critically injured a bicyclist on Bardstown Road near Grinstead Drive. I had ridden there just a few days ago. A bicyclist traveling southbound on Bardstown Road had been hit by a minivan also heading southbound. News reports have thus far given no clues about the cause of the crash. Epitomizing the rush to release sensational news, a television news report of the crash and the accompanying photos and video alternately report the victim as a teenager and a 27-year-old woman, and the striking vehicle as a minivan and a TARC bus. It turns out that the TARC bus on the scene was not involved in the crash, and the victim was indeed 27 and not a teenager. I got the creeps from the photos and video (filmed from a helicopter), though they do not show the victim or any obvious gore. Just the tell-tale bicycle with a crushed rear wheel, leaning against a tree behind yellow police tape...

The crash happened at about 3:40 PM on a day with good visibility and no precipitation, on a street with quite a bit of bicycle traffic. An eyewitness account, which I received second-hand, said that the bicyclist was riding in the middle of the right southbound lane, being passed by a TARC bus in the left southbound lane. The minivan had been following the bus and swerved to pass it on the right. While doing so, it hit the bicyclist. This sounds eerily similar to the crash that killed bicycle commuter Vance Kokojan in July.

If you know any of the eyewitnesses to yesterday's crash, please ask them to contact Bicycling for Louisville if and when they are willing to talk about what they saw. Learning what actually happened in injury crashes is critical to our ability to change the factors that cause these crashes. It also helps us learn the strengths and weaknesses of the justice system in protecting the rights of bicyclists.

A fellow cyclist informed me this morning that the crash victim is in the ICU, unconscious. He had spoken with her father. Please hold the injured cyclist and her family and friends in your prayers or positive thoughts.

My first day as a Seattle bike commuter

During the ProWalk/ProBike Conference in Seattle, I am staying with friends 5 miles north of the conference site. My friend Nancy, a long-time bicycle commuter, led me on the bicycle ride into downtown this morning during rush hour. The experience contrasted in some interesting ways with my commuting experience in Louisville.

Seattle has the fastest growth rate of any major US city and suffers from severe automotive traffic congestion. As you picture my bicycle commute here, keep in mind that I passed and was passed by many more cars this morning than I encounter on my commute in Louisville. No part of our trip was on the famous Burke-Gilman Trail or any other off-road path; we rode on streets with lots of cars, trucks, and buses. We had the use of bike lanes for perhaps a quarter of our route, and it was generally clean. The streets were in about the same state of maintenance as Louisville city streets, with occasional holes or cracks requiring dodging but no really bad stretches.

Immediately, I noticed the omnipresence of other bicyclists. During a 5-mile commute at about 7:30 AM, we were never out of sight of other bicyclists. For about a mile and a half, we rode amidst an accidental assembly of 7 bicycle commuters. I don't think I've ever seen 6 other bicyclists during an entire 5-mile commute in Louisville, let alone 6 others at one time. On the return trip at about 6 PM, I only briefly rode without another bicyclist nearby. During the round trip, I saw at least 20 other bicyclists. They all appeared to be riding to or from work or on another trip for transportation - no racing bikes or team jerseys or groups of riders socializing or riding in a pace line.

I don't recall seeing even one bicyclist blow through a red light. For about three miles, I stayed within a block of another rider who did a track stand at every red light, sometimes for nearly a minute. I saw no wrong-way riders and very little sidewalk riding. The Seattle bicyclists, like Seattle motorists, universally yielded to pedestrians in crosswalks. I see this only rarely in Louisville. Most of the pedestrians crossed in crosswalks after waiting for the "walk" signal, another rarity in Louisville. On streets with two or three lanes in my direction, motorists accepted my staying in the middle of the narrow right lane. In general, I found the motorists patient and accepting of my presence.

Some bicyclists made some iffy choices, swerving around buses or cutting around slow-moving cars. For the first and second times in my many years of urban riding, I had bicyclists pass on my right - bizarre and dangerous behavior. On the whole, though, I found the behavior of Seattle's rush-hour on-street bicyclists better by far than run-of-the-mill bicycling practice in Louisville.

The high number of bicyclists on Seattle streets appears to have had an unfortunate side effect: none of the other bicyclists waved, nodded, or acknowledged me at all, even when I greeted them. The relative rarity of bicycle commuting in Louisville seems to support a camaraderie that I enjoy. I hope that we keep that friendliness even as numbers of bicycle commuters increase.

