Road Rage in the Southland

[Shepherd]

Don't you hate it when a motorist won't pull over and swap insurance information with you on the first "bump," and so you have to escalate things? ...lol

 

[BStrong]

You are addressing straw men of your own making.

My argument, we don't know what was in the mind of the driver.
We don't know if he acted reflexively turning into the rider.

Neither of those statements depends on the assertion that technically the biker was no threat to the driver.

I know from this thread that reading the posts of others may confound you, but I didn't expect you not to read your own.

You brought up self defense, you brought up the knife, and you want to know what the difference is between self defense claims involving a firearm or using a car as a defensive weapon.

That's exactly what my post addressed.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I know from this thread that reading the posts of others may confound you, but I didn't expect you not to read your own.

You brought up self defense, you brought up the knife, and you want to know what the difference is between self defense claims involving a firearm or using a car as a defensive weapon.

That's exactly what my post addressed.

So your answer is, you didn't understand my post and my clarifying it with you wasn't enough, you choose to go with your initial misinterpretation? Got it.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

When I observe a rider that has minimal or no safety gear on, it actually gives me a chill.

This story goes back 20 + years and I whipped out the google fu but no link.

Kid gets call from the gf, come over and we'll go swimming.

Shorts, T-shirt, flip flops, helmet, no gloves.

Predictably, kid goes down. No broken bones, low speed, road rash. Kid is treated, the medicos send him home.

Kid lays down. Kid wakes up. High fever. Parents take kid to hospital, kid has rip roaring infection, dies within 48 hours.

Wear protective gear, period.

A few years back I was knocked off by a van driver who changed Lane into me without checking his mirrors and wrote my bike off. The day I picked up my replacement I stopped for petrol and there was a kid of about 16 on what was obviously his first moped with his dad in a car showing him how to fill it with petrol, the kid's in a t shirt and tracksuit bottoms. I went over, I was still wearing the jacket I was wearing in the accident, I pointed out the abrasions all the way down the arm and across the back and told the man how much more damage it would've done to bare skin and that I'd been knocked off at less than 30mph, the same speed the scooter would do unmodified. I said I didn't want to put his son off but suggested he get him to invest in some riding gear. His response was to pretty much tell me to sod off and mind my own business.

 

[Elagabalus]

Don't you hate it when a motorist won't pull over and swap insurance information with you on the first "bump," and so you have to escalate things? ...lol

The problem is, since he fled the scene, we don't know what was actually said and how 'menacing" he was behaving. I think the kid intentionally swerved to hit the motorcyclist but was the kid legitimately fearful of his life at that point?

 

[PhantomWolf]

I've seen a number of videos of motorcycle crashes, etc. and although I realize that many result in death or severe injury, perhaps what surprises me is that not all do. Even with protective clothing and helmets, I would image that being tossed or dumped from a bike at any speed above 15 mph would inevitably put the cyclist into a hospital or morgue. By comparison, many people become seriously injured even when they are belted in a car, surrounded by steel and air bags. How is it that a motorcyclist can fly through the air, skid and roll multiple times on the pavement for 100s of feet, and then stand up? Again, I fully realize that standing up doesn't mean that he individual is not seriously hurt. But they aren't dead.

It has to do with Force loading. If you come off a bike and skid across the road and then come to halt slowly, your body isn't under a huge force load at any point. Most injury will be caused by friction burns, and leathers and a helmet to protect against banging your head on the pavement prevent most serious injuries. If you slide straight into a wall about about 60km/h, then you'll suffer extreme negative acceleration and suffer massive force loading causing serious injuries and/or death.

If you compare this with a PV, people are stopped pretty quickly in PV crashes, either by their safety devices, which are designed to spread the acceleration out and so reduce the force loading, or by whatever they hit, such as the windscreen or dashboard, which will tend to do massive damage.

 

[TheGoldcountry]

If you compare this with a PV, people are stopped pretty quickly in PV crashes, either by their safety devices, which are designed to spread the acceleration out and so reduce the force loading, or by whatever they hit, such as the windscreen or dashboard, which will tend to do massive damage.

Just look at racing. Dramatic crashes that leave pieces of the car for 200 yards, drivers walk away from because the energy was distributed over distance.

