Joe Cipale
In the meantime, if you run a stop sign in your Ultra-light Calfee and get creamed by the driver of a minivan, I am sure that the driver of the van will take comfort in fact that you were fined $8.25 for impacting their life alonf with yours. Sorry... I think that running a stop sign is running a stop sign.
Joe
James Thomas wrote:
> This is a belated response to the bike sting thread from May 3rd. I
> also tried to respond to the Jonathan Maus's May 11th blog http://
> bikeportland.org/2007/05/11/one-year-later-at-the-salmon-street-stop-
> sign/, but the blog never accepts my responses on any topic (so
> Jonathan, drop me an email).
>
> The root of the problem lies in the laws for traffic violations,
> which should be changed. I would like to see cyclists take a
> legislative approach.
>
> Fundamentally, we should accept the responsibility for the mass of
> the vehicle we are controlling. I believe not only cyclists would
> support it, but so would pedestrians and owners of smaller vehicles.
> I am an owner and operator of various vehicles at various times,
> including bicycles, a Mini Cooper and a full size van. When I make a
> mistake in the van, I am taking on much more responsibility for
> causing injury and damage. The penalty for an infraction should
> represent that liability. A rather simple legislative solution would
> be a rating multiplied by the mass of the vehicle.
>
> For example, let's start with running a stop sign. At present our
> society has assigned a value of $242 to that infraction. For
> simplicity, let us assume that the ideal car weighs 4840 pounds, then
> the value 0.05 could be assigned to the infraction (eg. run the stop
> sign, get a ticket for 0.05 x the Gross Vehicle Weight Rating of 4840
> lbs, leads to a fine of $242). Now if I ran the stop sign in my van
> and was ticketed, the 6600 lbs GVWR leads to a fine of $330 while in
> my Mini at 3600 lbs it would lead to a fine of $180 and on my bike,
> my gross vehicle weight might be 165 lbs leading to a fine of $8.25.
> I think the risks of damage and my danger to my fellow members of
> society are quite well reflected in this. After all, the laws of
> physics apply very well to mass (as well as velocity). We could
> choose net weight or gross weight or some other definition of weight,
> the important thing is that the mass of the vehicle comes closest to
> approximating responsibility.
>
> So, perhaps I should fire this email off to the BTA and my
> legislators, but in the meantime I've cluttered your race email. Any
> thoughts?
>
> James Thomas
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