Like shootin' fish in a barrel...

1200 Plus Arrested During Bay Area Anti-DUI Campaign

Yes, another reference to the "cyclists need to obey the rules too" meme.

A minor enforcement effort snags 1291 drunk drivers in the Bay Area in 10 days. 129 per day, and it's not like the cops were stationed outside every bar in the Bay Area.

I'd be very interested in the stats - 1291 arrests out of how many went through the checkpoint? You can't exactly extrapolate that percentage to the number of cars on the road during those time periods, as the police are probably stationed at roadways that would be expected to have a higher number of DUI infractions going on - near bars, etc... but that's a "sobering" stat.

Unfortunately, there is the story of the one that got away...

There has been one death attributed to an impaired driver on Bay Area roadways during the campaign, which will continue through Jan. 3.

The article did not indicate if the victim was wearing a helmet, or indicate the number of pedestrians killed by stopsign running cyclists.

3rd Ave San Mateo, Maple in Redwood City, Steven's Creek Trail in Mountain View

Today I had the "pleasure" of crossing 101 4 times on my bike between San Mateo and Santa Clara. 3rd Ave, Whipple, Maple, and Steven's Creek Trail. Whipple deserves a separate post so I'll start with the other three. Feel free to add in the comments and I'll integrate them.

Let's start with 3rd Avenue. 3rd has a separated bike path that goes down the middle of the overpass, a similar sensation to the bike path on the Dumbarton Bridge. You are protected while ON the overpass, which is good. The problem is that you have to get onto and off of the overpass itself.



Looks pretty straightforward, right? Wrong.


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The approach to the bike path is actually on 4th St (3rd is one way the other direction) and if you are riding on the right side of the road, you must cross three lanes of traffic, one of which could be going either way. A block back at the intersection of Humboldt and 4th, I decided to cross to the left side of 4th. There is a white line that creates a "chunk of separated space" there - it's not a bike lane, who knows what it is. I guess it's where San Mateo hopes you will ride to approach the bike path. I ended up jumping onto the sidewalk, with more experience I might take the "chunk of separated space". You are allowed to ride on the left side of the road on one way streets, but this thing is just sort of ugly.

Once you get on, you are onto the "onramp" of the path, there is an "offramp" going the other direction towards 3rd. Both "ramps" are bidirectional, I actually saw a cyclist approaching the main pathway from 3rd. I assume they rode on the sidewalk down 3rd since 3rd is one way the other direction.

At the East End, more strangeness.


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The path ends in the middle of the street, at an intersection. You are in the middle of traffic going either direction around you. My thinking is that the official position is that at this point you are supposed to walk your bike to the appropriate side of 3rd Ave based on where you are headed, when you get a crosswalk signal to cross 3rd from the middle. This is what a pedestrian would do, and it's what the cyclist in front of me did, I followed. I then got back into regular traffic on "J Hart Clinton" which was no fun quite frankly, then left into Ryder Court Park to get on the bike path to join my friends. Looking at Google Maps, it appears I made a mistake. The left into Ryder Court cannot be made by cars, as such there is no real provision to make a left hand turn there (turn pockets) but there is a light. Turns out the pro move is to go South on Norwalk after exiting the bike path, then make (a somewhat difficult) left onto a bike path, which then ends in the crosswalk into Ryder Park.

From the reverse direction, the best approach to the 3rd St Path is from Norwalk, in the left turn pocket (taking the lane) and then turning left directly into the bike path instead of the travel lane (or right from Norwalk the other way, and god help you if you are on J Hart Clinton).

Right then. Next - Maple. Maple is a piece of cake relatively speaking. From the Peninsula side, you turn right from Veterans NB or left from Veterans SB, or if you are lucky you are on Maple already, perhaps coming from Caltrain via Winslow/Middlefield. There is very little auto traffic on Maple, and no on/offramps. Coming from the other direction you are coming from either the Marina or Blomquist Road, both low traffic areas. This sort of makes Maple an "overpass to nowhere", I used it today in fact to bypass the nearby "Bridge to Nowhere" which is in a field that is currently muddy.

Next - Steven's Creek Trail.