Dale Earnhardt went straight into a wall, and died shortly after.

 

[3point14]

But anecdotal evidence suggests many drivers are uncomfortable with, or irritated by, lane-splitting.

My anecdotal research suggests that people are simply upset that someone gets to travel faster than them in traffic.

These people are children. They may look like grown ups, but 'he's now in front of me, wawawa' is not a grown up argument.

 

[3point14]

I will never believe that lane splitting is safe. That's absurd.

You know we're supposed to do critical thinking, right?

You know that the above, almost religious in its absolutism, is the antithesis of critical thinking, right?

 

[BStrong]

A few years back I was knocked off by a van driver who changed Lane into me without checking his mirrors and wrote my bike off. The day I picked up my replacement I stopped for petrol and there was a kid of about 16 on what was obviously his first moped with his dad in a car showing him how to fill it with petrol, the kid's in a t shirt and tracksuit bottoms. I went over, I was still wearing the jacket I was wearing in the accident, I pointed out the abrasions all the way down the arm and across the back and told the man how much more damage it would've done to bare skin and that I'd been knocked off at less than 30mph, the same speed the scooter would do unmodified. I said I didn't want to put his son off but suggested he get him to invest in some riding gear. His response was to pretty much tell me to sod off and mind my own business.

I was approached by a kid who was interested in getting himself a 2004 R1 of the type that got totaled out from under me in 2010.

I knew the whole family. His father and his older brother were both notoriously bad drivers and the youngest wasn't any better. The father worked as an outside salesman for a company. He had so many accidents with the company car he eventually had to drive his personal vehicle otj.

I ask the kid what kind of riding experience he had under his belt, and he hemmed and hawed. I advised him to go to Motorcycle Safety Foundation riding instruction and start out small.

Couple of weeks later, he informs me he's pissed that the dealer he went to for the R1 wouldn't sell him one -which believe it or not is the rule rather than the exception - and he was now looking for a used one...w/ no experience on any type of streetbike he wanted to get on the class leading liter class bike and not even basic MSF training.

He finds an earlier model year used R1 and buys it.

He lasted less than 30 days before crashing (solo vehicle crash) off the side of the mountain on St. route 84. Months in a coma, he eventually came out of it and even though he has got to the point where he can walk, he can't do anything much more complicated than playing checkers w/ his dad.

 

[luchog]

My anecdotal research suggests that people are simply upset that someone gets to travel faster than them in traffic.

These people are children. They may look like grown ups, but 'he's now in front of me, wawawa' is not a grown up argument.

My experience bears this out. I encounter many people on my daily commute who consider it a dire personal insult to have someone merge in front of them on the freeway. Instead of alternating vehicles in a "zipper" pattern on on-ramps or lane merges, they will try to force their way ahead of anyone in the next lane, risking collisions to gain that one extra car length and prevent anyone else from being ahead of them.

Collisions frequently result from this.

When attempting to change lanes, the moment I put on my signal to indicate the lane change, whoever is in the target lane behind me will immediately speed up to prevent me from merging into the lane in front of them, even if they are several car lengths back, and even if it means greatly exceeding the speed limit in order to do so. And don't expect anyone already beside you to drop back and give you space, because it ain't gonna happen. You'll have to slow way down and hope whoever is behind that car will let you in, which is also unlikely to happen. You'll have to hope you'll catch an opening before someone notices you're signaling and moves to block. And finding an opening is far easier said than done, because pretty much everyone is following far too close to be safe, often no more than one car length back, even at full freeway speed. Meanwhile, you're becoming a traffic hazard by driving too slow in the faster lane.

Again, collisions frequently result, and I was hit by one driver who did this. She was a good two lengths back, so I started the merge after having had the signal on for a good 10 seconds at least waiting for a big enough opening in the heavy traffic), and instead of hanging back and slowing a bit, the driver behind me gunned it hoping to block me out, but I was already halfway into the lane, so the driver swerved hard around me on the shoulder, then lost control swerving back and hit me, dragging both of us across the freeway onto the opposite shoulder, with the out-of-control driver hitting someone else along the way (I managed to avoid any further collisions).

