Bicycle Austin forum

RedFalcon

Member

Registered: 2013-10-10

Posts: 233

Ignore your rights and they will go away

You have a right to operate a bicycle on the roads.  But some people think you don't, and will yell at you to get off the road and onto the side walk. That way they can drive their climate destroying killing machines without having to slow down for vulnerable road users.

If you let them get away with it you then you are part of the problem instead of being part of the solution.

When you have a bad experience while out cycling you can do something about it.  Get a camera and use it when you ride and report harassment on the Cyclist Video Evidence website; https://www.cyclistvideoevidence.com/

Michael even has a link to that site in the top left of this page.

If a driver comes flying up from behind and lays on the horn you have been assaulted. Check out this new video from CVE (I'm not one for trigger warnings, but this one took me several times to get through.)

https://www.cyclistvideoevidence.com/20 … r-the-law/

Yesterday, while riding home from La Frontera I had to deal with a middle-aged white male driving a brown 4-door jeep (TX MCX 6560).  He tried to intimidate me with his horn and close following.  I filed a report with Round Rock police.

I got it all on video and submitted to the CVE site.

And that camera is kind of crappy, but it only cost me $25 on ebay.

Why are you still reading this?  Get on ebay and get a cheap $25 camera.

I know how to ride in traffic, so I don't get too many of these, but the fact that they occur at all deters lots of people from cycling.  Let's build a groundswell of discontent for bad driving.  Let's file police reports every time we see it happen. 

I have been trying to get Bike Austin behind this, but getting Bike Austin to do something is like trying to push a piece of cooked spaghetti through a key hole.

MichaelBluejay

Webmaster

From: Austin, TX

Registered: 2008-05-26

Posts: 1,466

Website

Re: Ignore your rights and they will go away

Thanks for posting this.  I think the original didn't make it to the email list when you first posted it on 5/23, so I just set it to post manually.

I've been meaning to buy a camera ever since you first turned me on to CVE, even though I don't bike so much any more, but this is the kick in the pants I need to finally do so.

Though it sure is disheartening though to see all the cases on CVE where police blow off the cyclists' video evidence.  We certainly need a revolution, somehow.

I hear you about Bike Austin.  Their website is never updated, and a while back a former director tried to pressure me to remove a bit on my website where I pointed out that a local attorney was also a DWI lawyer.  (The lawyer happened to be a major donor to Bike Austin.)  The lawyer actually threatened to sue me (for reporting the truth!), then backed down once she realized I wasn't an idiot.

btrettel

Member

Registered: 2013-10-01

Posts: 60

Re: Ignore your rights and they will go away

I've been riding with a helmet cam since 2013 or so. I used to post videos on YouTube, but I've been too busy for the past few years to continue. I've since built up a large backlog of video.

There are multiple reasons to record video:

1. Makes you ride safer. (You're being recorded, so you don't want to do anything stupid on camera.)
2. Allows you to analyze your own riding to see how to avoid problems.
3. Intimidates some drivers into treating you with more respect. (My catchphrase has become "You know you're being recorded right?" when some drivers stop to yell at me.)
4. Documents crashes. The authorities are biased against cyclists and we need all the objective evidence we can get. This was my original motivation after reading this article where video was the only reason people believed a cyclist's story.

The only time when I intentionally stopped recorded since 2013 was when I worked briefly for the US Army and I was legally not allowed to record part of my commute. I'd record until just before the checkpoint.

As Michael Bluejay said, don't expect video to solve everything. I was assaulted by a driver in early 2018. I had HD video of the entire incident from my helmet cam and rear camera. The police could hardly have cared less. They did take my statement and put on a good show, telling me how important addressing road rage is to them, but there was no followup beyond a call I got later where they asked me for the plate number. They didn't want to look at the video. To my knowledge nothing happened after the police asked for the plate number. [Edit: I removed some details.]

Last edited by btrettel (2019-06-03 21:20:51)

RedFalcon

Member

Registered: 2013-10-10

Posts: 233

Re: Ignore your rights and they will go away

Yep, those other reasons for riding with a camera are also true.  You can review incidents and think about what you might have done differently. 

Pro tip: If you talk out loud to yourself when you ride remember that some cameras record sound too.  A few times I caught myself saying things I might not want played back if I got killed or seriously injured before I could clear the files.

I have found that some incidents that seemed pretty scary when they happened don't look that bad on video, and other situations that were not really an issue at all look terrifying on video.

And you are so right, video wont solve everything, or even anything for any particular incident.  BUT, keep those cameras rolling and post incidents to the CVE site (on top left of this page).  My hope is that if we can get enough posted we can use them when we try to make road design improvements and so we can demand better (any) enforcement.