So, when I have to quickly brake (to avoid things in front of me) and the cyclist who thought it was cool to be tailgating me slams in the back of my car?
That has happened to me TWICE, both times they grabbed their bikes and ran, leaving me with the insurance costs of fixing up the damage to my paintwork..
How about the cyclists weaving and cutting through the traffic, making cars emergency stop because they decide its ok to cut around the front of you as they
can go faster than the heavy traffic by doing it?
And the one I really love, the cyclists who blaze straight through red lights and pedestrians crossing because they are somehow more holy that all other road
users? I have seen at least one nasty accident between cyclists and crossing pedestrian..
The fact is that ALL road users have to follow the rules, however many cyclists want and in fact demand special treatment.
Bring on the equiality I say - time to register those bikes, have manditory fitness checks for they safety, and test/license to riders for the road?
Then there is the issue of road taxes, etc - time they started paying their share?
Damn those two way streets, cyclists are special and shouldnt have to do THOSE things, right?
Start quoting technical road laws at people to excuse your situation, and you better be damn ready to follow them yourself.
Everything you talked about is already illegal. And dangerous for the cyclist to boot!
There's nothing about bicycles that makes cyclists act with this "holier than all other road users" .... you see the same attitudes in car drivers, motorcycle riders, and pedestrians. That's right: the cyclist that runs a red light has the same attitude problems as the driver that cuts you off. Stop this rant at cyclists: it's quite misdirected, really.
Now ... about those "equality" measures. The compact car weighs around, say, 3000 lbs. At 40 mph, it has about 218 kJ of kinetic energy behind it. A cyclist + bike weighs, say, 200 lbs. At 20 mph, there's a whopping 3.6 kJ of kinetic energy. That's 1/60th the energy.
There's a reason we require driver's licenses. A stupid cyclist is (mostly) a danger only to himself. A stupid motorist is a danger to everyone around them.
No ... equality means enforcement of the rules. Yes, cyclists blow red lights and go the wrong way down one-way streets. Ticket them, just as you would a car doing the same thing. By the way ... next time you're driving, pay attention to just how many traffic infractions happen around you (including yourself). Most likely, you've become quite desensitized to the stupid little things that all the other cars do.
And, just FYI ... most cyclist already pay their fair share of road taxes. Or did you think cyclists never own cars or pay income/property taxes? And what's a fair share? What wear does a bicycle do to the road? What percentage of the construction funds went into the (probably too narrow to be safe, anyway) bicycle lane?