I don't think there is a day that goes by in this 30 mile corridor loop where there isn't a collision of some sort. There certainly isn't a week that goes by without several.

 

[3point14]

I was approached by a kid who was interested in getting himself a 2004 R1 of the type that got totaled out from under me in 2010.

I knew the whole family. His father and his older brother were both notoriously bad drivers and the youngest wasn't any better. The father worked as an outside salesman for a company. He had so many accidents with the company car he eventually had to drive his personal vehicle otj.

I ask the kid what kind of riding experience he had under his belt, and he hemmed and hawed. I advised him to go to Motorcycle Safety Foundation riding instruction and start out small.

Couple of weeks later, he informs me he's pissed that the dealer he went to for the R1 wouldn't sell him one -which believe it or not is the rule rather than the exception - and he was now looking for a used one...w/ no experience on any type of streetbike he wanted to get on the class leading liter class bike and not even basic MSF training.

He finds an earlier model year used R1 and buys it.

He lasted less than 30 days before crashing (solo vehicle crash) off the side of the mountain on St. route 84. Months in a coma, he eventually came out of it and even though he has got to the point where he can walk, he can't do anything much more complicated than playing checkers w/ his dad.

I can't imagine getting on a bike like that from nothing and you miss out on four or five iterations of 'wow, this is much faster than the last one' going from a 50 to a 250/350 to a 600 to something R1ish. Each new bike is an experience. Even if you live, if the first one's an R1, that's going to spoil the rest for you, isn't it?

Not that I ride. I have done, but, quite honestly, sod that, these days.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

I was approached by a kid who was interested in getting himself a 2004 R1 of the type that got totaled out from under me in 2010.

I knew the whole family. His father and his older brother were both notoriously bad drivers and the youngest wasn't any better. The father worked as an outside salesman for a company. He had so many accidents with the company car he eventually had to drive his personal vehicle otj.

I ask the kid what kind of riding experience he had under his belt, and he hemmed and hawed. I advised him to go to Motorcycle Safety Foundation riding instruction and start out small.

Couple of weeks later, he informs me he's pissed that the dealer he went to for the R1 wouldn't sell him one -which believe it or not is the rule rather than the exception - and he was now looking for a used one...w/ no experience on any type of streetbike he wanted to get on the class leading liter class bike and not even basic MSF training.

He finds an earlier model year used R1 and buys it.

He lasted less than 30 days before crashing (solo vehicle crash) off the side of the mountain on St. route 84. Months in a coma, he eventually came out of it and even though he has got to the point where he can walk, he can't do anything much more complicated than playing checkers w/ his dad.

In the UK bike licenses are issued on a separate driving test than cars, these days the training requirements are pretty stringent. The downside IMHO is that while my generation tended to buy bikes because they were cheap and you could ride them straight away but youth related financial constraints meant that we started small and slow, rode a lot, and gradually built up to the fast ones. These days people tend to switch to bikes when they can afford an expensive hobby, the graduated licence encourages people to go for big bikes when they pass, as do the bike magazines and of course the whole 'expensive hobby' thing so you tend to have people who have relatively little experience on really fast bikes on occasional sunny weekends when they're trying to show off to their mates. Not necessarily ideal.

 

[Brainster]

I loved dirt bike riding when I was a kid, but having heard too many stories about riders going down on their bikes, I never got into street riding. Reading this thread certainly does not make me regret that decision.

I do ride a bicycle a fair amount, and there my attitude is that everybody is trying to run me over. Fortunately there is a terrific bike path near my house so I only have to ride on a few back streets before picking it up.

 

[KoihimeNakamura]

My experience bears this out. I encounter many people on my daily commute who consider it a dire personal insult to have someone merge in front of them on the freeway. Instead of alternating vehicles in a "zipper" pattern on on-ramps or lane merges, they will try to force their way ahead of anyone in the next lane, risking collisions to gain that one extra car length and prevent anyone else from being ahead of them.

Collisions frequently result from this.

