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Two bicyclists injured in separate crashes just 11 minutes apart on Brattle Street in Cambridge
By adamg on Wed, 08/02/2023 - 2:31pm
Cambridge Police report that a driver turning left onto Mason Street from Brattle Street slammed into a bicyclist around 8:54 a.m. yesterday.
The bicyclist hit the front of the vehicle and landed on the hood of the vehicle. The bicyclist suffered injuries to their left shoulder, and scrapes on their legs. The bicyclist was transported to the hospital for further evaluation. The motorist was issued a citation, and a crash report was taken.
That crash happened just 11 minutes after police also had to return to a less injuring crash at Brattle and Appleton streets, where a bicyclist apparently ran a stop sign and right into the driver's side door of a car. The bicyclist suffered facial injuries but declined medical attention, police say, adding officers issued no citations.
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Comments
Wow
First Case - Car driver at fault - Citation.
Second Case - Bicyclist at fault - No Citation
Not good CPD. Not good.
Meh
In both cases the rider was injured and the driver was fine. The injuries of the person who ran the sign are punishment enough in my book provided they covered any damage to the car.
Agree that no citation is no big deal
Agree with BostonDog that a citation isn't really necessary, but it is also possible for a citation to be mailed later, especially when the apparently responsible party was the one who was injured. It's not uncommon to mail a citation to an injured driver; bicyclists surely deserve the same consideration ...
This a problem because, what, exactly?
Car at fault: seriously injured bicyclist, could have killed them. Citation.
Bicycle at fault: injured bicyclist, car driver fine. No citation.
There is an order-of-magnitude difference in potential harm between a vehicle weighing 4000+ pounds with a top speed of 100 mph and one weighing 200 pounds and a top speed of 20 with the wind.
Laws for thee
Don’t think the second cyclist necessarily needed a citation, but there does have to be some acknowledgment that anyone riding in or on any kind of vehicle needs to take traffic rules seriously. There is no comparison to the damage a car can do to a cyclist- it’s a whole different wheelhouse — but please , cyclists, do the bare minimum with signs and lights. They’re there for a reason , and that reason protects you as well.
And you don't think the injuries covered that acknowledgement?
I'm pretty sure that bike rider knows quite well at this point to be more careful riding through an intersection controlled by stop signs.
I mean, to a large extent
I mean, to a large extent they're there because the rules were written for cars and non-motorized vehicles got included as an afterthought. For bikes to treat red lights and stop signs the same as cars doesn't really make sense, and the Idaho Stop has been shown to be safer. But still, the Idaho Stop doesn't say that bikes can just completely ignore red lights or stop signs entirely, and yielding to crossing traffic is just an obviously good idea.
No
Both people at fault ran stop signs.
Don't give me this "weight / force" shit.
Anyone who agrees with you is a hypocrite.
Officer discretion
So, you believe that officers should not be able to use their discretion?
As long as the cyclist pays for the damage...
...then I'm good.
FWIW, I'm an avid cyclist and really have been enjoying these cooler, dry days......
Hypo to separate you from your bike rage
Someone is carelessly swinging a wiffleball bat and hits someone (likely no injury, perhaps a sprained wrist for the bat swinger).
Someone is carelessly firing a gun and hits someone (likely severe injury).
They are both "at fault." Should we treat them similarly?
Different things are different
This may shock you but different things are different, and hitting someone with a several thousand pound vehicle is a materially different thing than hitting someone with primarily your own weight. That isn’t hypocritical at all to say. Bikes aren’t cars and the equivalence between them is what is hypocritical.
Bad motorists kill other people
Bad cyclists kill themselves.
Get out of your car - your brain is going soft. There is no statistical case to be made for expending resources on the latter when the damage done by the former is extreme.
nope
The first crash was a left turn that didn't have the right of way. Unless you were there, you can't say whether the driver also failed to stop at the stop sign.
As for the 2nd crash, you are forgetting something. While the officer was present at the scene about 50 drivers rolled through the same stop sign. So unless the officers stop and cite every single one, fairness is not an issue here.
Seems like its a huge improvement, actually
In 99% of these cases, it's "no citation", so we're already up 1 citation more than usual.
Most of my Boston travelling is via bike
If I ran a stop sign / red light on my bike and caused a crash, I'd certainly expect some form of punishment for causing that crash, just as I would if I were driving a car.
I see all the hatred towards cyclists on this site and it's mainly because of cyclists not obeying traffic rules. I always stop at intersections with signs or lights specifically because I don't want to get run over while crossing the street - I don't quite get why so many people just breeze on through.
That said, there are plenty of incredibly confusing intersections where I'm not sure what the goal of the bike infrastructure is. Do I enter the left-hand turn lane with regular traffic, then get honked at because oncoming traffic thinks I'm just gonna gun it? Am I expected to cross on a standard green and then wait again to take the left? If it's a 3-way intersection and I could just keep going straight, does the light actually apply to me?
