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More than 100 bicyclists honor memory of bike rider killed in Cambridge crash
By adamg on Sun, 11/18/2018 - 2:37pm
The procession from the Meng Jin ghost bike ceremony to #WDoR2018 as 100+ riders take the lane and bring visibility to vulnerability. A stalled plan would have brought bike lanes here before this month’s fatal crash. #VisionZero pic.twitter.com/4NuZnAhuj2
— BostonCyclistsUnion (@bostonbikeunion) November 18, 2018
Meng Jin died on Nov. 9.
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Comments
A very diverse crowd much
A very diverse crowd much like crowds at a Boston protest. In all seriousness I hope Boston area drivers can slow down.
Yes, about those diverse crowds
Have you taken a look at the 31 new Republican members of the House? In all seriousness, I hope they can put the country first instead of supporting a treasonous buffoon who wants us to go rake leaves in forests.
Sounds kind of stupid, no? Right up there with your faux concern about diversity.
7 cyclists have died this year.
7 cyclists were killed in crashes with motor vehicles this year in Massachusetts. The youngest was 4; two were in their 50s and two in their 70s. A variety of genders and races as well.
So there's your diversity. Does that make you feel better?
Please explain
How can you tell from the photo?
Ponder this: Massachusetts is diverse. It is not Majority Minority. Those are two different things. Figure that out.
Wow
With that sort of repartee, I'm sure you'll be graduating to the big kid table at Thanksgiving dinner in...oh, eight or nine years.
In all seriousness I hope
In all seriousness I hope Boston area cyclists can speed up.
When batteries allow bicycles to cruise at the speed of traffic, then every lane becomes a bicycle lane.
Um...
You mean motors. Batteries add weight and slow bikes down. Motors add kinetic energy and speed bikes up.
Then again, they're not bikes at that point either. At best they're "e-bikes" or "pedelecs".
The new ghost bike
#ResponsibilityOverHashtagSlogans
Safety over speed? This happened at a red light, didn't it?
Vision Zero is about as grass roots and local over here as the same thing is in Los Angeles.
Crash not accident? Meaningless distinction. Not even applicable here if the accident happened starting from a dead stop.
World Day? As someone who has seen at least some of the world outside or 128, I can tell you that out there, people are taught to look both ways before crossing the street and to refrain from loitering in the blind spots of other vehicles whether they are on foot, on a bicycle, or in a barely street legal war surplus armored personnel carrier.
Do you know why there are more and more ghost bikes going up around here? It's not because drivers are behaving worse or because they're out to score some kill marks under their windows. It's because lots and lots of people are being given the idea that they can ride their bikes in traffic without being required to complete safety training and demonstrate proficiency the way motorists are.
This would be bad enough but it's also true that a good portion of this cohort of people are also entitled and arrogant in their temperament and expect to have to take no responsibility for their own safety. So they ride without lights, without helmets, weave in and out of moving traffic, fail to yield for pedestrians, and it's no surprise that a fraction of them that's more than zero pay for it with their lives.
Militants like the Boston Cyclist Union egging them on and reassuring them that the right approach is to make noise and issue demands and that it's someone else's fault do not help the situation. It will lead to more ghost bikes, not fewer.
Smugly Wrong About Everything
As someone who has ACTUALLY seen the world outside of 128, I can tell you the amount of bike safety infrastructure in Western European countries like Denmark and the Netherlands puts this country to shame. Also, there are no fools like you blaming the victims for not wearing a helmet, since very few cyclists in their cities wear helmets.
The only reason why more cyclists are getting killed and injured is because there are more cyclists and very little bike infrastructure. It's not because of the moral failings of the cyclists.
Meng Jin was apparently right hooked at an intersection by a truck with no side guards. We don't know anything else about the accident at this point, because even the police apparently don't know as eye-witnesses and the preliminary police report differ.
Your pattern of blaming victims for their own demise is absolutely disgusting, compounded by the fact that you know absolutely nothing about which you're spouting. I would suggest you keep your lazy, ill-informed pathologies to yourself to spare yourself further embarrassment in a public forum, but I can see you have no shame.
Blind spots
Are called blind spots for a reason.
And...
...motorists are responsible for checking their blind spots. What's that you say? Can't be done? Yes, it can. Every competent driver was taught how to do this in driver's ed.
