accident

Safety tips for bicyclists, motorists, and pedestrians--

Cyclists:

• Wear proper safety gear, especially a helmet
• Obey all traffic laws, signs and signals
• Never ride against traffic – ride with the flow

Motorists:

• Reduce speed when passing bicyclists
• Give bicyclists adequate space to maneuver – typically allow for 3 feet
• Don't blast your horn when approaching cyclists – startling them can cause an accident
• Stop for pedestrian at crosswalks and intersections – it's the law

Pedestrians:

• Cross the street at marked crosswalks and intersections whenever possible.
• Be aware of your surroundings – watch for vehicles turning or baacking out of parking spaces and driveways
• Use pedestrian pushbuttons to activate/extend the walk signal. Never enter a crosswalk when a signal displays a solid or flashing Don't Walk message
• Use sidewalks. If there are none, walk facing traffic so you see vehicles, and drivers see you

Ciclovia--the street festival where cities close down miles of streets and residents come out to enjoy walking, bicycling, scootering, skating, and all other manner of fun physical activity--is coming to Missouri in a big way this summer.

Looks like the MidWest Bicycle Expo & Swap Meet has some cool speakers and sessions lined up.

The full list is below.  

If you're coming out to the Swap Meet (Sunday, Jan 31st, 10am-3pm), but sure to

  - Stop by the MoBikeFed booth

  - Come to my talk at 11AM--I'll be unveiling a major new partnership with MoDOT--and a break through in moving bicycling and walking forward in Missouri.

The Freakonomics blog is covering a research that seems to confirm what many bicycle advocates have been saying for years: Laws requiring helmets while bicycling reduce the amount of bicycling.

The new version of the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD) has been release

d--after many years of work and at least two years of anticipation.

(The draft of the chapter of bicycle facilities has been essentially complete and circulating since at least 2007--apparently technical issues in other sections of the manual caused the delay in final publication.)

The most significant change for bicyclists is the manual officially approves the use of "shared lane markings" or "sharrows".

Many cities--including Columbia and St. Louis--have been trying out the sharrow markings but in the past such cities have had to get special permission from the Federal Highway Administration to use the markings on an experimental basis.

Police have laid charges against a driver who struck and very seriously injured student Kimberly Armstrong as she crossed a crosswalk at Broadway and Kearney on her way to school in September.

The injury is one of a string of Springfield students injured walking or bicycling to school this year.

The Springfield News-Leader reports:

The man who hit a Hillcrest High student with his car Sept. 22 was speeding and has been charged with careless and imprudent driving, according to the Greene County Prosecutor's office.

If convicted, Scott Harper, 28, faces up to a year in jail, a fine of up to $1,000, or both.

Harper's vehicle struck Kimberly Armstrong, who was age 15 at the time, as she crossed the intersection of Kearney Street and Broadway Avenue.

An accident investigator found that Harper was going 55 mph and concluded the accident "would have been avoided entirely" if he had been driving the speed limit.

Very often charges against drivers in cases like this are completely justified--but rarely are they brought by prosecutors, as in this case.

Springfield police are to be congratulated for thoroughly investigating this situation to find the ultimate cause:

Officer James Hinkle concluded Harper was traveling 15 miles above the 40 mph speed limit, and that was a key factor in the collision.

"It is my opinion that this crash is the result of inattention and excessive speed of Mr. Harper," Hinkle wrote in his report.

"If Mr. Harper had seen Ms. Armstrong in the crosswalk when he crested the hill, he would have had time to react to either avoid the accident or reduce his speed substantially.

"Had he been going the speed limit, this collision would have been avoided entirely."

We have previously published an estimate of the number of non-drivers and non-driving adults in Missouri.

Here is an updated estimate, based on the most recent data available (2007 Federal Highway Administration data).

In brief:

• 30% of Missouri's population does not have a driver's license. 
• Over 16% of adults do not have a driver's license.

The question, as always: How well does Missouri's transportation system and policies provide for the needs of this large minority of the population--100% of children under the age of 16 and 16% of adults--who live in our society, go to school, have jobs, and pay taxes, but cannot drive?


Overall population (2007)

Missouri population	5,878,415	100%	source
Number of licensed drivers	4,161,957	70.8%	source
Number of non-drivers	1,716,458	29.2%

Population age 16 and above (2007)

Population age 16 and above	4,976,668	100%	source
Number of drivers	4,161,957	83.6%	source
Number of non-drivers, age 16 and above	814,711	16.4%

KSHB-TV has a followup about the bicyclist who was hit and injured by an angry driver in September.

The incident happened on the downtown Kansas City airport loop road, a very low-traffic road very commonly used by bicyclists.

The KSHB article says:

A cyclist injured by a hit and run is angry the alleged driver is not facing more serious charges.

On Wednesday, a Lee’s Summit woman was charged for the incident in Clay County Circuit Court. Dawn Mais, 29, faces the class A misdemeanor of leaving the scene of a motor vehicle accident.

“I’m absolutely dumbfounded,” said Chuck Pullium, who was hit while riding his bike near the Wheeler Downtown Airport on September 26. “The woman threatened to do bodily harm and then carried through with her threat.”

Pullium accused the driver of honking her horn, yelling at him to get off the road, and then hitting him on NW Lou Holland Drive. The accident mangled Pullium’s bike and left him with a cracked tailbone.

The driver didn’t stop, but Pullium and his son returned to the area the next day. They located the suspected vehicle parked in a secure lot at the airport and called police. A probable cause statement said that “officers observed a scratch on the right front of the vehicle.”

Full story on the KSHB web site here.