Brooklyn Spoke

Andrew Sullivan has been running a few posts about “Drivers vs Cyclists,” and recently featured this reader response:

I lived in NYC for 20+ years and I’m currently living in San Francisco, and I can tell you the reason for bike problems is that there really are no rules for bicyclists. As a pedestrian I’ve nearly been killed in NYC by a bike going the wrong way down a one-way street. Or just recently in SF in the SOMA district, I saw a woman nearly hit as a bike sped along the sidewalk around a corner and never slowed down. Bikes are not supposed to be going fast on sidewalks in city, right?

It’s not about bike lanes; it’s about people thinking they own the streets and sidewalks because they’re on a bike.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a bike rider myself, but again, I was nearly knocked down by a speed cyclist around the seaport in Manhattan on my bike. The thing about bike riding is that there are no rules, really, and that’s part of the beauty, the freedom. But as they become more prevalent in car traffic and pedestrian traffic, it’s really becoming a problem. Like I said, I’m an urban dwelling bike rider myself, and I’m appalled at the bike riding behavior going on.

Emphasis mine. We’ll have come a long way when people finally realize that being nearly hit by a cyclist is far better than being actually hit by a car.  But I guess almost only counts in horseshoes, hand grenades, and cycling.

Midwood residents and community groups are working to get a part of East 15th Street between Elm Avenue and Avenue M turned into a pedestrian plaza.  There’s a tiny amount of media-generated “controversy” surrounding the idea, but thankfully the Midwood Development Coroporation has smart people like Lori Raphael speaking on its behalf.

“It is an old-fashioned notion to leave a street open without space for people and say, ‘Oh, we’re protecting seniors.’ ” said Lori Raphael, a Midwood resident and member of the Midwood Development Corporation’s board. “These plazas are orderly and an amenity and they are a lovely thing to have for everybody.”

Community Board 14 has a hearing about the plaza scheduled for April 4th before the full board votes on April 16th. If you live or work in the area, please attend.  All meetings and hearings are open to the public.

Via Kate Hinds.  Available at Threadless, which calls this shirt “Bicycles in Mirror Are Closer Than they Appear.”

We’ve come to expect the series of post-incident events that will likely lead to the eventual lack of any real charges against the drivers who hit and killed Jusheem Thorne in a crosswalk on Eastern Parkway last night, if the drivers can even be tracked down.

But what still has the power to shock is the utter disregard for human life demonstrated over and over again by motorists in this city.  Thorne’s death is just one extreme case among many, but there are the more mundane moments, too.  We’ve all seen a driver speed up to catch a green light, honking his horn as he barrels toward the intersection as if to tell pedestrians who dare find themselves in the crosswalk, “I see you, but if I hit you it’s your own damn fault.”  Never mind a little courtesy or cautious driving; a green light clearly means that a driver has the right to kill.  “But I had the light,” is a close cousin of “But I didn’t see him!”

A pedestrian who runs down a sidewalk tackling other pedestrians like some kind of amateur linebacker would surely be arrested in minutes and most likely taken for a psychiatric evaluation.  But a driver who barrels down the street–or even the sidewalk–without regard for his fellow citizens is just a real New Yorker trying to get somewhere important.

Not all drivers are sociopaths, but it’s only behind the wheel of a car that this kind of sociopathic behavior is culturally accepted.  What can we do to change the culture?

Photo: Bicycling Magazine

Matt Seaton, who once wrote in The Guardian that the Prospect Park West bike lane “could affect the future of cycling worldwide,” has an excellent feature in Bicycling Magazine on last year’s “bikelash” and the growing pains associated with increased cycling and bike-specific infrastructure in New York City.  This passage is one of my favorite parts:

Tom Vanderbilt, author of the New York Times bestseller Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says about Us), said, “A Harvard researcher talks about the ‘four stages’ of social norm change: silly, controversial, progressive, then obvious. In the first stage, we had a sort of reflexive denial: New York isn’t Europe, that won’t work here, etc. I think we’re somewhere between the second and third stage when it comes to cycling in New York; opponents are finding they can’t make viable arguments against cycling as a transportation mode on safety or traffic-flow reasons, so now it’s more about the left-wing, Copenhagenizing cabal.”

In the fourth stage, Vanderbilt explained as I joined him on a weekend ride out of the city to the pretty town of Nyack, on the Hudson River, changes such as bike lanes are widely considered not just positive elements but so desireable as to be obvious needs.

While Neighbors for Better Bike Lanes and the last holdouts of the bikelash believe that all of this bike lane nonsense will be behind us once the Bloomberg administration is over, they’re terribly mistaken.  No one riding out there today is thinking to himself, “You know, this biking thing is great for now, but once Janette Sadik-Khan is gone I’ll probably put the bike away and go back to taking the subway.” The toothpaste is out of the tube when it comes to biking in New York (and everywhere) and no amount of lawsuits will put it back in.  The biggest bike lane opponents in the world might very well win small battles here and there in the coming years but they’ve lost the larger war, if there ever was a war to begin with.  As Janette Sadik-Khan says in Seaton’s piece, “People are starting to vote with their pedals.”