At the ProWalk/ProBike Conference, I continue to learn about ways to make bicycling safer and more enjoyable and convenient. Still, it's fascinating and heartening to see how much better bicycling can be even in the absence of visibly improved streets and intersections. Better attitudes and practices by motorists and bicyclists make an enormous difference.

How cool is that!

On my way home from work on Friday, I saw another rider getting onto his bicycle. Far from the norm for downtown bicyclists, he was wearing an aerodynamic helmet and riding a time trial bicycle with bladed carbon wheels. He caught me at a red light and asked, in a European accent, "Is there a bicycle shop near here?" It turns out that he came from Denmark for the Ironman Triathlon in Louisville this weekend. This is his first visit to the continental US. He went to Hawai'i last year - I would guess for the Ironman, as well. We taught each other the hand signals for stopping in our respective countries: left arm bent at the elbow, hand pointing down, palm back in the US; left arm extended upward, palm forward in Denmark.

We rode together to a nearby bicycle shop where he borrowed a wrench to tighten his pedals. I gave him the phone number of some friends who frequently host Danish exchange students, as well as my own phone numbers. He politely declined my offer to ride with him on Saturday, saying that he needed to train on the triathlon route. I was astonished to have encountered a European triathlete on my bike ride home from work in downtown Louisville!

During the 2005 Louisville Bicycle Summit I could not have imagined that Louisville would in 2008 host an Ironman Triathlon with thousands of competitors from as far away as Europe. In the past three years, our city has hosted the Master's National championship series for two years, a major national cyclocross race, and many other races, and our region now has over 30 sponsored bicycle racing teams. Several community leaders avidly race bicycles. This marks amazing local growth in bicycle racing over the past 10 years.

This explosion of bicycle racing happened because some people convinced themselves it was possible and worked hard to make it happen. I take their example as an inspirational reminder that a similar explosion in transportation cycling and other types of bicycling can happen here if a few of us show similar hope and diligence. Let's make it happen!

Bike commuter down!

I always find it painful to read or hear about a fellow bicyclist having been hit by a car. Lately, it has gotten increasingly personal. In the past 5 weeks, at least three commuting cyclists in Louisville have been hit by cars, and a fourth (Dan Cooley) was assaulted by a motorist. One death (Vance Kokojan), three sets of painful (though not life-threatening) injuries. In the past three days, at least two bicycle commuters have been hit locally. One is a friend and Bicycling for Louisville volunteer.

Each time I hear of a bike-car crash, I try to get in touch with the bicyclist or any witnesses to learn as much as possible about what happened. Thus far, I know next to nothing about the crash that happened yesterday. My friend who got hit on Wednesday has told me part of his story, and we'll meet on Monday to talk further. Everything that we can learn about these crashes can help us determine what can prevent future crashes. Sometimes, surviving bicyclists can learn something that they can do to protect themselves better. If a similar set of motorist or bicyclist errors shows up repeatedly, we can educate the public about them and urge the police to enforce the pertinent laws more strictly.

Bicycling for Louisville also wants to learn how well the legal system works for bicyclists. When do injured bicyclists receive a fair shake from the legal system and drivers' insurers? When do the bicyclists get a bum deal, even when the motorist bears most or all of the fault for the crash? This information is helping us to craft our vulnerable roadway users bill, and will help us get it passed in the Kentucky legislature.

If you or anyone you know in greater Louisville gets in a car-bike crash in which you believe that the motorist is (at least mostly) at fault, please contact us as soon as possible after the crash. We can put you in touch with lawyers recommended by other bicyclists and by fellow lawyers. We can tell you simple things that you can do to protect your rights and give yourself the best chances of a just settlement. If and when you are ready to talk about your crash, we will interview you respectfully to help the cycling community capture as much knowledge from your unfortunate experience as possible.

Through the sadness and anger, we continue to work diligently toward solutions that make bike-car crashes increasingly rare.

Heaven and hell

How can anyone not ride bicycle in weather like this? During the morning commute today, greater Louisville had temperatures in the upper 60s and we expect a fifth day in a row (National Weather Service) with sunny skies and temperatures reaching no higher than the mid 80s. When I left work yesterday afternoon, the temperature was 81 degrees with a light breeze, sunny sky, and low humidity. It feels like paradise. This idyllic weather makes it easy to ignore hazards and challenges that otherwise might dim a cyclist's mood.