Self Explanatory. The only rub is knowing where the access point is. On the Bay Side, take Pear SB from Shoreline, then right onto Inigo, left onto La Avenida, which dead ends into the trail entrance. The closest entrance on the Peninsula side is Moffett. This is a pretty nice trail, observe reasonable speed as there are lots of pedestrians.

Crossing Highway 101 on bike between San Francisco and San Jose

The San Francisco Bay Area is home to a large number of bike commuters. The geography and demography of the area is a bit unique on the Peninsula from San Jose to San Francisco - unlike "typical" cities with jobs in the center ringed by suburbs of houses, the jobs and residences are dispersed. On my ride from San Francisco to Santa Clara with the googlers there are people who peel off in San Mateo, Foster City, Menlo Park, Palo Alto, Cupertino, and other enclaves I'm missing. We see dozens of cyclists riding the other direction as well.

One problem is that the Peninsula is split by a chunk of asphalt - US Highway 101. There are jobs on each side, and residences on both sides. On the west side, people tend to ride along the Caltrain tracks (or actually take their bike ONTO the Caltrain). On the East side, there is a route that is somewhat more pleasant in spots, including many miles of bucolic bike paths along the bay, populated by a seemingly unending parade of Kiteboarders and Feral Cats.

The problem? At some point you will need to cross the 101. Since it's a limited access freeway, that usually means an overpass with high speed traffic merging in and out of lanes to either exit or enter the freeway. This can lead to tragic results in some cases. But collisions - I believe - are less frequent than one might expect, most likely because people either learn very quickly how to cross the overpasses, find an alternate route, or give up and find another way to get where they are going.

This blog post will be a catchall to inventory a series of upcoming blog posts on the various crossings of 101, from the hairiest and scariest (Holly, Oyster Point) to the most serene (Steven's Creek Bike Path). I'm going to list them here and build the links in as the series grows. Feel free to suggest crossings that I may have missed - the overpasses are obvious but there are all sorts of "hidden" methods of getting from one side to the other. And if you'd like to volunteer to help the project, please do.

Thanks.

Murph

List of 101 crossings from San Francisco to San Jose

Cesar Chavez - San Francisco
Sierra Point - South San Francisco
Oyster Point - South San Francisco
Grand - South San Francisco
S. Airport - South San Francisco
San Bruno Ave - San Bruno
Millbrae Ave - Millbrae
Broadway Bike Bridge - Burlingame
Peninsula Ave - San Mateo
Monte Diablo Bike Bridge - San Mateo
3rd Ave - San Mateo
Fashion Ave - San Mateo
Hillsdale - San Mateo
Ralston - Belmont
Holly - San Carlos
Whipple - Redwood City
Maple - Redwood City
Woodside (84) Redwood City (legal?)
Marsh - Menlo Park
Ringwood Bike Bridge - Menlo Park
Willow - Menlo Park
University - Palo Alto
Embarcadero - Palo Alto
Bike Bridge - Palo Alto
Adobe Creek Seasonal Bike Underpass - Palo Alto
San Antonio - Mountain View
Rengstorff - Mountain View
Shoreline - Mountain View
Stevens Creek Trail - Mountain View
Moffett - Mountain View
Ellis - Mountain View
Mathilda - Sunnyvale
Borregas Bike Bridge - Sunnyvale
Fair Oaks - Sunnyvale
Fair Oaks Bike/Ped Bridge - Sunnyvale
Lawrence - Sunnyvale
Bowers - Santa Clara
San Tomas Aquinas Bike Trail - Santa Clara
San Tomas - Santa Clara
Lafayette - Santa Clara
De La Cruz - Santa Clara

I think I have been crossed all of these except the following
De La Cruz, Borregas, Adobe, Woodside, 19th, 3rd, San Bruno, Airport. Some of them I am looking forward to visiting, some (De La Cruz) not so much.

Should be fun.

Texting at a red light.

In a prior post I mentioned a driver next to me at a red light who was furiously setting up her music playlist on her iPhone. Not only did she differentiate this from "texting", she also said to me "I'm not driving".

I was reminded of this while searching for texts on a cyclist killed on Hillsdale Blvd this morning. I saw the following tweet.

@dharmakate Additionally, a fatal car vs bicycle accident on Hillsdale over the freeway. I just passed it. Suddenly rethinking the bike in Spring. :'(

I got into a conversation with the author who indicated she was "stopped". I asked if this meant "parked". Is it ok to text at a stoplight?