The infrastructure is definitely confusing in places.
I generally use the left hand lane. I’d rather be harassed but not run over than not seen and run over. But every situation is different.
I don’t think most people complaining that cyclists don’t obey rules of the road designed for motor vehicles honestly care about that. It’s just that they resent the rising resistance to motor chauvinism and know they can’t openly whine about having to share the road. They’d be beyond apoplectic if police actually started enforcing drivers to follow the rules of the road.
Well at least you were honest here
https://www.universalhub.com/comment/936783#comment-936783
This was bound to happen.
I could have predicted this exact type of crash at Mason and Brattle. There's a reason why the first principle of road design is to have everyone stay to the right. Putting a two-way bike lane on the left side of the road forces bicyclists into left-turning drivers' blind spots, in a place nobody is conditioned to check.
They can declare this to be a Cycling Safety Improvement Project but that doesn't mean it's actually safer than what was there before. This is going to happen again and again unless the bike lane is redesigned. I'm not sure what to do myself. Brattle was the most convenient route to that part of Cambridge and beyond, but I'm not comfortable biking in the new cycle tracks, especially eastbound.
There are brand new bike lanes here
and this isn't a good start for them.
Bike lanes don't help with intersections, though.
Left-hooks and running red lights need other solutions... :-/
(Bike lanes can make some of these problems *worse*, in fact, although I don't know the specifics of these crashes in particular.)
And yet intersections are where most bike/car
Intersections are where most bike/car crashes occur.
Protected intersections
The Massachusetts Separated Bike Lane Planning & Design Guide covers protected intersections. The only intersection I can think of that meets those standards though is Inman square post reconstruction. We desperately need more of these, I truly do not understand why they aren’t included with protected lanes as a matter of course. Instead bike lanes here usually just peter out at intersections, which reflects that whenever there is a conflict with car infrastructure and bike infrastructure the car still wins.
Route 9 around Brookline Village
There are protected intersections on Route 9 between the fire house and the J-way overpass. They're terrible. There are no working loop detectors for bikes, nor are there manual actuators, so the bike signals never activate. If you want to actually get through the intersection you either have to dismount and cross as a pedestrian, ride in traffic (which is what I do) or ride through against the bike signal when you think it's clear and hope no overtaking motorists flatten you when they come screaming around the turn.
Poor design?
Design of the bike lane at Mason and Brattle may be a factor here.
I've been through the intersection several times since the bike lane was installed, but only as a passenger in a vehicle driven by someone else.
"The bicyclist hit the front of the vehicle and landed on the hood of the vehicle." Sounds like the bicyclist slammed into the car, not vice versa.
Cars going east on Brattle have a stop sign, and their only option is to turn left onto Mason. All other streets are one-way (for cars) coming into the intersection.
Bicycles going east on Brattle are in a segregated lane about 15 feet to the left of the cars that are going the same way. Most bicyclists want to continue east on Brattle, so their path conflicts with the cars turning left onto Mason.
I'm not sure if the eastbound bike lane has a stop sign. Logic says that it should.
If there is no stop sign for the bikes, then that would be a major contributing factor for this accident.
If there is a stop sign, but the bicyclist didn't stop, then the bicyclist is at fault.
If the bicyclist did stop, then the design would still be an issue. When you have two parallel lanes of traffic, both with stop signs, who has the right of way? It's not clear. Yes, logic says that the bike should have right of way, since the car is turning left. But factor in the visibility: The bike is approaching the intersection from behind the car, and 15 feet to the left of it. In order to see the bike, the motorist who pauses at the stop sign must crane his/her neck backwards and to the left. That's not something that most motorists would expect to do.
Plus, since the cars must all turn left, motorists may not be aware that bikes have the straight-through option.
Even if the bicyclist technically has the right of way, if the motorist can't easily see the bike, then the design is at fault.
New Brattle bike lanes
Are amazing and have made my commute infinitely better... But being detached from traffic only makes the new (and totally unannounced outside of the second phase planning documents I'm sure EVERYONE totally read like I did!) stop at Appleton and the semi new (as of last fall) Mason configuration more problematic when you suddenly thrust into being part of traffic.
Half of cyclists have no clue what to do with these parallel stop signs, or don't want to figure it out, and just gun it rather than hesitate, which means all the drivers fall in to three categories:
1) Expect cyclists to run it and resent it, making it into a asphalt turf war.
2) Expect cyclists to gun it and turn it into a game of hesitant inching and flailing of arms (oh and by the way, if you have that damn tint kit I have no effing clue what you are gesturing!)
3) wait shit that was a bike lane? There was a stop sign? Why are there bikes? Why is this person on my hood?
Again, the bike lanes are great, but these designs warp whether a bike is a vehicle following the same rules of the road or not. Legally they are, and street designers expect it, but with these protected facilities so many cyclists and drivers aren't really sure what's going on when they meet.
It’s good that the driver in the first crash …..
