No Door Prize
A Victorian MP is pushing for a three-fold increase in penalties imposed on drivers who open car doors in front of cyclists, that would make the offence the equivalent of running a red light.The problem grows...
Mr Barber said so-called "dooring" incidents were a growing problem and that a hefty increase in penalties would help educate drivers to look for cyclists before opening a car door.Perhaps they already do.
posted by Dan at 10:10 PM |
4 Comments:
Cars, doors and cyclists .. meh, it happens. No biggie, it never bothers me watching them spin out into traffic to avoid a door, like it doesn't seem ot bother them to ignore road rules.
Each to their own I guess.
The Gold Coast City Council's
efforts along Marine Pde, Southport take some beating. The road is fairly narrow, but not to worry. The Council still painted bike lanes, the inside one of which had to be within inches of parked cars.
So, if you rode in the bike lane you stood a good chance of having a door opened in front of you. But if you did not ride in the lane you were abused by motorists for not doing so.
The least risk involved riding on the adjacent footpath, which got you abuse from pedestrians.
Score at full time: Council 3 Cyclists 0.
How the hell are they going to enforce it?
The day will come when I fail to spot the tell tale signs of an idiot about to open his/her door without so much as a backward glance. At that point, 115kg of steel bicycle and rider are going to crash into a nice soft driver at 40km/h.
Screw fining them - I just want them to survive long enough on life support for me to sue them for all the pain and damage they've cause me.
Can we therefore have a penalty introduced for cyclists who ride into the back of parked cars, as has happened to my car on four occasions during the past 12 months and causing thousands of dollars damage that then has the flow on effect of causing my insurance premiums to skyrocket...
Of course, since cyclists are not required to hold any type of third-party coverage my insurance company has been unable to recoup any of the costs... even though police had to attend 2 of the incidents since the cyclist was seriously injured.
To make matters worse, one of the cyclists attempted to sue me for damages (injury claim and bike repairs) because I was "negligent" in parking my car on the road in a shared parking/bicycle lane.
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