{"id":444,"date":"2013-09-20T10:50:19","date_gmt":"2013-09-20T17:50:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/?p=444"},"modified":"2021-05-23T02:02:41","modified_gmt":"2021-05-23T09:02:41","slug":"are-we-not-traffic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/are-we-not-traffic.html","title":{"rendered":"Are We Not Traffic?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday I wrote about signs blocking bike facilities<\/a>.\u00a0 They say the squeaky wheel gets the grease and changes were indeed made…\u00a0 but, before we see that, here is the soundtrack<\/a> for today.<\/p>\n

I don’t want to take credit for these changes… no really.\u00a0 I don’t. \u00a0 There are now TWO signs blocking this area:<\/p>\n

\"Double<\/a><\/p>\n

Besides saying BIKE LANE CLOSED, and thereby allowing motor vehicles to legally drive in it, what more information is so compelling that SDOT should block the sidewalk with another sign?<\/p>\n

Ah yes, my favorite:<\/p>\n

\"Bikes<\/a><\/p>\n

As if placing signs in our way of travel wasn’t enough of a reminder that bicyclists and pedestrians are second class to motorized vehicles, this sign distinguishes between bicycles and traffic.\u00a0 Are we not traffic?\u00a0 We are vehicles<\/a>.<\/p>\n

RCW 46.04.670 states that “‘Vehicle’\u00a0 includes every device capable of being moved upon a public highway and in, upon, or by which any persons or property is or may be transported or drawn upon a public highway, including bicycles.”<\/p>\n

Although this is the law, many people do not view bicycles as vehicles and, instead, as impediments to traffic. A sign that says, ‘BICYCLES MERGE WITH TRAFFIC” only reinforces this misunderstanding.<\/p>\n

I would like to see a sign that says, “MOTOR VEHICLES YIELD TO BICYCLES”, not to mention better laws<\/a> to make roads safer for ALL traffic.<\/p>\n

Anyway, I am less than thrilled about these signs.\u00a0 Are they in anyway helpful?\u00a0 Do we really think that, without that BIKE LANE CLOSED sign, cars would not enter a bike lane?\u00a0 How about this bike lane limo, Which I saw just around the corner from these two signs:<\/p>\n

\"Bike<\/a><\/p>\n

This was right after a truck and trailer were in the bike lane.\u00a0 I talked to the driver (nicely) and he said he was about to make a U-Turn.\u00a0 I doubt that that actually happened, but neither of these traffic members seemed worried about driving in a bike lane.<\/p>\n

Until bicycles are thought of as legitimate vehicles and part of expected traffic, these problems will continue.\u00a0 SDOT’s sidewalk signs don’t create these problems<\/a>, but they sure don’t help solve them either…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday I wrote about signs blocking bike facilities.\u00a0 They say the squeaky wheel gets the grease and changes were indeed made…\u00a0 but, before we see that, here is the soundtrack for today. I don’t want to take credit for these changes… no really.\u00a0 I don’t. \u00a0 There are now TWO signs blocking this area: Besides […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":448,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bicycle-advocates"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/Bikes-Merge-w-traffic-no-truck1.jpg?fit=1481%2C1111&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=444"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1209,"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444\/revisions\/1209"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.washingtonbikelaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}