When Massholes park their cars, they stay parked

Um maybe, but not likely. From my bike seat I tend to see far more cars accelerating through "pink yellow" lights, failing to yield on left or right turns, forcing their way into traffic while blocking traffic in the opposite direction, making left turns after the light is red and more "blocking the box" infractions than I do bikes running lights ... although you probably don't think of that as running red lights, failing to yield, etc. These are all moving violations, even if what "everybody does in their car" is "normal" to you. Just don't try them in Canada or the Northwest.

I challenge you to actually back up your assertions with some factual evidence, like, say, actual research, traffic counts, scientific surveys of cars behaving badly vs. bikes, etc.? I bet you can't, because those streets with heavy car traffic tend to have a lot of these infractions going on all the time. For instance, the asshole who nearly ran me down on Cambridge St. the other morning even though I had a frigging green light and waited for box-blocking vehicles to clear the intersection. He was stopped behind the stop line when his light turned red, he ran the red and blared his horn at me. See! I have lots of anecdata, too!

Then again, cars running red lights kill people, even if the first ten through on red are special in MA. Cyclists running lights tend to kill only themselves.

Now, praytell, stand on a typical busy corner or downtown corner and count the sheep ignoring the walk signals and wandering mindlessly into the path of cars and bikes and each other. You can't pick and choose which mode you are going to do enforcement on - or single out cyclists because, well "bikes are bad peeeeopollllllle".

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Speeding too

By alex - 5/27/11 - 12:45 pm

#6

You left out speeding. That has to be the most commonly violated law for car drivers. There are some roads where you would be hard pressed to find a single driver sticking to the posted speed limit.

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Boston is pedestrian unfriendly

By chicken - 5/27/11 - 1:21 pm

#7

I agree, the priority of enforcement between modes should be based on the relative danger. Cars can be highly lethal, followed by motorcycles/scooters, bicycles, and then pedestrians (they could trample someone!).

Now perhaps people in Boston wouldn't ignore pedestrian signals if they were actually designed and worked correctly. The fact of the matter is that this city's traffic infrastructure is highly unfriendly to pedestrians. I've lost count of the number of times I see all crossing cars stopped at a red light, but the "Don't Walk" signal is still up. How can I believe that the pedestrian signal is correct when I can clearly see that it is safe to cross? Why are pedestrians relegated to second-class status, being forced to push a button if they desire to "legally" cross even the tiniest of streets in this city? And that's assuming the button and signals work -- oftentimes they don't. Pushing the button and waiting and wondering if it works or not -- endlessly frustrating.

I think that the planners in this city forget that cities are first and foremost meant for people to inhabit, not as places for cars to congregate.

I visited Chicago recently. Whatever you may think of the place, I really appreciated this: there are no Walk-signal buttons. Every intersection in the city has a Walk portion in every cycle of the signals. The design was incredibly consistent too, and it was shockingly clean (in the parts I walked, anyhow). Not to mention: cars actually stopped at red lights. We could learn a thing or two from them.

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I walk past that parking lot

By chicken - 5/27/11 - 1:22 pm

#8

I walk past that parking lot quite often. Every time I do I think: it doesn't belong here. Brighton Ave between Allston Village and Union Sq has quite a bit of foot-traffic. Get that parking lot bullshit out of the city and into the suburbs.

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Seriously?

By Stewart - 5/27/11 - 4:09 pm

#9

I walk past this parking lot all the time myself. We're talking like eight parking spaces and a drive-thru lane. What, pray tell, would we do with all the vast real estate getting rid of it would open up? Ooh, maybe another nail salon! Or hey, howzabout another mobile phone store? Fun!