When attempting to change lanes, the moment I put on my signal to indicate the lane change, whoever is in the target lane behind me will immediately speed up to prevent me from merging into the lane in front of them, even if they are several car lengths back, and even if it means greatly exceeding the speed limit in order to do so. And don't expect anyone already beside you to drop back and give you space, because it ain't gonna happen. You'll have to slow way down and hope whoever is behind that car will let you in, which is also unlikely to happen. You'll have to hope you'll catch an opening before someone notices you're signaling and moves to block. And finding an opening is far easier said than done, because pretty much everyone is following far too close to be safe, often no more than one car length back, even at full freeway speed. Meanwhile, you're becoming a traffic hazard by driving too slow in the faster lane.

Again, collisions frequently result, and I was hit by one driver who did this. She was a good two lengths back, so I started the merge after having had the signal on for a good 10 seconds at least waiting for a big enough opening in the heavy traffic), and instead of hanging back and slowing a bit, the driver behind me gunned it hoping to block me out, but I was already halfway into the lane, so the driver swerved hard around me on the shoulder, then lost control swerving back and hit me, dragging both of us across the freeway onto the opposite shoulder, with the out-of-control driver hitting someone else along the way (I managed to avoid any further collisions).

I don't think there is a day that goes by in this 30 mile corridor loop where there isn't a collision of some sort. There certainly isn't a week that goes by without several.

[derail]
I'm goign to assume that's 405. I-5 isn't any better, not that I should be speaking because I don't reliably slow down for people merging if I'm on autopilot. (That and the Port of Tacoma interchanges are tools of some evil star.)

[/derail]

It's been my experience that people just want to get to their point faster, to where they get impatient if you're "only" going 5-10 over. As for bikes.. I've never understood why people get upset. If the biker is lane splitting, good for them if they know what they're doing. Gets them there faster, takes up less space, and frankly, I'd rather people get where they are going rather than get stuck in traffic jams...

 

[BStrong]

The desire to jump on the latest greatest bike tackle w/o any experience or training is definitely a male ego thing.

I know many women riders but have never encountered one that fell victim to that conceit.

I like the idea of a tiered licensing scheme, but if it was in place when I turned 16 I'd have been sure it was some type of a commie plot to keep me off the bike I wanted.

Here's the thing about the 2004 R1.

After I sorted the suspension and brakes, dropped weight through titanium and carbon fiber from the stock 441 pounds wet to 418 pounds and did a minimum amount of tuning, even with my 220 pounds of meat and gear on the bike I had to be careful applying power past the apex of the corner. If I didn't, the back tire would immediately start to spin - "rear wheel" steering is best left to the pros and that leaves me out. I had learned everything I needed to know about post-apex throttle control when I totaled my YZF 750SP at Laguna.

 

[BStrong]

My anecdotal research suggests that people are simply upset that someone gets to travel faster than them in traffic.

These people are children. They may look like grown ups, but 'he's now in front of me, wawawa' is not a grown up argument.

It's a very common reaction and I agree with your observation.

On another website that I hang around there are two general subjects that aren't deemed fit for discussion by the owner and the moderators - conspiracy theories in any flavor, and motorcycle lane sharing.

Either subject seems to bring out the worst in people.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

You know we're supposed to do critical thinking, right?

You know that the above, almost religious in its absolutism, is the antithesis of critical thinking, right?

Yes, let's do some of that critical thinking, shall we.

An assertion is made in the thread, lane-splitting studies show it is safer. The studies looked at injuries. The reason it was safer was because bikes getting rear-ended is so dangerous.

These studies (I looked at these two reports: Motorcycle Lane-splitting and Safety in California and LANE SHARING: A GLOBAL SOLUTION FOR MOTORCYCLE SAFETY) only looked at injuries to the rider. Neither looked at whether lane splitting resulted in fewer accidents. The first study found lane-splitters were more likely to rear-end someone else.

LSM were, on the other hand, more likely to rear-end another vehicle than other riders (38% vs 16%) (Tables 13 and 14).

The assertions being made here that lane-splitting is safer are using studies that looked at rider injuries, not whether or not it's a dangerous practice for the driver with said bike in one's blind spot and too close to one's vehicle.
The studies essentially found if you are on a motorcycle and stuck in traffic, you are better off getting between cars than sitting behind one, risking being plowed into from behind.

