Steele Olmstead responds after St. Petersburg police ticket 16 bicyclists as safety campaign begins
Following a recent crack down on bicyclist behavior reported by the St. Petersburg Times today, FBA member and personal injury attorney Steele Olmstead responded to the staff writer with the following:
Mr. Boyle:
I thoroughly enjoyed your article. I do agree law violators should be ticketed. But I believe ALL the violators of traffic statutes should be ticketed.
Now, can we do another story about the law that requires cars to give bicyclist 3 feet of room when passing? (Florida Statutes 316.083(1); How cars are supposed to give the right of way to bicyclist and pedestrians when they cross sidewalks? (Florida Statutes 316.125(2)) or when riding two abreast on a four lane road, the car MUST change lanes? (Florida Statutes 316.083(1); How cars don’t treat bicycle like other cars, even though the law clearly STATES bicyclist are entitled to all the rules and rights of the road? (Florida Statutes 316.2065 ); How cars are supposed to wait for cyclist and pedestrians when they are in a lined crosswalk? This last constant violation is what killed Admiral Leroy Collins, J. (Florida Statutes 316.130(7)b(b); And most importantly, and fundamentally the problem here: how police and sheriff’s CONSTANTLY FAIL to ticket drivers for these blatant violations of Florida law, basic road safety and common sense?
I just settled a case wherein a commercial van hit my client on a four lane road while he was riding 18″ from the white line at the furthermost edge of the right side of the road. It is a very common occurrence. Cars think we cyclists are just a nuisance. The law enforcement doesn’t protect us by enforcing the law though the LAW does. When will we see that story?
I am a personal injury attorney, but I was a cyclist ever since college. We have good laws protecting cyclists but they are constantly ignored and not enforced. It is a very real problem that never gets addressed and your article carries on the overlooking of these laws.
If the Mayor is St. Petersburg is going to “crack down” on violators, let him crack down on all of them, including those that don’t give cyclist the rights on the road that the law provides.
Please, do give me a call and I’ll tell you all about what my clients, friends and family endures on the roads and sidewalks in the second most dangerous area for cyclists and pedestrians in the United States.
J. Steele Olmstead
I agree with the letter, but could we PLEASE refer to motor vehicle DRIVERS instead of cars. Cars are inanimate, they don’t think or do anything. They are driven by people, as are bicycles.
I realize this is mostly a product of lazy writing, but it pervasive and it insidiously removes personal responsibility from the choices and actions of PEOPLE.
BTW, this is not cars vs bikes or us vs them. It’s us vs ourselves. Most of us drive cars and bikes. The problem is that the justice system has become skewed in favor of the indifferent operation of fast, heavy and dangerous vehicles at the expense of the safe operation of slow, light, low-impact vehicles.
It is the culture of speed vs our very humanity.
And one more thing. I was almost t-boned (on my bike) by a woman on a bicycle in St. Pete at a 4-way stop. I stopped at my stop sign and started to go when she blew through hers without batting an eye. I saw a lot of scofflaw cycling when I was there for a week last spring, I saw almost no law-abiding bicycle drivers. I agree with equitable enforcement, but I’m totally in favor of ticketing people who think they can make up their own rules just because they’re on a bike.
I t-boned a car when i was going 25MPH on my road bike in the bike lane. I should have been more vigilant but the car turned right in front of me into a driveway area and then told me as i was picking myself up before going to the Dr that I should have watched where she was going. She didn’t even consider that she did not have the right of way. So i now consider all vehicles my enemy and watch much more closely. I try to obey all laws but as any cyclist knows – cars do not consider bikes at all.
Carl:
There’s nothing good or practical that can come from considering “all vehicles [your] enemy.” First off, as a bicyclist, you are yourself a vehicle driver. People make mistakes. You said yourself that you should have been more vigilant. Instead of thinking of motorists as enemies, think of them as imperfect fellow road users who make mistakes, and try to figure out how to make it less likely that their mistakes will result in your injury. It’s what’s called defensive driving, and the principles of defensive driving apply to all drivers, whether their vehicles are motorized or not.
The real issue here is not how you should consider a driver of a vehicle or cars or motorist or cyclists. Let’s drop all the touchy feely politically correct ways we should be viewing our fellow humans get back to the reason this article was written. It’s about obeying the law regardless of weather you’re driving a car or riding a bike. I don’t disagree with any of you on your comments but automobile drivers are not aware or ignore the law and what’s worse is law enforcement isn’t doing their job. Instead they’re doing exactly the opposite and that’s what we need to focus on and be vocal about. So, if want to do something about it, write letter(s) to your local law enforcement and state and local governments. If fact, do it over and over again until something is done, that’s how you change things. Get your friends and family to do it as well.
I live in, drive and bike, St Petersburg – particularly the Pinellas Point/Lakewood Estates area. The sad thing about the Stop Sign discussion is that no one – no car, truck or bicyclist, should be stopping at many of these intersections. The City has a slow(very slow) process for installation of roundabouts, which many of the south side intersections would be ideal locations for.
It’s just not efficient for us to use 4 way stops as the default traffic control device in these days of $2.50+ gasoline. As inconvenient as it is for a cyclist to clip in from a stop sign, it costs America $Billions in gasoline to have automobiles come to a complete stop every time they meet a cross street.
Chris
When I start feeling that “all motorists” are horrible people, I have a rule: I must look for three motorists doing good things and give them a complement noting specifically what it is that they are doing good. The good thing could be being patient, passing safely, etc.
This forces me to start noticing the good motorists. Many of them I can’t get to logistically. So after I’ve finally been able to reach the quota of three good motorists, I’ve noticed many more than three.
Americans have a bad habit of focusing on the negative things that happen. It’s easy because the negative things are the things that make our lives interesting.
Imagine yourself as a school teacher with 30 students. 29 kids behaved themselves all day. But, one student was a constant problem all day. When you got home that night, who do you think you’d be talking about: the 29 kids who behaved or the one kid who was a terror?
We bicyclists do the same. We talk about the bad motorist and completely forget about all the other motorists who safely passed in the left lane.
Letter is EXACTLY correct!