Certainly a lot of drivers think it's ok to text at a stop light. The CHP does not agree.

Want a scare? Check This

Today's MUNI diary

I awoke to wet roads this AM and had to assess my commute. My rain bike is currently DOA, I have yet to acquire a "better" rain bike a.k.a. a cyclocross bike, and I didn't feel like slogging it out on the Mountain Bike, so I decided to take the 48 to Caltrain today.

I remember something noteworthy from maybe 50% of my commute rides, and it's probably only that high because almost all rides that consist of riding all the way to work from SF (50 miles) are noteworthy for the ride itself, not something goofy that happened on the way (though sometimes noteworthy things happen, like the thugs in East Palo Alto passing alerts about a cop coming by on their Nextel phones). However, a MUNI ride almost always provides fodder for thought.

Nextbus is a great thing, and I managed to find a bus leaving in 10 minutes from the time I handed my son to my wife. I threw on some clothes and wandered down to the stop. On the way, I noticed that they are now making children out of sugar.



The traffic dropping kids off at Alvarado School backed up for 3 blocks on Douglass. There was probably a similar backup on Eureka, though I didn't check. There is the possibility that normally traffic splits up between Douglass and Eureka, but on a rainy day we can't have the kids walking an extra 100 yards in the rain, given they are made of sugar. But the most likely scenario is simply that more people drove their kids to school today because we had a light drizzle in San Francisco, and they were afraid their kids would melt. I certainly saw fewer than normal amounts of people walking their kids to school.

Maybe the problem isn't that the kids would melt. The kids are usually accompanied by adults. Maybe the parents were afraid that they would melt. Noe Valley has more than their share of people who bike their kids to school on the trail-a-bike, but we have plenty of softies as well.

Thinking more about *who* I see walking the kids to school on a daily basis, the problem might be even more complex. Once again, this is Noe Valley. We have a strange phenomenon - crunchy granola type-A moms. They don't drive their kids to school - their kids walk to school. And their kids are accompanied on their walk to school by their nannies, who take the bus from the Mission. Anyone paying attention to MUNI lately could see that taking MUNI has become a bit of an adventure lately. Perhaps the traffic can be explained by crunchy granola type-A moms driving their kids to school because the nanny is late because the J-Church is made of sugar.

Anywho, back to me. I looked up at the Nextbus sign on the stop - 2 minutes. Perfect. I looked back up 2 minutes later - 2 minutes. 2 minutes later, the bus had apparently progressed 1 minutes worth of distance on the GPS. Is the 48 made of sugar? Then I looked up the street at the still backed up school dropoff traffic, and made a note of the cars darting out of the double parked line into the opposite travel lane. Great. I avoided the meltdown that is the MUNI underground only to be foiled by triple parked Noe Valley moms gridlocking the 48.

When the 48 eventually arrived, it was packed. Unusual as the 48 doesn't really start to jam up until 24th and Douglass. As we pushed into Noe Valley and the bus got more crowded, it was clear there hadn't been a bus for a while. Maybe I need "lastbus" - that will tell me how long it's been since the last bus has come through, so I can go back to sleep and wait for a less crowded bus. I'm not made of sugar so I don't mind a crowded bus, but a crowded bus makes awful time and I was going to miss the Caltrain.

The bus was really jamming up and people in the front started yelling MOVE BACK. This apparently was lost on two gentlemen towards the back that were doing the Larry Craig and taking a "wide stance", filling a spot that could serve 6 people or so, and blocking an empty seat. I barrelled through and took the seat to try to allow more people on the bus (Nextbus was showing 30 minutes to the next bus). This allowed me to overhear my wide standing friends discuss the wonderful new BART connector to Oakland Airport, and how one of them worked for a contractor who was probably going to get one of the contracts. Figures - selfishly taking tax dollars for a ridiculous project, and selfishly leaving 4 people at the bus shelter at 24th/Church while they spread out in style (until getting off 1 block later at Dolores!)