Alas, I'm glad that I didn't ignore too much on the ride to work this morning, because I almost got hit by a car. Riding down the hill on Payne Street westbound toward the corner of Payne and Charlton Streets (Google map), I narrowly avoided getting hit by a driver pulling out from the stop sign from Charlton onto eastbound Payne Street. I was heading downhill at about 24 mph (in a 25 mph zone) with another car following me at a respectful distance. I was bearing left to follow Payne Street as it bends at Charlton. The driver coming from Charlton was bearing left to get onto Payne Street eastbound. Vehicles on Charlton face a stop sign; vehicles on Payne Street do not. Traffic on Charlton Street should yield to traffic on Payne Street.

When the driver at the stop sign on Charlton failed to yield to me, we were on a head-on collision course. I yelled "Hey!" at the top of my lungs. Having already started to bear left, I was leaning the wrong way to make an emergency turn to the right (otherwise the ideal evasive maneuver). Instead, I turned harder to the left to clear her car more quickly. Had she not hit the brakes, she would have hit me broadside. She stopped in the middle of the intersection. I yelled some choice words into her open passenger-side window and continued riding. The driver following me pulled alongside me when the lane widened and asked, "Are you all right?" I said, "I'm fine." At the stop light a few feet later, I asked her, "Did that look as crazy to you as it did to me?" She nodded and said, "My heart was pounding!"

My coworker, another devoted bicycle commuter, observed that the strange geometry of the Payne/Charlton intersection frequently causes problems for both motorists and cyclists. For many years, Payne Street has been signed as a Bike Route, based on the low speed and volume of motor vehicle traffic compared to Frankfort Avenue and Lexington Road. When Louisville Metro designates a street as a Bike Route, shouldn't the Department of Public Works and Assets evaluate the street and its intersections for any necessary safety improvements? Budget constraints might not allow costly changes immediately, but the Bike Route designation should be accompanied by a plan, including time line, for any appropriate improvements. In the case of Payne Street, four such improvements stand out:

1. Replace the stop sign intersection at Charlton Street and Payne Street with a modern one-lane  roundabout. This is much different than a traffic circle and has no stop signs. It would help to keep traffic on Payne Street to the 25 mph speed limit, reduce crashes at the intersection, and reduce confusion and inconvenience for drivers approaching from Charlton Street.
2. Repave Payne Street from Baxter Avenue to Lexington Road, where pavement cracks parallel to the travel direction threaten bicyclists with disastrous crashes. This section of Payne Street has had unacceptable pavement cracks for over 4 years, as detailed in a letter to Metro government in May 2004. (To their credit, Metro has fixed many of the maintenance issues raised in that letter.)
3. Make safety improvements at the traffic signal at Payne Street and Lexington Road. Consider replacing this signal with a modern roundabout, which would reduce traffic delays for motorists and end dangerous confusion about which lane to use. Each leg of the intersection has two lanes to serve three destinations, with each lane open to straight traffic and turning traffic. If a roundabout is deemed too expensive or otherwise inappropriate, use pavement markings to designate turn lanes.
4. Per #3, consider replacing the traffic signal at Payne Street and Spring Street with a 1-lane roundabout. The consideration of traffic signal versus roundabout will be quite different for these two intersections because of the difference in traffic volumes, numbers of lanes, and frequency of turning movements. If a roundabout is deemed inappropriate, mark turning lanes and install bicycle-sensitive traffic detectors to trigger the lights on both Spring Street and Payne Street. The existing detectors on eastbound Spring Street will not trip for bicycles.

If the vast majority of drivers (including bicyclists) paid close attention, showed patience and caution, and followed the traffic laws, we could get by with the streets and intersections that we already have. Good design of roads and intersections takes into account the common mistakes that drivers make and makes those mistakes less likely, less dangerous, or both. It will cost money to retrofit existing roads and intersections to improve safety for motorists, bicyclists, and pedestrians. In the meantime, we need to push private developers and government officials to use the best available cost-effective designs each time a new road or subdivision street network is designed and built. "The way we've always done it" doesn't cut it anymore. 

