Shut Up Legs
Down Under Member
Two days ago, a female cyclist was riding legally along a bike lane in Collins St, Melbourne, and got caught by a an opened car door when some passengers exited a taxi.
This particular cyclist is a regular on two Australian cycling forums, and she's mentioned previously that there isn't any real alternative for her commute home but Collins St, even though its pathetic excuse for a "bicycle lane" is only about 2 feet wide at most. Riding in primary position in the main traffic lane could be justified, given how impractical the bike lane is, because our laws allow cyclists to avoid bike lanes if they're impractical to use for any reason. However, this isn't really an option here, because sitting behind car exhaust pipes while these cars crawl along a congested, narrow street is very unhealthy.
She posted her helmet-camera video of the incident:
This shows that the attitude of the taxi passengers was less than ideal. Fortunately, the subsequent publicity has made it impossible for them to remain anonymous, and (at least) one of them is now discussing the incident with the Police
. I love it when the social media effect kicks in - this incident has been reported in mainstream newspapers in most Australian states, some Facebook pages, Reddit, the BNA and BN forums and other cycling forums, etc., and now these 3 guys faces have a fair bit of internet publicity.
I was feeling pretty angry at these guys, and I'm still upset that it actually takes a helmet-camera video and considerable publicity to get some people to admit they've made a mistake
. As one person put it: regardless of whether he felt that he'd done anything wrong or not, if the guy who'd opened the taxi door into the cyclist's path had simply done the right thing and exchanged contact details, he would have gotten away with relatively minor consequences, perhaps just the approx. $350 fine for dooring. Instead, he's given his employer (and of course, himself) some very bad publicity, so that will cost him in other ways.
Of course, many of the comments on the various forums and online news sites reporting this incident are less than sympathetic, but that's what you get with social media: disagreements come with the package, and some people are well-informed while others are astoundingly ignorant. But at least it achieved one thing: it forced the taxi passenger to do the right thing and contact the Police
.
This particular cyclist is a regular on two Australian cycling forums, and she's mentioned previously that there isn't any real alternative for her commute home but Collins St, even though its pathetic excuse for a "bicycle lane" is only about 2 feet wide at most. Riding in primary position in the main traffic lane could be justified, given how impractical the bike lane is, because our laws allow cyclists to avoid bike lanes if they're impractical to use for any reason. However, this isn't really an option here, because sitting behind car exhaust pipes while these cars crawl along a congested, narrow street is very unhealthy.
She posted her helmet-camera video of the incident:
This shows that the attitude of the taxi passengers was less than ideal. Fortunately, the subsequent publicity has made it impossible for them to remain anonymous, and (at least) one of them is now discussing the incident with the Police
. I love it when the social media effect kicks in - this incident has been reported in mainstream newspapers in most Australian states, some Facebook pages, Reddit, the BNA and BN forums and other cycling forums, etc., and now these 3 guys faces have a fair bit of internet publicity.I was feeling pretty angry at these guys, and I'm still upset that it actually takes a helmet-camera video and considerable publicity to get some people to admit they've made a mistake
. As one person put it: regardless of whether he felt that he'd done anything wrong or not, if the guy who'd opened the taxi door into the cyclist's path had simply done the right thing and exchanged contact details, he would have gotten away with relatively minor consequences, perhaps just the approx. $350 fine for dooring. Instead, he's given his employer (and of course, himself) some very bad publicity, so that will cost him in other ways.Of course, many of the comments on the various forums and online news sites reporting this incident are less than sympathetic, but that's what you get with social media: disagreements come with the package, and some people are well-informed while others are astoundingly ignorant. But at least it achieved one thing: it forced the taxi passenger to do the right thing and contact the Police
.
