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Prestigious-Owl-6397 t1_j6lfmnx wrote

Reply to comment by Sent_From_time in Third Bicyclist Killed in Philadelphia in January 2023 - Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia by hdhcnsnd

This isn't a question that's easily answered. Most intersections and traffic laws were not made with cyclists' safety in mind, nor were they made with any recognition of how bicycles operate. Sometimes these situations lead cyclists to cautiously break the law, and sometimes the law is simply ridiculous. For example, if there's debris in the bike lane and you exit the bike lane to avoid running over debris that can puncture your tires, any drivers behind you who hit you because they weren't paying attention to the bike lane or were speeding won't be held responsible. This sometimes leads cyclists to completely avoid bike lanes known to be full of trash.

That being said, most minorities are judged by the few, and cyclists are no exception. A group of engineers in Denmark studied traffic cameras in multiple cities around the world. They observed 106,000 cyclists, and only 5% broke the law. They actually found a higher percentage of drivers who broke the law. Of that 5%, only 1% recklessly broke the law. The other 4% were incidents like I described above. https://youtu.be/USAeytatNe4

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Sent_From_time t1_j6lh6ly wrote

Wait, did you just compare cyclists to minorities that have been oppressed for centuries in this country?

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Prestigious-Owl-6397 t1_j6lix7w wrote

Minorities refers to anyone in the minority in this instance. Most people in the US drive cars. Therefore, motorists are the majority. Only about 1% of Americans commute by bike. Therefore, bicyclists are the minority. Anytime you have a clear minority, it's easier for people in the majority category to judge the minority category by a few people. I'm not saying this is right. Of course ethnic minorities faced atrocities that a white cyclist never had to face. They're not comparable, and I wasn't comparing them. I was using minority in the strict sense of the word.

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Sent_From_time t1_j6lm74v wrote

Yeah, thats a lot of words that simmer down to “my foot is now officially in my mouth.”

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DavidLieberMintz t1_j6lnhnw wrote

The word minority is not synonymous with people of color. It literally means not the majority. Most Americans do not ride bikes, so cyclists are the minority.

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