Despite all the hullabaloo the 12 or so of us who were destined for Caltrain were safely delivered at 22nd St Station one minute late. About 5 blocks away from the station, people started doing their "get my 8 ride ready for quick validation" dance. It looked like we might actually make the train when a double parked kiss and rider blocked the bus from making the right onto 22nd St. ARGH. We darted out of the bus and ran down the stairs, screaming at the conductor who waved and screamed back "WE'LL WAIT, I'LL VALIDATE YOU ON BOARD". MUNI vs. Caltrain in a nutshell.

Cars speeding vs Bikes running stopsigns.

An interesting comment on a prior post

I have a twist on this theory. By and large, about 99% of all speeding infractions even result in a ticket. Anyone who drives (like myself) can tell you that from personal experience. Also, only the most egregious speeders generally get whacked.

The practice of bicycles going through red lights hardly ever gets ticketed. So my theory is basically, a bicycle going through a red light is the equivalent of a car speeding. Common infractions that are sparsely ticketed and I would argue, rightly so.

Interesting. But clearly there are those who don't see this equivalency - if bikes want to be treated like cars, they must obey the rules like cars. This does not differentiate "a common infraction for a car" from "a common infraction on a bike" - an infraction is either a common one that is sparsely ticketed, or it is not. Running a stop sign - ticketable, always, no gray area. Speeding - common infraction that is sparsely ticketed - on a bike or in a car. Ergo, stop running the stopsigns, but feel free if you are on your bike to go ahead and speed.

Or perhaps not

Posted by Angela Hey, a resident of the Portola Valley: Brookside Park neighborhood, on Jun 13, 2007 at 10:47 pm

Today I passed a bicycle doing more than 35 mph down Alpine Road - speed limits apply to bikers too. Can the police please cite people who speed on bikes or break the traffic laws in other ways?

My all time favorite internet forum post.

Cyclists don't get ticketed like motorists.

An amusing sight on Airport Road in Millbrae this AM. First, I saw a cop by the side of the road up ahead. Then, I saw a car whizz by me fast enough that the cop decided to put down his coffee and ring speedy McFly up for a speeding ticket. That got me to thinking about the old meme that the laws aren't enforced against cyclists.

I've never actually seen a cyclist ticketed, but I've heard of examples. And I've heard far too many commenters on blogs and newspaper forums complain about the laws not being enforced on cyclists.

Now, I've been known to roll the occasional stop sign. 4 way stop, sort of treated as a yield, T intersections I might barely slow. Unless of course I see a police officer. Just like any motorist blowing down the freeway at 90 MPH, I know full well that I might want to rein in my riding a bit if Johnny Law is in sight.

Here's my thinking on why motorists might get more tickets than cyclists. If your face is buried in a big mac, with a cup of coffee in one hand and your eyes on the radio dial then you, like my friend on Airport this AM, are not paying attention to the task at hand - driving your car - and therefore you are oblivious to the cop sitting in plain sight in front of you. When I'm riding my bike I am acutely aware of conditions. It's not that I'm more or less inclined to skirt a few rules - it's that I'm better at not getting caught.

Biking to Work for the win.

In my Inbox at work today.

Another laptop stolen in Calif

Dang thieves – that’s 3 in 3 weeks.

All from cars. I believe all were visible from the outside.

Out of sight – out of mind.

ZoomSafer

I referred to a product named "ZoomSafer" in the comments to a previous post, and received a follow up from the founder of ZoomSafer. Google is amazing.

Here is his comment.

In response to Murphstahoe and regarding ZoomSafer....

ZoomSafer is software that actively encourages safe and legal use of mobile phones while driving.

ZoomSafer detects when you are moving faster than 10mph and automatically activates and applies safe driving policies.

It does include the ability to exit as passenger so you can use your phone if you were on a bus or in a taxi.

The software itself is fully configurable -- and you can remove the "exit as a passenger" option if you prefer.

Parents and corporations might want this. Individuals and prosumers probably don't. It's up to you.

Matt Howard

I had to refer to the NY Times Article before I could make an accurate response - I did recall that the lead in to the story was from an individual who was using ZoomSafer. Mr. Howard certainly didn't repudiate the PR for his product that does not dovetail with his comment here. And on ZoomSafer's website - the first menu button after "ABOUT" is "PERSONAL".