How much is youth bicycle education worth?

Last week, Bicycling for Louisville had to vacate the old church building that had housed our youth bicycle repair and safety education program. The owner of the building, Presbyterian Community Center in Smoketown, had given us free use of part of the building for the past three years. (Thank you, PCC!) Now, they have demolished the old church to make room for a new child development center.

While packing our belongings and moving them into storage, I reflected on the triumphs and challenges of the youth programs that we operated there. In 2005, as part of the grant-funded ACTIVE Louisville project, we launched a youth earn-a-bike program. In the program, kids 10-14 years old learned bicycle repair skills and could earn a bicycle to keep by helping to refurbish other bicycles. We also taught them bicycle handling skills and traffic safety.

Alas, earn-a-bike programs are difficult to operate at low cost without many dedicated and skilled volunteers. Teaching a 12-year-old how to repair a bicycle takes enormously longer than having a competent mechanic repair the bike. The instructors need excellent bike repair skills, teaching skills, and ability to maintain order among pre-teens in an environment rich with accident potential. Letting a repaired bicycle leave the shop without a thorough inspection (and possibly re-repair) by a competent mechanic opens the risk of injury to someone riding the bicycle, and consequently the risk of lawsuits. Ours was among many youth earn-a-bike programs that closed after a couple of years because we couldn't afford to provide enough qualified adult help for each student.

Packing up the shop gave me a chance to see again many of our experiments at making the program more effective and interesting for the young people. We had lots of good ideas, and some of them worked. Even our most successful summers or semesters, though, ended with only three or four students earning bicycles. Most of the students who started the program dropped out after a week or two, once they realized that they needed to work to earn a bicycle. A pre-teen ready to attack any bicycle problem with Vise Grips and a can of WD-40 often does not believe that some old person has something valuable to teach him or her about bike repair! God bless those gifted teachers and youth leaders who can lead young people to learn without making them feel like students in a class. I haven't developed that gift.

What about the triumphs? Taking three 11- and 12-year olds on an 18-mile bike trip and then on the Tour de Spirit rank as high points. We taught one 12-year-old to ride a 2-wheeler without training wheels. Three months later, he joined me on a 23-mile ride! Some of our students got pretty good at overhauling and adjusting the bearings on hubs, bottom brackets, and headsets. They developed skills needed to ride safely in traffic. We had fun together. I prize the memory of watching "our" kids riding through the neighborhood on bikes that they had refurbished and earned.

Were these high points worth the disappointments - the break-ins and thefts, dwindling enrollments, scrambling for funding, shutting down the shop? From a funder's standpoint, probably not. We have no way to show that the benefits justified the cost per participant. Perhaps a student who did not complete the program learned something that kept her or him out of a crash. Maybe the program built enthusiasm for biking among kids who participated only briefly or not at all. Maybe one of our graduates had a life-changing experience that would justify the entire cost of three years of running the program. We'll probably never know.

I know one thing, though. When I see a group of our young bicycling students start to "get it" - using proper lane positioning, scanning and signaling before turning, paying attention before entering or crossing a road - I know that our work is paying off. Every day, I ponder how to bring this experience to more youngsters in ways they can enjoy and absorb. Maybe we'll find the perfect formula and someday this blog will tell about the thousands of youth we have reached and how they have made bicycling safer and more widespread throughout greater Louisville. In the meantime, I will feel grateful for the opportunity to help a few youths learn to enjoy bicycling safely.

Pure Joy

On Bike-To-Work Day in 2003, I conducted a 2-minute poll of people stopping at a booth at the downtown Louisville Bike-To-Work Celebration. Participants answered a handful of questions about whether and how often they commuted by bicycle, and reasons in favor of or against biking to work. People who rode to work rarely or not at all gave a variety of reasons in favor of bike commuting - getting exercise, saving money, etc. People who rode to work frequently almost uniformly gave high scores to a reason ignored by non-bike-commuters: biking to work is fun!