If you’re looking for something fun to do with the kids this Saturday, come to PS 261 in Boerum Hill on Saturday for the second annual Bike Swap and Rodeo.  It’s a great event and your chance score a cheap kid’s bike, donate an old bike, learn to ride, or just have fun.  I went last year and really enjoyed seeing so many kids riding around in a really safe space.

• Bring an old kid’s bike and get a new one from the bikes available for $15.
• If you don’t have an old bike to donate, you can still purchase a bike for $25.
• Bike New York trainers will be on hand to teach kids to ride for free. (Advanced registration required. See BikeNewYork.org for details.)
• Bike New York will also offer bike skills clinics to teach basic and advanced skills for riding.

Mechanics from Recycle-A-Bicycle will be on hand to make sure all bikes are tuned up and in good, working order.  Volunteers are needed, so if you can help out or if you want more information, download this PDF about the event.

I went last year and it was a ton of fun.  Even if you don’t have kids, it’s worth swinging by just to check out the extreme cuteness rolling around the schoolyard.

Photo: Dmitry Gudkov

Via Bike Blog NYC and 718 Cyclery.

Krys Blakemore is a fantastic bike mechanic (and terrific artist) who’s worked at 718 Cyclery from the beginning.  Joe Nocella, 718’s owner, writes:

On March 15th, Krys was hit by a car here in Brooklyn.  After major surgery, she is unable to walk, work or ride her bike. Her rehab period will be extensive, but a full recovery is planned.

Krys was 718 Cyclery’s first employee, and is the kind of person who would help others at a moment’s notice.  She is also the kind of person who would never dream of asking for help…

I am not that kind of person…please donate what you can to help offset the costs of her not being able to work.

I rode behind these two kids and their dad on Grand Street this evening during my commute home.  When they stopped at an intersection with me behind them he looked at me and apologized.  “No need to apologize,” I said.  “This is worth waiting for.”

If this isn’t a sign of how far biking in New York has come I don’t know what is.

Photo: DNAinfo

This is just horrifying.  A driver fleeing the scene of a bus crash tore down 18th Avenue in Bensonhurst and hit a cyclist earlier today, stopping only when he crashed into a Range Rover.  No word on whether anyone was in the Range Rover when it was hit.

A 63-YEAR-OLD bicyclist was clinging to life Wednesday after an 80-year-old driver slammed into him on a Brooklyn street, officials said.

The victim was riding his bike around 4:25 p.m. on 73rd St. near 18th Ave. in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, when a driver in a black Mercedes-Benz who was fleeing from another accident plowed into him,, cops said.

The octogenarian behind the wheel – identified by witnesses as Tommy Saladino – had crashed into a school bus minutes earlier and kept going, according to police.

After hitting the cyclist, Saladino rammed into a Range Rover before finally coming to a stop, officials said.

Three media outlets picked up this story tonight.  Note the difference in the headlines:

• Post: “Elderly Driver Hits Elderly Cyclist in Brooklyn”
• Daily News: “Cyclist critical in Brooklyn Crash – 63-year-old man struck by 80-year-old motorist in Bensonhurst”
• DNAinfo: “Bicyclist Critically Injured by Mercedes in Bensonhurst”

The News does a good job of reporting the story with humanizing touches, naming the driver of the Mercedes and mentioning the age of the cyclist.  Even the Post, in its trademark brevity, manages to mention that an actual driver was behind the wheel of the Mercedes.

The DNAinfo story, however, is a classic example of what Steven Vance calls the “Robocar” style of reporting.  The headline says the cyclist was hit by a “Mercedes,” not a a driver or motorist.  No mention of a driver is made until the very end of the piece, and then only to mention that he was taken to a nearby hospital.  Even worse than that is this description of the series of events following the first collision:

The bus, which did not have any children on board, chased the Mercedes, which swerved into another lane and slammed into the cyclist, who was delivering food for a restaurant, Luca said.

“The bus…chased the Mercedes.”  The only humans mentioned here are non-existent children and the seriously injured cyclist.

All three reports mention that the driver is expected to be charged.

Here’s a snapshot from last Thursday’s CB6 Bike Share Planning Workshop in Park Slope.  It was an active and spirited process, with overwhelmingly positive group of participants offering their two cents.  I can’t speak for every table, but at mine every community member had overwhelmingly positive ideas for where stations should be placed, with the majority favoring on-street locations over sidewalks.

There are two more workshops scheduled in Brooklyn this week:

• Wedensday, March 21st:Community Board 3’s workshop will be held at Restoration Plaza, 1368 Fulton Street in the Multi-Purpose Room.  Sessions begin at 6:00 and 7:00 pm.
• Thursday, March 22nd:Community Board 1’s workshop will be held at the Swinging 60s Senior Center, 211 Ainslie Street, Brooklyn, New York 11211.  Sessions begin at 6:00 and 7:00 pm.

If I’m not mistaken, this week will wrap up the planning process for Brooklyn, so if you live, work, or play in these districts make sure you don’t miss your chance to have your say.  As an added bonus a sample bike will be on display, giving you an opportunity to kick the tires.