Individuals buying this product is sort of akin to putting your credit card in a block of ice. You haven't really changed your behavior for good, but you get some style points. When you get down to it, we'd need a pretty gnarly technical solution in order to stop cellphone usage in cars.

I watched some of the videos on the site and while I really like the features where texts and phone calls are automatically responded to with a message saying the receiver is driving their car - this should be enough. "I'm driving, will call you back when I am not driving". But the video then goes on to show how you can override the block for "close contacts", and says "Then, with your eyes on the road" as the driver looks over to the blackberry. Improved, sure, but it sends the message that we can come up with all sorts of solutions to make an inherently unsafe proposition safe.

Howard somewhat repudiates any lackadasical use of his product in the comments, I give him credit for that. And Businesses and Parents could - if they wanted - use his product as a big hammer to completely prevent cellphone use while driving by using the "exit while passenger option", or at least monitor it closely with the email alert. Turning the phones off and sending the message "I'm driving" could be one small stone in building the mindset that "I'm driving" is no different than "I'm not home" used to be in the bad old days of landlines.

Upon review I think the product has value in creating a technical solution to a non-technical problem. I'd love to see insurance companies allow a discount for strict implementation of such a product for companies - professional drivers are some of the worst abusers of cellphones in cars (take for example Taxis - brutal). It's sad that we humans cannot simply process a bad behavior and stop it, but that can be said about several things more pernicious than texting and driving (yes, many such things exist).

I am a teabagger, and I'm proud of it.

Yesterday our fun little progressive transportation sandbox known as Streetsblog was invaded when SFGate posted a direct link to a Streetsblog article.

SFGate - the San Francisco Chronicle's online presence is known for it's rather opinionated commenters. And aside from Mark Morford, the top commented articles are always cycling related. This brings out the best commentary on Critical Mass and endless streams of "Cyclists don't pay taxes".

The "cyclists don't pay taxes" crowd was in full force now that Streetsblog had been revealed. "peternatural" agrees with my assessment.

Some SF gate commenters can be pretty vitriolic when the topic involves bikes. They generally complain about these things:

Bikers are freeloaders who use the streets but contribute nothing to their upkeep, and if you asked them too they would probably whine and comlain because they are whiners and complainers.

peternatural then follows up with the boilerplate cyclist response...

But, since gas taxes are so low in this country, general tax funds pay for a big share of the infrastructure. Most bikers do pay sales and income tax, so this point is factually wrong. In fact, motorists who drive a lot are getting a partly free ride.

There is a general thesis that the anti-cycling crowd is primarily populated by knuckle dragging Sarah Palin fans. Guns, god, and a big Ford F-150 driven on a road made by God for CARS. One would think that might not describe the SFGate commenters since San Francisco is Gomorrah, after all. But this is the internet, and many if not most of SFGate's commenters are from Red States like Texas.

I agree with the thesis that there is a large intersection between rabid anti-cyclists and the Fox News/Glen Beck crowd. But herein lies a dilemma. The whole Raison d'être of Fox News is "taxes bad" . Seems to me if I sold my car, stopped driving, and thus stopped paying DMV registration and gas taxes, then I am being exactly the sort of patriot they are looking for! What a conundrum. Of course, they'd probably kick me out on my Frenchie loving butt for using the term "Raison d'être".

I guess their rationale is that they should be able to buy gas and cars and just not be taxed on it. Of course, then they would be paying no taxes just like me, and would lose their exclusive claim to the road. Dammit, another conundrum!

Anyway, I'm going to have to thumb my nose at "peternaturals" apologist mindset. I'm thinking I'll just put a couple of teabags on the back of my bike and continue protesting taxes the old fashion way by consuming less of a taxed good. I am a freeloading cheapskate after all. I learned to be one when I read a quote from a famous Marxist who said "A penny saved is twopence dear"

"Bike Box" - a.k.a. "Car Box"

Update: I rode over this spot today. The signal for the cyclists is in fact before the real stop line. So the car was parked in the wrong place, sure, but it's not a bike box.

There is however an real bike box now at Scott in the wiggle in San Francisco.

Today I was riding east down Evelyn from the Mountain View Caltrain station. Frequently on this route I will then take a left on Mary to get onto Central Expressway to head to work. The left turn there has an advanced stop line for cars with a triangular spot for bikes to set up their turns. There is a lot of value for a bike to make this left turn from the front of the queue because you need to be able to set up a proper line as you turn left, so as to be able to take a straight line over the Caltrain tracks.

