There is no way to differentiate since the end results are the same. The biker who knows he can make a right hand turn from the adjoining street onto the through street is either ignoring the stop or seeing it as a yield and proceeding without stopping. Yield does not mean "stop", it means "yield the right of way if necessary".

You keep ignoring the fact that vehicle law is not created just to protect the automobile driver from death by bike accident. It's there to protect YOU, too. And the pedestrians who you are a serious threat to.

Oh, please. You can't imagine how a bicyclist who runs down a pedestrian could do significant physical harm to them? A twenty MPH piece of steel/carbon fiber/whatever with an attached human mass would just what, bounce off a pedestrian?

You don't get it. What you personally do or don't do is irrelevant. You cannot write laws based on how one person acts, you need to deal with aggregate (that means "as a whole" or "as a group") behavior. You don't get near pedestrians, so obviously any laws that protect pedestrians are not necessary, right?

Or bike/ped accidents have gotten to the newsworthyness of "the sun came up this morning." And more peds don't bother reporting them because by the time the cops could get there the biker is long gone. I've had bikers almost run me over in a crosswalk -- a MARKED crosswalk at a four-way stop intersection, so there is no excuse at all -- and I know that by the time I pull my phone out of my pocket, dial 911, and explain the problem to the dispatcher that bike rider will be one among thousands somewhere in a two mile radius, probably already parking his bike outside the class building.

You question the fact that when vehicle laws are obeyed the people involved are safer? You don't believe that a bike that stops at a stop sign is both safer to himself and to others? I see this kind of stuff every day. It's common here. I don't know where you live where you don't have pedestrians or crosswalks at stop signs, but that pretty much leaves you without much data to provide concerning the issues.

You must be kidding. Cops aren't supposed to enforce the actual laws, they're supposed to decide what is stupid and write tickets for that? Wow.

And I've told you that there are uncounted numbers of them in this city that will do exactly that, and that what you personally do is irrelevant when writing traffic law. I don't intend on killing anyone today, should there be no laws against murder? You don't intend on entering an intersection even when you have the right of way if there's any risk of being run over, so let's do away with stop signs that, when obeyed, solve the problem.

You can stop arguing that the existing laws shouldn't apply to them. That's a start. I remember the idiots because they are both so common and do memorably stupid things.

Like I said, I'd love it if stop signs didn't apply to me in a car, either. I don't intend on running anyone over, and I don't intend on hitting someone else. Let's get rid of all stop signs, ok?

And I think I prefaced my comments with "if only you were the only biker on the road". Creating special laws for all bicyclists based on your personal behavior is not correct. Looking at aggregate behavior is. If a very large number of bicyclists already treat stop signs as yields, and do so in a way that endangers themselves and others, then it is not a correct course of action to actually make stop signs be yields for bicyclists.

Of course you have pedestrian crossings at stop signs. Stop signs are at intersections. Intersections are where ped crossings are. What is strange about that?

And here's an Oregon specific: EVERY intersection has a pedestrian crossing, they just aren't all marked. The markings are irrelevant, the law says vehicles must stop before entering the crossing if there is a pedestrian in it. That's the basic law, but there are specifics that deal with three lanes or more, or islands.

I'm not talking about pedestrians, I'm talking about bike riders who simply slide over into the crosswalk while still riding their bikes. You walk your bike, then good for you, you are a pedestrian at that point, and your use of the crosswalk is appropriate. I got no problem having to stop for a pedestrian.

At the intersection I described, I would not have to stop AT ALL if you stopped like you are legally required to do. I would not have to stop longer, and I don't know why you think I would have to.

If I am ranting, then you are too. I'm describing standard behavior for bike riders I see every day. If that's a rant, they've brought it on themselves and I can't help that.

And I pretty much made it clear I wasn't talking about you when I said "if only you were the only ...". That means I'm talking about other people.

Actually, you were arguing that all bicyclists should get special treatment under vehicle law by making stop signs into yields for you, based on your personal manner of riding. Turning stops into yields does NOT minimize the hassle for everyone, as I've already explained.

Neither example I gave had anything to do with an "opening". The first was a bike making a right turn onto the street I'm on without bothering to stop at the stop sign. There is no need for an "opening" -- he's turning right into the bike lane. The PROBLEM was that he neglected to signal so I don't know if he's actually turning until he does it, and his speed combined with potential road debris means his turn could become a slide into my path. The second was a bike who moved over into the crosswalk pretending to become a pedestrian. Peds don't have to wait for an "opening" to step into a crosswalk and force traffic to stop. In fact, if they do NOT move into the crosswalk the traffic isn't required to stop and they may never get an "opening" to cross. I.e., entering the crosswalk is how an "opening" is created, not vice versa.

That's a lie. If I ran over you because you blew the stop sign and failed to make the turn you could have easily made at a slower speed, it would go on my driving record, it would impact my insurance rates, and the trial would cost me a lot of money and time. I might even feel a bit of remorse over the accident, but that depends on how many bikers who want special privileges I've talked to recently.

Second, the traffic laws aren't there just so you aren't a danger to drivers. Pedestrians are involved, and you are a significant danger to them.

And I'll remind you, I'm treating your comment as a generic one including all bikers because changing traffic laws would effect all bikers and not just you. If you want to argue for a change, you need to admit and accept that your personal habits are irrelevant, just as my personal driving habits are when talking about changed to motor vehicle laws.

Once again, so there can be a higher tax rate on people who drive on major roads and/or at peak times.

