Scooters: What Does This Mean for People That Ride Bikes?
Dear Seasoned Chicago Cyclists,
Please try to impart the patience and compassion you would have for a first time bike commuter. Having experienced the roll out in DC and already had one scooter fatality, there's definitely a concern about safety. Basically, scooter users will likely be pedestrians (not cyclists) turned scooter riders so they won't know the ins and outs like a seasoned cyclist. Think first time Divvy user. So yes, you'll see them on the sidewalks (even though they aren't supposed to), bike lanes, and streets. Lots of patience will be necessary. While scooters can be a good addition to the non-car commuter, they do pose risks to themselves (mostly) and other vulnerable users of the roads.
Here's an article with the details of the scooter roll-out:
https://chi.streetsblog.org/2019/06/11/ready-or-not-10-different-sc...
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Yasmeen on
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I think I can figure out why insurance is important. I also understand that sometimes people end up in financially difficult situations. As I don’t know the cyclist’s personal financial situation, I’m going to withhold my judgement and see him as a person in need. You know, a little empathy and compassion.
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Permalink Reply by Bob Kastigar on
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I think Tony P has a legitimate point. People with "financial hardship" (real or imagined) easily stop paying the insurance premium because (1)they don't seem to be getting anything for it, and (2)they'd rather spend the money on something else.
Kicking in a couple of bucks wouldn't hurt anything.
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Permalink Reply by ketoguychicago on
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Argonne's right. The rate in miles had declined so much that the mortality rate is expressed per billion miles travelled. All mortality is too high, but the per mile (billion mile) trend continues down.
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Lake Shore Drive is particularly interesting. From the Chicago Tribune last year:
"Although the 3900 block [of LSD] was particularly active, Lake Shore Drive as a whole is a hotbed of high-speed ticketing, accounting for more than half of all such citations in the city. The number of high-speed tickets issued on the drive jumped to 4,344 last year, up from 501 in 2014. Citywide, 7,816 such citations were issued last year, up from 1,365 in 2014."
My note: The city makes MUCH money off the drive... it would be about a million dollars from the drive.
As Argonne points out, traffic engineers set the rules and such. This may be why the south side is 45mph, where it is less hilly and is straighter, while the north side which is hillier and more dense is only 40 in parts. (I'm paraphrasing from other parts of the Trib article)
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Permalink Reply by Argonne69 on
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And how many fatalities do you think occurred on Lake Shore Drive? I imagine it's very few relative to the number of miles driven on the drive. How many of those were due to excessive speed, and not simply carelessness or distraction? The city has a cash cow there, and isn't going to give that up.
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Permalink Reply by Filka Bean on
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Excessive speed is carelessness. A skillful driver might be able to avoid a crash at high speed, but everyone has this funny habit of imagining that they’re more skilled than they actually are... I mean, not me, y’know, and obviously not you, but like, other people. Oh well, anyway, what were we talking about? Oh yeah, how The Man is such a jerk not letting us set our own rules! So we think the scooters and ebikes should be totally unlimited, right? Because if 85% of the teenagers racing them feel safe, then...
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Dude, if you’re quoting the article i think you are, in my opinion you’re missing the point: those aren’t no “15 mph over the limit” tickets, those are people driving 40 mph or more above the limit!
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Sure they are. They'll ticket for 5 over on the drive, and for much higher as well. the point being that revenue is a big factor in speed enforcement. Indeed people reach much higher speeds in part where to some people the Drive feels like a 4 lane highway thus they're prone to speed, which works out for the city to generate speeding ticket cash. Small towns deploy a version of this too to raise money writing tickets for 30 in the 25 after people come off a 55 stretch. We didn't invent it, it's just what happens, and yet the per billion mile safety rate continues to improve. Again, with opportunities for more improvement because any mortality or injury is more than we'd want. A big opportunity for improved safety on the Drive and elsewhere is to curtail distracted driving, and some enforcement in this area is coming.
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Permalink Reply by Carter O'Brien on
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Do you have any evidence, stats, etc. backing up the claim they ticket cars going 5 mph on LSD? Even in much of rush hour that would entail ticketing every last vehicle on there, so color me skeptical unless you've got some proof. Police resources are limited, and they don't like to slow down traffic during rush hour by adding gapers block delays.
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See the article - resources of all sorts are of course limited, nevertheless, they manage to generate half such citations from LSD. As for the 5mph thing, that's from the police. I don't encourage running your own experiment and as always, your mileage may vary.
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Can’t tell what “sure they are” refers to. “High-speed tickets” is specific terminology that refers to someone driving 35mph or more above the limit. So on LSD that’s at least 75. Should the drive look less like a highway so drivers feel less entitled? Yes! Should we be opposed to police ticketing these drivers? Hell no! Here’s that article, btw, so everyone can play: https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/breaking/ct-biz-lake-shore-driv...
Re: “we didn't invent it, it’s just what happens”, who is “we” and where in the world did all these roads come from?!? They just sprouted from the earth or what?
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