This morning, I wheeled up to the bike box and there was a car pulled up past the stop line and into the bike area.



I sent this out in a tweet and Fritz asked "There is a bike box there?". I had to think about this - my kneejerk reaction is "Yes", but is it a legitimate "Bike Box" - e.g. is the striping done like that specifically for bikes? I thought I recalled there being a bike symbol painted there - the tiny bike symbol with the vertical line through it to indicate where the bike sensor is in an intersection, but I wasn't 100% sure. I figured I would take a look at the Google Maps and check it out.


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Amusing. There is a car stopped in the bike box in the Google Satellite View, on the left side of the intersection. You can see how the striping is set up if you look at the right side of the intersection showing the left onto Mary from WB Evelyn. And no, that car is not in the process of making a left...

You can look at the ground there in the streetview picture, I don't see a bike marking. I'll have to go check it out again. What is clear, bike box or not, the first line is the stop line.

Not the first time I've ever seen a violation captured by Google....

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Cyclists forced into deadly intersection.

Update: From Mark Simon via SVBC.

"We have received a number of inquiries from cyclists concerned that we closed a gate on Pico Boulevard, an unimproved private street that is the entrance to our SamTrans base in San Carlos. The street has been used by both cyclists and pedestrians. We closed the gate out of concern for the safety of... cyclists and pedestrians... sharing an unimproved street with buses that come in and out of our base with high frequency. Because of the inquiries, we will conduct a safety assessment of this area as it relates to our use of it and the use of it by cyclists and pedestrians. It will take several days to complete the assessment and when we are done we will report out to those who have inquired and through this venue.

The "Bayway" commute route from San Francisco to the South Bay includes a section between San Carlos/Foster City that offers cyclists a few options, and making the correct decision can not only provide a little peace, less odors, but also increase safety. From Oracle's campus to Redwood Shores Parkway, the most obvious route is to take Shoreway. This takes one past a recyling dump and forces you to spend time alongside large garbage trucks. The other option is Twin Dolphin, a four lane street with a median through an office park with little traffic(why they needed 4 lanes here is a mystery to me, but I digress). Twin Dolphin is far superior for cycling.

North to South, both roads take you to Redwood Shores Parkway. On Shoreway, you would go straight through the treacherous intersection with Holly and shortly take a left onto Skyway. Since I've been commuting this way, my handlers always led me down Twin Dolphin instead, which ends with a right onto RWS, at which point you must cross three lanes of traffic to make a left onto Shoreway.

This left is very difficult - it is controlled by a left turn arrow and the intersection does not sense bikes. I mean, it really doesn't sense them because I have stood there in a pack of 12+ bikes and we eventually ran the light in frustration after missing out on two cycles. While there isn't much cross traffic, the opposing traffic sometimes has a green while the through way shows red, so you could be running a left against a red into oncoming traffic you would be led to believe will stop. The "best" tactic seems to be to wait for cross traffic to have a green, cross left, then complete the box turn. The legality of this is tricky - the sensor doesn't pick up the bike and my understanding is you aren't required to wait forever if the light won't turn. Basically, it just sucks.

An unfortunate incident at this intersection caused some of us to revisit how to handle the Holly/RWS intersection - the death of Mary Yonkers who chose to ride from Oracle to Holly on Shoreway, and was killed by a right turning dump truck.



It was discovered that by going straight through RWS on Twin Dolphin, you go into a parking lot, then onto Pico Blvd. Pico Blvd is sort of a road through some SamTrans bus storage lot from what I can tell. This takes you onto Airport which becomes Skyway and you head into San Carlos, without dealing with the Holly/RWS intersection.


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Above is the view of Pico looking into the hotel parking lot. I would be coming from the parking lot, but this morning I saw a rider headed the direction viewed in the frame. He didn't make it very far and neither did I...



I'm not sure why this was closed off, but if at all possible we need to figure out how to get this route open.

Hat tip to the South Bay Cycling mailing list for pointing this out, I would have ran into it anyway, but knowing this obstacle was in play prepped me to photograph the site.