Sami Fournier
Saying we don't have a 3-foot law in Oregon mis-states the actual regulation a bit, as we have an even better law. See below for the facts, and pass them on to relay in the driver's meeting.
Oregon:
Like most states, Oregon has a law that requires general safe passing
distance. It also has the following:
SB 108 passed in 2007. The resulting bill created a safe passing
distance geared primarily for non-urban cycling conditions. SB 108
creates the offense of unsafe passing of a bicycle and other
improvements:
* Safe passing distance means distance that is sufficient to
prevent contact with the person operating the bicycle if the person were
to fall into the driver's lane of traffic.
* Exceptions include if a bicycle is in a bike lane, if the driver is
going less than 35 mph, and when cyclists are turning left and the
motorist is overtaking on the right. In these exception cases, ORS
811.410 still applies stating a vehicle that is overtaking any other
vehicle proceeding in the same direction shall pass to the left at a
safe distance.
* Drivers may drive to the left of the center of a roadway to
safely pass a bicycle if it is unobstructed for sufficient distance to
permit the driver to pass the person safely and avoid interference with
oncoming traffic.
* Legalizes pace line cycling by limiting the offense of
"following too closely" to motor vehicles.
We were happy with this bill because we felt:
a. the in urban areas and at lower speeds passing distance was not a
primary issue in Oregon.
b. in higher speed areas, especially where trucks and larger vehicles
are present, that 3-feet is not adequate. The law that we passed
requires significantly more than 3-feet in those areas.
--- On Tue, 11/3/09, kellie wrote:
From: kellie
Subject: [OBRA Chat] a negative into a positive
To: obra@list.obra.org
Date: Tuesday, November 3, 2009, 1:08 PM
For those of you who commented on my post about a week ago regarding the "3 foot law" ( which we don't have in Oregon) that protects cyclists, the owner of the company sent me this e-mail this morning. Thanks to Ray Thomas for offering his assistance to me, and thanks for your e-mails regarding ORS 811.065.
Bruce Parker ( owner of Parker Concrete) sent me this e-mail today.
Good morning Kellie.
After speaking with both you and our driver, I’ve decided to take a negative and turn it to a positive as much as possible. To do this, I could use some help from you – some information.
I am going to have a drivers meeting Friday morning to go over safety issues and this will be one of the topics. Please let me know by Thursday the things you think should be covered. We know the obvious things like pedestrians and bikes may not always be easy to see but on top of that, the things that are a concern that us in the non-bicycle community may need to pay more attention to.
I apologize for any inconvenience this has caused you but, help us make something good of it.
Thank you,
Bruce Parker
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