Even in dense urban traffic, most of us bicycle commuters enjoy our rides. Bicyclists who ride strenuous training rides or push themselves hard on recreational rides experience the equivalent of a runner's high, another form of joy. Riding a long touring day through unfamiliar terrain brings the joy of discovery and all of the sensory pleasures of the route, perhaps heightened by the pride of hauling ourselves and our bicycles over some scenic peak or mountain pass. Those of us who poke around neighborhoods and parks at a leisurely pace avoiding hills have the joy of moving slowly through a rich sensory environment observing the animals, plants, people, topography, and buildings that we so often miss when racing from Point A to Point B. Riding on a quiet country road or neighborhood street carrying on a conversation with a riding buddy provides a joyful camaraderie difficult to find in a stationery venue.

Fast, slow, strenuous, easy, distant, local, urban, rural... all of these rides have in common the joy that we encountered when we first learned to ride a bicycle. I have the pleasure and privilege of having all of these riding experiences at least occasionally, and of sharing them with other bicyclists. If you ride in any of these ways, you are part of my bicycling fellowship and community. I am grateful that thousands of people in Southern Indiana and north-central Kentucky take part in the bicycling community, and that our bicycling community continues to grow.

Don't try this at home, or anyplace else

What's up lately with wrong-way bicycling in Louisville? Yesterday, I saw at least five bicyclists riding against traffic on one-way streets or riding on the left side of 2-way streets. This morning, I saw two others. I see bicyclists of different races, ages, and apparent economic status levels riding against traffic everywhere from Northwestern Parkway in Portland to Frankfort Avenue in Crescent Hill.

Wrong-way bicycling is one of the top three ways that bicyclists get themselves killed by cars. The others are bicycling while intoxicated (no joke!) and riding at night without adequate lights. I consider all three suicidal. There is never a good excuse for doing any of them.

Most readers of this blog probably already religiously avoid wrong-way riding. You can use the following list to help educate others. If you even occasionally ride against traffic, please read on to see if this will help you change your mind and your bicycling practice.

Top 7 reasons NEVER to ride against traffic:

7) If you crash into someone else, you will most likely be held at fault. In other words, wrong-way riders give away their legal rights. If you like the idea of crashing with a car and then having to pay to get the car fixed, then wrong-way riding is for you.

6) Many traffic signs and signals will be difficult or impossible for you to see. If you ride the wrong way on a 1-way street, you will see only the back side of the traffic signals, so you won't know when traffic on the side street has the green light. Most Stop, Yield, and other traffic signs are posted on the right side of the street, so it will be easy for you to miss them and get into a crash with someone who is abiding by the laws.

5) You might collide with a bicyclist riding the correct way. If a right-way rider comes toward you and you avoid colliding, you might force one another into a curb, parked car, or moving car. If you cause a law-abiding cyclist to crash by riding on the wrong side of the street, you also risk the wrath of said law-abiding cyclist. For heaven's sake, NEVER ride against traffic in a bike lane! This is a real recipe for crashing with another cyclist.

4) Being able to see cars coming toward you doesn't help! Most urban and suburban streets have concrete curbs that will keep you from getting out of the way of an oncoming car. You see the car coming, and then you are trapped.

3) If you get hit, you will probably suffer more severe injuries because your speed and the motor vehicle's speed add up. A 35-mph car strikes a 12-mph bicyclist from behind at 35-12= 23 mph. A 35-mph car strikes an oncoming 12-mph bicyclist at 35+12=47 mph - twice as fast, with dramatically higher chances of severe or fatal injury.

2) The speed argument in #3 also means that drivers will have only one-third to one-half the time to see you and react to your presence as they would if you were riding in the same direction as the motor vehicles in your lane. If you think that too many drivers fail to notice you when you ride with traffic, just imagine what will happen when you give them only half the time to notice you.

1) A wrong-way cyclist crosses every driveway and street from the opposite direction that drivers on that driveway or street normally look to see crossing traffic. Wrong-way cyclists make themselves difficult or impossible for crossing drivers to see, because the roads are set up with the assumption that everyone drives or rides on the right-hand side. Coming toward a crossing driver from the wrong direction drastically increases chances of a crash.

Spread the word: Don't ride against traffic! Riding against traffic triples your chances of a crash, increases the likelihood of serious injuries, and makes you at least partially liable in case of a crash. If we could rid our region of this one common bicyclist mistake, our bicycle crashes, injuries, and deaths would probably drop by 30-50%.

Making Real Improvements

In the wake of Vance Kokojan's tragic death, Mayor Abramson, Police Chief White, and citizens around the region have stated their opinions of what it will take to make bicycling safer in our region. Several priorities stand out, based on the experience of many cities around the world.

