The Chainlink

Rear Facing Camera Catches Driver (Deliberately?) Hit Cyclist

This is a bit hard to watch. Likely the driver won't even get a ticket.

http://urbanvelo.org/rear-facing-camera-catches-driver-deliberately...

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And then rogue bicycle mirrors will be knocking over pedestrains. Where does it end?
 
Steve Weeks said:

Weapons-grade Denial is in evidence here. The driver was out of the lane, and if he *really* didn't see the cyclist, there is something wrong with his visual system. I suspect this was intentional. Ironically, attention seems to be focused on the mirror that hit the cyclist; there is another point of view...

Not to reduce the outrage at this incompetent or malicious driving, but had the cyclist been equipped with a rear-view mirror this might never have happened. This type ("struck from behind" or "rear end") of incident/accident is very common, accounting for 40% of fatalities in the League of American Bicyclists "New Report": HERE.

I posted the following on the League's New Report page: 

I notice that nowhere in these comments, or in any of the League's publications that I can recall seeing, is there any mention of the need for, or use of, rear-view mirrors for avoidance of "rear-end" accidents. There seems almost to be a stubborn refusal to consider this simple technology as a means of giving cyclists a way to protect themselves. In most, if not all, states it is illegal to operate a car or motorcycle without rear-facing mirrors. Why do more bicyclists not avail themselves of this simple and inexpensive technology?

Personally, I will not ride in traffic without a mirror... I feel naked and vulnerable without one. Of course, if the hypothesis that mirror use reduces rear-end accidents is to be verified, the data from bicycle accidents must include whether a mirror was present or not. To my best knowledge, this information is neither collected nor published.
Until more information is available, I will continue to use and strongly recommend rear-view mirror use. To do otherwise is to abdicate cyclists' responsibility for taking reasonable precautions for self-preservation.

Steve Weeks, DDS
Chicago Street-riding Commuter

LOL!!

h' 1.0 said:

And then rogue bicycle mirrors will be knocking over pedestrains. Where does it end?
 

So at what part of the vehicle does it actually become the vehicle that strikes someone, according the the police chief? smh

Oh, I see. The cyclist was merely struck by the truck's mirror. Nothing to see here, just move along people.

You're doin' a bang-up job there, Chief.

What upsets me most are all the motorists drove right on by.

I would watch a second time to count them if I thought I could stand the anguished wheezing.

There needs to be an app to allow motorists to view what's happening outside their vehicles in a little window on their smart phones.
 
T.C. O'Rourke said:

What upsets me most are all the motorists drove right on by.

I would watch a second time to count them if I thought I could stand the anguished wheezing.

My wife was involved in a scooter accident a few years ago. She was riding home on a quiet residential street. A driver on a cross-street blew a stop sign, stopping in the middle of the intersection. From the damage to the scooter (and my wife) we were able to determine the bike did a full 360 end-over-end.

But the scooter and car never physically made contact so under Illinois law it was a single-vehicle accident. The accident report included nothing about the driver of the car, who had backed out of the intersection before police arrived and played innocent. (Witnesses changed their stories too, our attorney lived in the neighborhood and said he'd never seen anything like it. Pursuing with a private investigator would likely have cost us thousands which we didn't have.)

I don't know how it would have been treated, legally, had my wife contacted the car but not the scooter. But it's possible that affects how this case is handled, despite the damning video evidence.


Davis Moore said:

Gawd people, the bike wasn't struck, the rider was just hit by a mirror. The chief of police says so, so that's what happened, okay? What's all the ruckus about?

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