Bikes in Boston
Ok, I have to agree with Pete X when he says that the US is woefully behind European countries like the Netherlands and Denmark when it comes to bicycle infrastructure. The thing is, I don't see the US realistically adopting Euro style bike infrastructure anytime in my lifetime (I'm 43). I have read numerous horrible stories of people tragically dying in bike accidents that wouldn't have happened if we did have Euro style bike friendly infrasturcture here in Boston in UHub over the years. I would love to be able to ride a bike across the city for my daily commute, but alas that would not be very pragmatic for me as I enjoy life and don't want to end it prematurely, so I chose to confine my bike riding to a relaxing ride along the Southwest Corridor bike path once or twice a year. With that said, I would gladly pay some kind of car or gas tax if I were confident that the proceeds would be spent on building Euro style bike infrastructure here in Boston, at which time I would start riding on the new BBX(Boston Bike Expressway) everyday to work. As a result I would hopefully get in better shape from riding every day, lose the spare tire, and maybe even get laid more. Wishful thinking all around?
Political Not Practical Problem
Implementing safe infrastructure requires sustained political pressure and leadership. The mayor of Sevilla, Spain implemented a network of protected bike lanes in 18 months because he made it a political priority. Mayor Marty "car guy" Walsh needs to change his tune.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/jan/28/seville-cycling-capital-s...
And what a wonderful network it is!
I was there in October and it was simply amazing infra. You can clearly see where the took existing parking and said to hell with this, two-way bike lane. And its not on every street but its setup well enough to provide a safe network for people to get around on.
That's exactly the kind of
That's exactly the kind of thing I'm talking about. I would totally support something like that here in Boston. I like bikes a lot, but I don't feel safe riding around Boston the way it's set up today so I drive- I don't want a ghost bike with my name on it. I would be the next Lance Armstrong if the proper infrastructure was in place and I would not grovel about paying some kind of additional tax to get it. Lots of other people I talk to feel the same. In the meantime, I'll be driving where I need to go.
Infrastructure is Key
I don't fault you for driving @PeyoteEatingWaterBear, I biked all the time when I lived in DC. Now that I'm back in Boston, I've only biked a handful of times. The difference is that DC has installed bike infrastructure in a far more systematic way than Boston.
@spin_o_rama, I'm glad the Sevilla network works as well as the article says!
Always the same smoke screen
Never concede anything, divert attention away from the point being argued (cyclists' belligerent refusal to take responsibility for their own safety given the facts on the ground here), question the morality that of the guy making the point, and end with a nonsequitor about "victim blaming."
Guess what, snowflake: blaming the victim is perfectly reasonable if the victim's actions caused the accident. If I shoot myself in the foot while at the firing range, it's not the gun maker's fault for making an unsafe gun, it's not the NRA's fault for defending the second amendment, and it's not the RSO's fault for letting me in: it's my fault for failing to be safe with a dangerous instrument.
Hmm, did I make the sociopathic victim-blamer angry?
First off, you clearly don't know what non-sequitur means, which is quite ironic for someone claiming to be a "roman."
Next, you took a post on the memorial of a cyclist struck dead by a dump truck (where, again, it's not clear HOW he died) as a chance to lecture us on the perceived behavioral failings of the cycling community. Therefore, it is quite a reasonable "sequitur" to say you are victim blaming. Then IN THE VERY NEXT SENTENCE you defend victim blaming by name! Seriously, guy, I warned you about embarrassing yourself, but you just can't help yourself can you?
Finally, "snowflake"!? Hahahahaha
Keep going, you're almost there
Using your own words of course, if you hit a cyclist with a car, it's your fault for failing to be safe with a dangerous instrument.......your car! See how that works, you keep digging and digging into your logical fallacies that it eventually bites your entire argument in the ass.
so fake, roman
The whole point of calling it a crash, is because when you take responsibility for your car it doesn't crash into anything. Hardly a meaningless distinction.
The whole point is to deny that safety is a shared responsibilit
I take responsibility for looking where I'm going and checking my mirrors and blind spots when turning or changing lanes at a cadence that does not diminish my cognizance of what's in front of me. You must take responsibility for not entering my blind spot or sneaking up on my side faster than I can be expected to see you, and for having lights on at night so that I can see you when I do check my blind spots and mirrors.
Nope
You have full responsibility for where your car goes. Full stop.
And you have full responsibility for not getting yourself killed
by deliberately choosing to be careless and jumping in front of my car.
Exactly the kind of belligerent irresponsibility I'm talking about.
You have a problem with responsibility, don't you
Seems like everything is always everyone else's fault - can't ever be that YOU FAIL.
Yep. Classic sociopathy.
You have a problem with responsibility, don't you
Seems like everything is always everyone else's fault - can't ever be that YOU FAIL.
Yep. Classic sociopathy.
True.
But if I position myself on my bike in your blind spot, Swirls, would it still be your fault if you could not see me, hit me and killed me? No. It would not.
Actually
It would be her fault and she seems to know that.
Read your driving manual for more information. Massachusetts even puts it on line for your convenience.
Yes. Yes it would.
Blind spots are not "places the driver can't see so the driver doesn't have to worry about." They're places the driver can't see so the driver does have to worry about. A safe, law-abiding driver would make sure that his or her blind spots were clear before making any maneuver on the roadway, just the same way as a driver on the Turnpike makes sure there's no one approaching over his or her shoulder before changing lanes.