First, keep encouraging bicycling. Mayor Abramson and other Metro officials continue to tell the community that bicycling, for both transportation and recreation, is good for bicyclists and for the community at large. The Mayor continues to remind motorists that bicyclists belong on the roads. Thank you, Jerry. This message needs to stay front and center, because experience worldwide shows that more bicycling correlates with lower crash, injury, and death rates. (My July 17 post, "Good Times, Bad Times" explains this "safety in numbers" phenomenon.) We need to make sure that the frustration and fear that follow a bicyclist's death do not result in people riding less.

Second, address any factors that contributed to the specific crash. An avid bicyclist and fellow UPS employee of Mr. Kokojan has contacted the City's head transportation engineer suggesting two fairly simple steps to make Outer Loop survivable for other bicyclists who need to use it. First, keep the shoulders clean. Having a ridable shoulder would help bicyclists stay out of the path of high-speed motorists. Second, drop the speed limit from 55 mph to 45 mph. That stretch of Outer Loop already includes two traffic signals at UPS, so a lower speed limit will not significantly interfere with its function for motorists. Lower speed dramatically reduces the chances of death for a cyclist or pedestrian hit by a motor vehicle, and also makes it easier for motorists to avoid crashing. I spoke yesterday to the same Metro official and supported those two changes. Because Outer Loop is a state road, Kentucky Department of Highways will need to decide about changing the speed limit. Metro government can lobby for the change, but can't make the decision.

Third, learn from the crash. Comparing this crash with others helps to identify patterns that point to actions we can take to reduce risks. I'm thinking of four fatal car-hit-bike crashes in Louisville duringthe past 2 years: this most recent crash on Outer Loop, the May 4 pre-dawn death of a bicyclist struck by a police cruiser on Dixie Highway, the infamous death of Chips Cronen last July on the Clark Memorial Bridge, and the cyclist on Grinstead Drive killed by a motorist turning left onto Cherokee Parkway in 2006. Three of these four fatal car-bike crashes took place in dim light at or before dawn, one on a misty day. Motorists need reminders to stay alert to bicyclists in less-than-ideal light, and bicyclists would do well to invest in better-than-minimalist taillights and headlights for riding in poor light. We need to keep fresh batteries in our lights, too, and consider using reflective vests or other reflective gear when riding in dim conditions. At least three of the four crashes involved motorists simply not paying adequate attention, or hurrying without concern for others nearby. There is no excuse for hitting a clearly visible bicyclist from behind - this happened twice among these four crashes. We need laws and public education to make this obvious and to penalize guilty drivers in a way that makes a real impression on them and on others.

Do these four crashes indicate a need for new facilities? Chips Cronen and Vance Kokojan were killed by motorists who could have passed them safely by moving into or staying in the left lane. It would have been wonderful if those roads had shoulders or bike lanes that would have allowed the bicyclists to stay out of the paths of these inattentive drivers, but its is clear than any driver with his or her head on straight could have avoided them just fine on the roads as they exist today. No new facilities could have prevented the other two fatal crashes. Bicycling for Louisville will continue to invest time in the slow process of improving the roads, while also putting an emphasis on improving the behavior of drivers and bicyclists through education combined with better laws and stronger law enforcement.

Good Miles

This past week, I rode bicycle 157 miles - my highest 1-week mileage total thus far this year. Probably all of the active bicycle racers in Louisville and more than a few recreational cyclists, along with some bike couriers and long-distance commuters, rode at least that far during the week. My 157-mile week stood out for one reason: the longest single ride during the week was only 12 miles.

Each day, I ride 5 miles to work - perhaps a few miles longer if I take a detour. Then, I will ride to appointments, ride home, maybe take a tandem ride with my wife (including that 12-mile ride last Sunday) or ride with a group of students. My rides totaled between 10 and 36 miles each day last week. Sometimes, I was poking around the neighborhood at a leisurely pace, and sometimes sprinting to keep up with traffic signals downtown. I rode 25 miles on the day that I donated a unit of blood.

