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City to consider safe passing resolution
Earlier this year, Gov. Perry vetoed legislation that would have required motor vehicles to give bicyclists and other vulnerable road users a 3-foot berth when they pass. Now the city of Austin is considering an ordinance that would do the same thing.
The City Council will discuss the item at Thursday’s public meeting. Interested parties can sign up at City Hall now to speak about the issue at that meeting. If you have questions about how to make sure your voice is heard, contact Nadia Barrera, the Bicycle/Pedestrian Project Coordinator, at 974-7142.
You can also register your support or opposition to the resolution without speaking by signing in at the kiosks at City Hall, 301 W. Second St.
Eighteen other states — including our neighbor Louisiana — have similar safe-passing laws.
Perry’s veto to the state legislation came as a surprise to many in the cycling community, especially since the governor is a cyclist himself.
Texas law already requires a “safe driving distance” between vehicles and bicycles, but does not specify how far apart they must be. There were 315 bike-vehicle crashes in Austin last year, one of them fatal, according to police.
For more information, go here.
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By Chris BeHanna
August 26, 2009 8:25 AM | Link to this
I agree with CO2creator: bike lanes go unmaintained and fill up with glass (and roadkill—there’s been a dead skunk plastered to the road on Anderson Mill since February) and other junk, and then car drivers get upset when you go into the lane to avoid punctures.
A paint stripe does not offer protection from multi-ton hunks of steel traveling mere feet from you. Wider lanes and sharrows work better—cars drift around and sweep the crap from the road when bikes aren’t present.
By CO2creator
August 26, 2009 10:42 AM | Link to this
Just what we don’t need more laws. Perry was right to veto the bill as it overlapped with existing laws. I really don’t care how close car/trucks pass me just that they don’t hit me.
Why doesn’t the existing laws get enforced when cyclists are wronged?
Louisiana amended an existing law with their 3ft for passing a cyclist.
How about a law that would allow cyclists if no one is in or approaching an intersection to treat stop signs as yields and red lights as stop signs? Other states have laws like this.
How about a little breakdown of the bike-vehicle accidents by cause, Pam?