This "blind spot excuse" business is just nonsense.
As for MGL, it's plainly spelled out in 90§14
Blind spots are your responsibilty.
By the way, the technology exists to prevent a truck from having any blind spots, it's just that corporations don't care about safety. Side guards would have helped as well.
Term of art
Use by transportation professionals. It has NOTHING to do with some soros-sponsored bike lobby lighting fires for high speed rail Q-conspiracy theory.
Source: my son works summers in traffic an safety at DOT. Drilled it in to everyone's head: CRASH not accident.
Yeah whatever
You're as trustworthy a judge as a vegan at a chili cook off.
Another source
Honey, teh googly works fine too:
https://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/newsroom/crash-not-accident
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/23/science/its-no-accident-advocates-wan...
http://www.atsip.org/ANSI_Ver_2017_D16.pdf
Professionals in the industry, darling. Sorry if that doesn't jibe with your feelings.
Much noise.
Signifying nothing.
Facts
Are Scary
Much data
Facts, WOW!
click the links?
or just throw a tantrum?
It doesn't mean anything to you that federal and state transportation agencies use this designation?
Says the guy
who likes to pop into the Nazi thread to defend the Nazis.
So silly, cinna..
Let's break this down: "Is because when you take responsibility for your car it doesn't crash into anything."
How about if your car slides on black ice and you hit someone and cause a, um, crash? There is nothing you could do about it, right? So how do you take responsibility? Not driving during the winter? Or during bad weather? Or is that an accident?
How about if your car has a mechanical breakdown and you, um, crash into another car? I guess that is an accident or am I wrong? Is it a crash? Or how about if a cyclist or a pedestrian walks right out in front of our car and you could not stop in time and hit that person?
This whole "crash vs accident" rhetoric started because bike zealots can't seem to acknowledge that some cyclists may make errors in judgement.
responsibility is silly?
Actually all of those examples are preventable. While it is not unusual for adults to ignore weather reports, and vehicle inspections, they do so by choice, not by accident. Why is personal responsibility only for people other than you?
Yes, and
In all of those cases you would register an at-fault incident and your insurance rates would increase, and a police officer could certainly write you a ticket (operating too fast for conditions, following too close, failure to yield to pedestrians, etc).
And if there is some sort of mechanical issue that causes a crash (the mob cuts your brake lines, or something?) then you might not be at fault, but someone else would be.
a confession
cut break lines and black ice are something I know about. Once my brakes were cut. I rolled through a stop and hit a cab from behind. The cab left, never reported it. I didn't know my brakes were cut until midas told me. So I have no idea what would have happened if the cab had not left the scene. I now know what it looks like when your brake lines are cut. But clearly the person that cut my brakes is responsible.
In separate incident, I spun out on black ice and took out a street light. My car was totaled and a state police officer wrote me a ticket for speed exceeding conditions. The officer called me and told me I would beat it. (yes, weird) He did not show to the hearing so the ticket was dismissed. I appealed the insurance fault, and at that hearing the city of xxx was found responsible for not clearing the road. I was surprised at the outcome despite the fact that i asked for it. I had appealed the points to gain time, so that other points could expire. It was my insurance rep, and the state board guy; the town did not send anyone. I think my insurance was happy to not have to pay for the light pole. Insurance paid off the loan, so i did lose my down payment at least. It was a humbling experience to come so close to losing my license, and I am a much more careful safe driver now.
Despite these examples i can't pretend that either incident were accidents.
A crash only requires one moving object
Roman wrote:
You'd better take that argument up with Merriam-Webster. They seem to think that all that's need for the verb "crash" to be applicable is a minimum of one moving object striking one or more other objects, regardless of whether or not the other objects are moving:
- Merriam-Webster Dictionary: "crash"
Either that, or unlike Meng Jin (who was reportedly stationary at a red light when he was struck and killed by a truck driver), the tree in the Merriam-Webster example was in motion.
(Or is your point that, at the time the truck operator crushed Meng Jin's life out of his body, the truck was moving so slowly that "crash" isn't applicable? If so, would #crUshnotaccident or #lowspeedcrashnotaccident work for you?)
That having been said, the term "crash" doesn't necessarily assign blame to a given party involved in a collision. It just removes the implication that all collisions are "accidents" which couldn't have been prevented. It's possible for road design, faulty machinery (brakes, traffic lights, etc), operator(s) (of motor vehicles, bicycles, etc), and other factors to be responsible for a crash.