None of this makes me remarkable. Instead, it points out part of what makes bicycling remarkable. Those short rides add up to the same health benefits and mood lift that come from a long ride. We can fit short rides into a busy schedule and still keep ourselves in good shape without needing to set aside large blocks of training time. We can enjoy riding nearly anyplace, and have great fun on a 20-minute ride a few minutes from home. Short rides for work and errands and visits give us the opportunity to replace the costs and problems of car use with the benefits and pleasures of bicycling.

Never let anyone convince you that you need a special place or special excuse to enjoy a bike ride!

Doing Something About It

This morning's online edition of the Courier-Journal includes more details about yesterday morning's death of bicycle commuter Vance Kokojan, along with heart-rending notes from friends and a family member. The WAVE-3 TV story concluded that "(i)t just turns out to be a tragic accident," evidently because Metro Police have thus far chosen not to press charges. The Courier-Journal story gives a more accurate description, citing LMPD Officer Phil Russell: "Under state law police are limited in the traffic and misdemeanor charges they can file in the case of an accident they don't witness... If, however, an investigation determines a driver's actions are wanton or indifferent to others, the findings could be presented to the commonwealth attorney's office for possible action..."

Kentucky law places traffic infractions into three categories: traffic violations, punishable by fines and points against one's license; misdemeanors, also punishable by jail time; and felonies, punishable by extended sentences in a penitentiary. Most speeding violations, right-of-way violations, running red lights, and other common infractions fall into the first category. Traveling the wrong way on a limited-access highway or operating a motor vehicle using an expired license, for example, classify as misdemeanors. Felonies include vehicular assault, manslaughter, homicide, and DUI on a suspended license. A police officer can cite or arrest a person whom the officer has reason to believe has committed a felony, regardless of whether the officer witnessed the incident. For misdemeanors and traffic violations, though, the law does not allow officers to cite people for infractions not witnessed by the officer.

In the vast majority of traffic crashes, no officer witnesses the crash and no charges can be filed unless the police and prosecutor decide to pursue a felony charge. A felony charge requires that the prosecutor prove that the defendant's action was wanton, reckless, knowing, or intentional. Each of these "states of mind" has its own legal definition, and each felony charge rests on a particular state of mind. Murder, by definition, is an intentional act. Wanton endangerment, by definition, requires "extreme indifference to the value of human life" but not an intention to harm the victim.

Bottom line: Police and prosecutors need to decide whether to charge an errant driver with a felony that would land the driver in the penitentiary, or not to file any charges at all. As we see time after time when bicyclists and pedestrians are killed by drivers, they usually choose the latter option, except in cases of DUI or hit-and-run. The law currently offers no middle ground.

Bicycling for Louisville has launched a campaign, Focus On The Road, to change this. Our proposed law, now being drafted by a legislative staffer, would do two things to plug this loophole and hold bad drivers accountable for injuring or killing vulnerable roadway users - bicyclists, pedestrians, equestrians, and road workers. First, it would more clearly define the driving behaviors that constitute felony recklessness. This would allow prosecutors to win felony cases more easily when drivers injure or kill a vulnerable roadway user while driving recklessly. Second, it would specifically allow law enforcement officers to cite motorists for non-felony infractions that the officer did not witness if those infractions resulted in injury or death to a vulnerable roadway user. The officer would issue the citation based on other acceptable forms of evidence such as physical evidence and eyewitness testimony.

Check our website for more information on the Focus On The Road campaign. Check back for updates, including why we chose this approach and how you can help us get the bill passed. When we have a complete draft of the bill, revised with advice from our legal team, we will post it on our website.

Holding drivers accountable for deadly driving will help us make the roads safer for all users.

Good Times, Bad Times

Before seeing the morning's news, I planned to name this post "In the Cool of the Morning." Taking a detour through Seneca and Cherokee Parks and the Beargrass Creek Trail on my bicycle commute this morning, I saw 7 other bicyclists out enjoying the beautiful morning before the heat of the day set in. Watching those recreational bicyclists along with probably 20 runners and 10 walkers out on the park roads and trail got me thinking that Mayor Abramson and Health Department Director Dr. Troutman must feel great to see what seems to me a boom in physical activity in Louisville. They have worked hard to promote it and bring it about.