Critical thinkers look at the research and verify if it does indeed support the conclusions being asserted. So in this case, the intuitive conclusion that lane splitting isn't safe perhaps should have had the caveat, 'unless there is convincing research to the contrary'. To that I say, these studies don't answer that question. Intuitively as a driver, that lane-splitter is harder for me to see, difficult for me to anticipate they will be there, and my margin of safety is less when they are that close to my car.

The suggestion to pursue critical thinking might just be some advice the adviser needs to also take. Just sayin'

 

[KoihimeNakamura]

Yes, let's do some of that critical thinking, shall we.

An assertion is made in the thread, lane-splitting studies show it is safer. The studies looked at injuries. The reason it was safer was because bikes getting rear-ended is so dangerous.

These studies (I looked at these two reports: Motorcycle Lane-splitting and Safety in California and LANE SHARING: A GLOBAL SOLUTION FOR MOTORCYCLE SAFETY) only looked at injuries to the rider. Neither looked at whether lane splitting resulted in fewer accidents. The first study found lane-splitters were more likely to rear-end someone else.

The assertions being made here that lane-splitting is safer are using studies that looked at rider injuries, not whether or not it's a dangerous practice for the driver with said bike in one's blind spot and too close to one's vehicle.
The studies essentially found if you are on a motorcycle and stuck in traffic, you are better off getting between cars than sitting behind one, risking being plowed into from behind.

Critical thinkers look at the research and verify if it does indeed support the conclusions being asserted. So in this case, the intuitive conclusion that lane splitting isn't safe perhaps should have had the caveat, 'unless there is convincing research to the contrary'. To that I say, these studies don't answer that question. Intuitively as a driver, that lane-splitter is harder for me to see, difficult for me to anticipate they will be there, and my margin of safety is less when they are that close to my car.

The suggestion to pursue critical thinking might just be some advice the adviser needs to also take. Just sayin'

"just saying", sure.

Anyway, those studies.

First study:

Lane-splitting appears to be a relatively safe motorcycle riding strategy if done in traffic moving at 50 MPH or less and if motorcyclists do not exceed the speed of other vehicles by more than 15 MPH. A significant number of motorcyclists lane-split in fast-moving traffic or at excessive
speed differentials. These riders could lower their risk of injury by restricting the environments in which they lane-split and by reducing their speed differential when they do choose to lanesplit.

Huh. (Abstract). Well, maybe the cite you gave alters this somehow, or is a caveat. Looking at the indicated table..

No 4,120 83.8 611 61.3 4,731 80.0
Yes 774 15.7 383

I.. am incredibly unimpressed by that. Maybe it's just me, but that small a sample size makes me want to ask if they did ANY OTHER FACTOR ANALYSIS to make sure there isn't something like speeding, etc.... And I can't tell they did. Well, we have a second study to look at.

Yet, despite significant traffic congestion and a higher number of motorcycles on the roadway, with the high number of motorcycles lane- sharing, the statistics show California has one of the lowest rates of rear-end motorcycle collisions. There are also physical aspects to rider safety
associated with lane-sharing when compared to being stopped in traffic. The physical laws associated with crashes shows that lane-sharing represents a less hazardous crash than being rear-ended. This information provides a strong indication of the safety advantages of lane-sharing. Similarly, European studies indicate that lane-sharing was a factor in less than
1% to 5% of motorcycle crashes

... Well, that seems to argue it's not a bad thing. Imagine that...

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

"just saying", sure.

Anyway, those studies.

First study:

Huh. (Abstract). Well, maybe the cite you gave alters this somehow, or is a caveat. Looking at the indicated table..

I.. am incredibly unimpressed by that. Maybe it's just me, but that small a sample size makes me want to ask if they did ANY OTHER FACTOR ANALYSIS to make sure there isn't something like speeding, etc.... And I can't tell they did. Well, we have a second study to look at.

... Well, that seems to argue it's not a bad thing. Imagine that...

I can't decipher your point(s) here. The larger study did a number of factor analyses from helmut use to speed and so on.

You cite the relative number of accidents that involved lane splitting. That still doesn't tell us how many excess accidents the lane splitting caused. And the one video we do have provides an example that would not be included given the biker ended up not involved but his bike was certainly in the lane splitting position when he kicked the car door.