…. was given a citation at least. They often aren’t.
But they should not be allowed to drive until a judge decides they are competent to do so again.
In the second crash, a verbal warning should have been sufficient. It’s unlikely the cyclist will do that again. The pain and possible scarring from their facial injuries should insure that. The driver may have been spooked even if their car received no damage. But would it be worth it to sue for that?
No damage in the second crash?
The bicyclist ran a stop sign (all too common) and right into the side of the car. Dents and scrapes for sure and likely the bicyclist doesn’t have any insurance. Probably sticking the driver with the bill just like City Councilor Lara did to that elderly homeowner.
you sound desperate. A dent
you sound desperate. A dent really?
Desperate for what?
You damage someone else’s property, you pay to fix it. The bicycle entitlement is mind boggling that you’re suggesting the driver just say no problem when a bicyclist ran a stop sign directly into a moving car. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize there absolutely is at least a large dent on the door and scratches that will require paint.
It depends on where they hit.
It depends on where they hit. Do you have that information?
According to the article
That definitely left a dent, at least.
did it?
Depends on the speed of the cyclist and the door. How fast could they be going if they declined medical treatment?
And again, it takes nothing to scratch or dent a door
Of course, if the car is a shitbox, maybe it makes no difference. If it's a newish car, the owner is certainly going to care - and the cyclist should pay.
Only if there is damage.
A smudge mark and a bit of dirt don’t count.
Pics of the damage, please.
Before your head explodes over the thought of a lowly rubber bike tire touching a holy and divine motor vehicle.
I'd like to see a pic
It takes very little to damage the side of a car. No, it isn't going to look like a car nailed it, but I'm sure there is damage and the cyclist should pay. It could easily be a grand or two.
My guess is that the only legal recourse is for the driver to sue.
driver's insurance is responsible for that.
The insurance company can pursue recovery from the cyclist. The bigger issue is that while the damage could be two grand, it probably won't be. My deductible is 1K.
The cyclist caused the damage and should pay
If I ran over your bike (obviously without you on it) and destroyed it or even just bent a wheel. You’d expect me to repair or replace it, right? How is this any different?
No, I'd expect your insurance
No, I'd expect your insurance company to pay. I would expect you to pay the deductible.
mistake
.
It all really just depends on if …..
…. your car was wearing high vis clothing and/or had headphones on.
Personal anecdote time!
I was hit by a motorist that ran a stop sign. He hit the back of my bike wheel and sent me head/shoulder first into the road. My groceries went everywhere, my frame/wheel was bent and had some scrapes. Ambulance ride to the hospital determined no concussion but I did miss some days of work due to soreness and head fog.
They were cited for running the stop sign by BPD, I received the police report and after speaking with a lawyer who is a friend of the family, was told it wasn't worth going to court for damages despite the ambulance ride, bike damage and lost work wages.
They had Geico insurance if I recall correctly. I had to fight for months just to get the ambulance bill taken care of.
So yeah, you can expect that the guilty party would repair or replace. Doesn't mean they will have to.
If you’re going to drive in the street …
… you’re going to be hit by a cyclist.
Why would we assume the cyclist doesn't have insurance?
If the cyclist is found to be at fault, the driver can make a claim against the cyclist's homeowners or renters insurance policy, which I'd bet most people in the area have.
Also, pretty funny to use an example of a driver causing (lots more) damage and then sticking someone else with a bill to try and make a point against cyclists - not sure you're making the point you seem to think you are here.
Running over a bike is ‘a lot more damage’?
New door, labor and respray will start at $2k never mind the cost for a rental car during that time. Any aluminum body vehicle will be double that.
How is that against cyclists? I’ve said the same thing about Lara smashing her car into that house. I guess it’s outlandish to suggest someone that caused damage to another person’s property pay to fix it according to a bunch of posters, which is crazy and frightening at the same time.
nice dodge
n/t
New door?
If you really think a cyclist hitting a door is going to end up needing a complete door replacement you are not making a serious argument. An auto body shop to remove a dent and/or touch-up paint and scratches, sure, but the entire door? Get real.
haha
You intentionally misread that to build a strawman!
you are obsessed with hating cyclists
Do you have amnesia? What about your endless tax rants?
Based on your reading comprehension
I'm going to guess you've run into a few doors yourself, apparently head-first and without a helmet.
People need to stop with cognitive impairment quips
Its such a low effort jab that reeks of abelism.
Its not ok when John Costello does it and it shouldn't be ok here too.
home or renter's insurance
home or renter's insurance would cover this?
It’s good that the driver in the first crash …..
…. was given a citation at least. They often aren’t.
But they should not be allowed to drive until a judge decides they are competent to do so again.
In the second crash, a verbal warning should have been sufficient. It’s unlikely the cyclist will do that again. The pain and possible scarring from their facial injuries should insure that. The driver may have been spooked even if their car received no damage. But would it be worth it to sue for that?