"I drove those miles on private logging roads and while spending the summer in Arizona. Prove otherwise."

Coming up with ways of making an invasive and privacy-destroying law easier to enforce isn't the usual kind of comment I see on /.

Unless those foreigners live in a state where a GPS tracker determines their gas tax and their state collects on behalf of Oregon (unlikely), they will be paying the gas tax.

This new GPS system won't spring into life fully formed overnight. It will take a decade or more for a significant number of cars to be properly "equipped" for government monitoring, and during that time there will be a gas tax for those who aren't yet. You can't let all those people stop paying a tax just because their car didn't come with an embedded GPS.

The plan from a decade ago included dumping the GPS data at the gas station when you bought gas and the tax was added to that transaction. It's trivial at that point for the sale to be "dumped GPS data, pays per-mile tax" or "didn't dump GPS data, pays exorbitant gas tax". Our neighbors won't be getting a better deal on gas by coming here.

"However we can raise taxes on people who recreationally drive heavy vehicles they don't neccerially need. Not an outright ban, but if you want to drive your giant SUV when you could have used a much smaller car,"

This statement has nothing to do with commercially-plated vehicles. It talks only about the subjective "neccerially need". Who are the police who determine when you should have "used a much smaller car" versus when an SUV is required? Is every SUV owner supposed to own two cars just so they can drive the small car for small things and the SUV for "huge" things?

And I hate to point out another fallacy in your arguments. "If you can afford an SUV" is nonsense. My "SUV" cost less than many "much smaller cars".

Oh, if only you were the only vehicle on the road.

I see bikers treat stop signs as yields every day. I live in a college town where the students just don't think obeying traffic laws is an important thing to do. As a driver, I just LOVE it when I'm traveling on the through-street and a high-speed biker comes to the stop sign on an intersecting road. Stop? Of course not. Blow through the stop sign at full speed, get halfway into the intersection, and then lay the bike over to the right and turn onto the street I'm on.

Why is that a problem? Well, as a defensive driver I cannot assume that this joker is going to turn (he didn't bother to signal one, but that is just another pesky traffic law he's ignoring). He's headed for a direct collision with me, so I have to slam on the brakes just in case. That usually isn't enough to stop before I'd hit him if he doesn't turn, though, so if he manages to hit a stone in the road and his turn becomes a slide -- he's dead. And I'll have been the one to run him over.

And then there's the ones who are actually crossing the street I'm on, and instead of stopping at the stop sign until the through-traffic clears, they jog over into the crosswalk and pretend they are pedestrians -- forcing everyone on the through street to slam on the brakes to stop for them.

Sharing the road means both sides have to share. You have to do things you don't want to do for the safety of everyone, just like I have to.

Oh, if only you were the only bicyclist on the road. I've seen too many bikers who ignore everything else at an intersection and blow through the stop. They ignore cars, and they especially ignore pedestrians in crosswalks. If every ped who had to jump out of the way of a biker breaking the law paid me a nickel, I'd be a 1%er.

Making me stop all the time is inconvenient for me, too. It wastes gas, so it's bad for the environment. Letting you play chicken with traffic by blowing through a stop sign to make a hard right turn raises my blood pressure, which is bad for my health, and it is potentially deadly for you.

If not having to obey the traffic laws is what compels you to ride a bicycle, then you really don't have the right attitude about bike riding. Expecting special treatment as a vehicle sharing the public streets because that would make your life more pleasant is, well, kind of selfish.

There is no need for an "odometer version". Cars already have odometers. And an odometer version may be in testing, but it will never survive the desire to put higher taxes on people who drive where and when the government doesn't want them to. The use of taxation for social engineering and not just provision of mandatory services is too great in the modern politician and government worker.

Since an explicit goal of this system is to charge higher taxes for congested roads at congested times, it's not just the miles in Oregon that have to be tracked, it is WHICH roads and WHAT times. That demands a GPS and recorded data.

I know an engineer who was working on this kind of system for Oregon a decade ago, and she admitted the data needed to be collected by could not imagine that the government might abuse it.

Please don't ever get lost in the mountains in my area, because my driving to a search to save your ass doesn't benefit you so I won't bother doing it.

What is an "annual emissions check?"

Yes, if you are going to tax someone on what roads they drive on and when ('congestion fee'), you need to know what roads they drive on and when. An odometer doesn't provide that information.

Why would we as a society stand up and demand more taxes?

Oregon tags (mine) renew every two years, by mail.

It would take much longer than 5 minutes for an employee of DMV to come to my house, break into my garage, and read my odometer.

An odometer cannot report that none (or most) of my miles were on I5 in downtown Portland at 9AM (or 2AM) so it cannot be used to charge a higher tax for use during congested times and places.

You pay at the pump and then get a refund by filing Form 1220, at least in Oregon. Other states have the same kind of thing.

Yep. But since knowing which roads and when is an important part of the pricing structure, a GPS will be required.

I'm a search and rescue volunteer enroute to an active search, where we find and extract a lost mushroom hunter -- alive. A week ago I was staff on an overnight training exercise that graduated 13 new SAR volunteers. Three weeks ago I was involved in a lost aircraft search. You say the only person who benefits from my car is myself?

All cars already have a mandated "odometer device". It's installed by the factory.

What that device doesn't record is:

1) where the vehicle was driven. There should be no tax on miles driven on private property.

2) what road the vehicle was on. Charging more for main roads and less for local roads needs this data. and,

3) what time the vehicle was there. Charging a "congestion fee" requires this data.