Alas, the morning news shows a different side of the story: a man bicycling in the right lane westbound on Outer Loop struck and killed by a car swerving from the left lane to pass a tractor trailer. The story chat to the online Courier-Journal story shows common threads:

• the Mayor should stop promoting bicycling until the city improves the streets
• the streets are too dangerous, so bicyclists should ride on the sidewalks instead
• bike lanes won't fix the problem - we need better driving attitudes
• changing attitudes can't or won't solve the problem - we need bike lanes & paths

It's a tragedy whenever a bicyclist dies in a crash, and my anger and sadness grows when the bicyclist was killed by an impatient and incautious driver. I understand the impulse to make pronouncements and point fingers when a fatal crash like this happens. We need to make sure that we are solving the right problem, though, rather than doing something just to do something.

As best I know, the victim in this crash was the second bicyclist to die in a crash in Louisville Metro in the year since Chips Cronin was struck and killed on the Clark Memorial (2nd Street) Bridge. The other was a man struck and killed by a police car while riding before dawn on Dixie Highway on May 4. What does this mean about the safety of bicycling on streets of Louisville?

1. Two bicycling deaths in a year falls within the range of bicycling deaths in recent years in Louisville. Of course, we want to see bicycling crashes, injuries, and deaths decline. Every death is one too many. Even so, today's tragic crash does not indicate a trend toward more crashes.
2. By all observations, many more bicycles are on the roads in Louisville this year than anytime in recent memory. If crash deaths stay roughly constant, that means that the rate of deaths per million bicyclists or per million miles of bicycling has gone down.
3. Research (download: 140 KB PDF) has shown that bicycling crash, injury, and death rates go down as more people ride bicycle in a given country or city. This makes sense for two reasons. First, motorists grow to expect bicyclists on the road and learn to drive safely around them. Secondly, the bicyclists grow in collective experience and help one another learn to ride more safely.  
4. Both of these fatal crashes occurred in early morning. We do not know the lighting conditions during this morning's crash, but the May 4 crash happened before sunrise. We do not know whether the bicyclists in either case used lights or reflective accessories. Riding during dark without lights increases crash risks by a factor of 10 over riding in daylight.
   
5. These fatal crashes took place on Outer Loop and Dixie Highway, notoriously bad roads for bicycling. Yes, every surface road in Louisville Metro should accommodate bicyclists safely. While we work toward that ideal situation, we need to acknowledge that some roads clearly pose greater hazards than others. The great majority of bicyclists in our region avoid riding on Outer Loop and Dixie Highway, especially at night or during rush hour. To use crashes there and then as an excuse not to ride on other streets during daylight misses the point: on the whole, the health benefits of bicycling vastly outweigh the risks of injury or death from bicycling.

I mourn the death this morning of someone who was probably doing something that we celebrate and support - riding bicycle to work. He had every right to ride where he was riding, and did not deserve to be hit and killed. His family and friends did not deserve to lose him. Let us work to make bicycling safer for everyone, by changing BOTH behavior and road conditions. Let us continue to promote bicycling, because more bicycling means safer bicycling. Let us not let his death scare us away from doing something that gives us joy, saves us money, improves our health, and makes our community better in many ways.

How many people commute by bike in Louisville?

Lots of folks have been asking lately, "Are more people biking to work now in Louisville?" Nobody has the data to know. Bicycling for Louisville did a bicycle traffic study for Louisville Metro government last year, but we don't have follow-up data to see how things have changed. KIPDA, which oversees transportation planning in our region, conducts a household travel survey every ten years. The most recent data, from 2000, showed that literally nobody rode bicycles to work! Obviously, they missed a few of us... Again, we lack follow-up data to identify trends.

My eyeballs tell me that both recreational and transportation bicycling are increasing rapidly. This morning on my 5-mile commute to work, I counted five other bicyclists. At least four of them looked to be commuting to work. Even two years ago, I rarely saw as many as two other bicyclists on the same route that I rode today. Nowadays, I usually see two or three other bicyclists as I ride to work.

Yesterday (Sunday) evening, my wife and I took a tandem ride through Seneca and Cherokee Parks and then along Beargrass Creek Trail before turning back for a slightly longer route home. Along the way, we saw dozens of bicyclists and only a few motorists. I think this was the first time in my 17 years in Louisville of seeing more bicyclists on the roads than motor vehicles, in the absence of a group bike ride. A summer Sunday evening with perfect weather brings out bicyclists, but I had never before experienced this in Louisville - probably twice as many bikes as cars and trucks on the roads!