Ironically, the rest of your comment actually backs this view: You repeatedly assert that pedestrians and bicyclists who are injured or killed in collisions with motor vehicles are to blame for their own fate. ie: You seem to be suggesting that many such "accidents" were not at all "accidental" but rather were the entirely preventable result of human beings making poor decisions. Sounds like the perfect argument for #crashnotaccident to me.
https://www.crashnotaccident.com/
Ahhh, there's the 9:45!
Right on time, Roman showing his sociopathic tendencies. We're trying to have a civilization here, asshole. Your stench is not welcome.
Ok, now I usually don't agree with ROMAN on much
However, this:
"It's because lots and lots of people are being given the idea that they can ride their bikes in traffic without being required to complete safety training and demonstrate proficiency the way motorists are."
is something I can almost agree with. Not sure if "lots and lots" of people are being given the idea, et. al., but I digress. Look, there are just too many areas in the city where it will never be safe to ride - period. You are not going make every stretch of city road safe for bikes. If you are on a bike, you do not position yourself anywhere near a vehicle with blind spots like a truck or a bus (especially where you can get right hooked). All these save the streets for bikes and other various bike nonprofits would better serve their bike riding public if they would warp back to reality, ditch the silly "crash vs accident' rhetoric, get off their soap boxes, and acknowledge, on some level, the aforesaid. Sometimes bike riders make mistakes in judgement (like all of us) and sometimes it may lead to their deaths. It is not victim blaming. It is creating teachable moments from tragedy so it will not happen to another.
When I bike commuted into the city way back when, a big portion of a fledgling bike organization's mission was...wait for it...bike safety or how to ride in traffic without getting killed. Folks wrote books on the subject. Now, there are plenty of websites that teach the same thing.
Please, for the love of whatever, take some responsibility, acknowledge reality and educate your bike riding public on best bike riding practices. And, you want to get cars off the road? Use some of your political muscle to advocate for a world class public transit system.
Or one can continue to do the same old, same old and continue to paint some old bikes white.
Go back to your wealthy suburb
And read your driving manual.
Cyclists are not the problem. Drivers are the problem.
sigh
This is why you bike advocates are not doing yourselves any favors. Handy summary of MA law as it pertains to bikes:
Your responsibilities: you MUST do these things
How many times a day does anyone downtown see the first and third being routinely ignored? Until that changes, cyclists AND drivers are the problem. And don't start with the friggin' 2,000-lb death machine shtick, we all know the stakes are higher for motor vehicles. But the law is the law, and Masshole cyclists are doing their part to contribute to unsafe road conditions as are Masshole drivers. But until the advocates on this forum can admit that, it just makes it hard for me personally to want to take up their cause
As for the third, almost
As for the third, almost never see that ignored.
As for the second that is completely untrue. Signals are recommended but not required.
Source?
What is the source for this summary?
Several things you list as "laws" are wrong.
Several others? Cyclists are as or more compliant than motorists (its massholes all the way down).
Note that the right of way laws regarding pedestrians are the same as those for motor vehicles - as in "you can't step out in front of a cyclist proceeding on a GREEN light and whine about bikes running red lights when you are "OMG ALMOST HIT ME" startled from your screenstaring".
as you wish
https://www.massbike.org/laws
First thing that popped up on google, and from a bike advocacy website, so I had no reason to question it. If anything is inaccurate, feel free to take it up with them. Really, the very first bullet is the main point I was making anyway.
....aaand you are making my point. You just can't admit that the way people behave on bikes in this town is pretty much the same as motorists: get where you are going as fast as possible, traffic laws be damned. I observe this firsthand every single day.
And I'm well aware of your last line and it has nothing to do with the point I was making.
MOS & Science
I actually "benefited" from the Diverse "Demonstration / Protest/???" that took place in a traffic lane in front of the Museum of Science yesterday. Around 12:30 PM I was on my way to park in the MOS garage and do my MOS Volunteer thing -- there was a slight delay in making my way through the two intersections and the turn in the MOS driveway. But no matter -- the real reason for this post is that our education system has failed terribly to educate us in what really is important.
In the Real World there are only a few Laws that Really Matter -- Not in the sense of Right & Wrong conduct in a Civil Society -- but rather in Survival of the Soft & Squishy [e.g. People]
These Laws that Matter are all about Matter and Energy -- if you Break these Laws you could end up as a statistic -- as in Dead!
There are Important Practical Corollaries of Newtons's Laws for the average human to understand
These latter also Most Important Laws will be left to time when the next appropriate unfortunate violation occurs
The cyclist didn’t break any
The cyclist didn’t break any laws physical otherwise. Another vote for killing people.
Not all Boston roads are safe
Not all Boston roads are safe for bicycles. Bicyclists should ride on side streets when this is the case.
That's nice
Now try to get to work that way.
Do you have any idea...
...where EXACTLY this crash took place?
ummm... at a bridge that
ummm... at a bridge that connects three bike paths and multiple parks?