My wife works at the hospital next door and heard the crash from the 3rd floor.  She thought it was two cars in a horrible accident and it turned out it was A BICYCLIST.  He was apparently in bad condition and unconscious.  I'm not interested in any nasty posts about drivers, just want to see if anyone has any info to pass along.  

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I hope that the cyclist can make a good recovery from his/her injuries and that someone was a witness.

Sadly, this just in.

Sad news.

yeah I read that too. So sad.

Kevin C said:

Sadly, this just in.

Also a piece in DNAinfo today.

Complete with gratuitous helmet reference.

Tony Adams 7 mi (dirtbag hipstr) said:

Also a piece in DNAinfo today.

Too much of this shit happens. My friends sister got hit by a CTA bus this morning. She is ok though. Stay safe out there guys.

This poor Hispanic person with no helmet and probably no insurance was taken to a hospital further away after hitting the 1999 Satan car when there was one right at the corner, maybe they did not have urgent care, hmmm.

What h' says, and I believe one article I read said that he was taken to OLR immediately, but transferred to Illinois Masonic.
 
h' 1.0 said:

Ill Masonic is the designated trauma center for that part of town-- OLR would not be well-equipped to deal with that sort of injury.

Juan 2-8 mi. said:

This poor Hispanic person with no helmet and probably no insurance was taken to a hospital further away after hitting the 1999 Satan car when there was one right at the corner, maybe they did not have urgent care, hmmm.

I think I pulled up this morning right after it happened. If it was the 36 bus on Clark just north of Fullerton. She was visibly shook up and her face was bleeding. Another biker witnessed it and left her info. I gave her a rag for the bleeding. I believe it was Ethan from Active Trans that pulled up a few minutes later and stayed with her. 

Jason W said:

Too much of this shit happens. My friends sister got hit by a CTA bus this morning. She is ok though. Stay safe out there guys.

One thing that I have learned is to use criticism wisely, if ever.  Often, the critic is really on their own "trip".  Often, the criticized person becomes argumentative.

However, regarding this current topic, I feel compelled to speak out.  I was going to my doctor’s office -more on this later- in the corner building Monday afternoon.  Though the cyclist was gone everything else was still there.  The bicycle was totally smashed and the cars windshield had about a 8 inch across deep round dent dead center.

Now as to my being there; it was a follow up visit, required as a result of my being hit by a car in early July, and spending 2 days in Illinois Masonic, which by the way is an excellent hospital, that does get a lot of bicycle related injuries.

I’m physically messed up, but thanks to my now smashed up helmet my head injuries are not major, and I hope to be back on my bike eventually.

My point is: Helmet or not, it’s your choice.  But, just because I don’t call you an idiot, to your face, doesn’t mean I don’t think you are one.

Yes, Rich, I did stop yesterday, I'm so glad that she was OK (mostly). Someone (maybe you) had handed her Crash Support Hotline info and I'm glad we talked her into calling.  

Several people on bikes had stopped and one saw the crash and offered her info as a witness. I'm glad that people wanted to help.

I'm also glad that she took the most important steps that our Hotline outlines:

1. Call 911, file a police report so there's a record.

2. Get witnesses and their information.

2. Get medical treatment no matter what, you don't know if there is damage that will show up later and getting treatment right away keeps it part of the record.

3. Call crash support hotline. Our staff and volunteers are there to to help guide you through reporting, legal and insurance q's and referrals and more.

And I was saddened to hear about Rafael's tragic death. Another death, another statistic. Another person who won't be going home to family and friends.

Univision contacted us to do a story about Rafael and bike safety. 

Active Trans certainly agrees with the direction of comments in this thread about helmet references and inequitable thoughts/treatment of people of color, so I wanted to share some background about our approach and preparation for interviews like this.

We didn't want this to be a story about "bikers" making mistakes and it's their fault they die.

1. Talked to reporter and educated her on challenging culture of crash reporting (both police and news media), including pushing her to appropriately say crash (preventable by choices people make) instead of accident (no one is at fault, these things just happen), that referencing helmet has no barring on story or tragic result, that a person (someone with family and friends) won't be going home, that there are other unreported or unwitnessed factors that could come into play (speeding, distracted driving, etc.), that people who are driving can also make choices to keep people safe and that with the disproportionate gap in people biking vs driving that people driving bear great responsibility to respect/yield/keep safe the more vulnerable people on the street (those walking and biking). 

2. Reviewed intersection with our planning team to determine if there were any facility/intersection challenges that we could point to. Fairly standard, nothing of note in this area for this situation.

3. Reviewed/practiced our crash and safety messages with education team.

4. Educated/pushed reporter again onsite and executed interview.

I don't speak spanish but the final result seems to be in line with what we hoped. My quotes reference both driving and biking for safety tips.

http://univisionchicago.univision.com/videos/video/2013-07-24/se-es...

Thanks,

Ethan Spotts, Active Trans

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