The Cyclist – Motorist Feud in Vancouver
In general, I have nothing against cyclists, and many if not most of them abide by bicycle safety bylaws and respect motorists on the road. Ideally both motorists and bicyclists should be able to share the road. The problem usually occurs when you have an event like the Critical Mass bike ride that happens on the last friday of every month in Downtown Vancouver.
Last bike ride resulted in a motorist assaulting a cyclist. I’m not sure what happened, but some of the bike riders I’ve seen are routinely pissing off motorists by breaking the law by standing in line to block motorists from driving through green lights so that they may have their entire group of 8 blocks length of bicycle riders cross the intersection and other types of illegal behaviour. Sometimes they cut off motorists and force them to stop so that they can get their other cyclist buddies out front. They use their numbers to control the motorists. I suppose this is because they had had a few motorists cut them off in the pass but it doesn’t make it right.
In my opinion, this just creates animosity and fuels the dispute between the two groups. Bicycle riders expect motorists to share the road with them, yet they do not share the road with them. Blocking motorists from going through an intersection at a green light so that other bicyclists can run red lights is against the law, but the Police refuse to do anything about it such as ticketing because the situation has gotten too bad at they focus on safety rather than control.
In my opinion, any cyclist that participates in a bike ride where other riders are doing this for them is just as guilty, since they are perpetuating this kind of behaviour. Minority groups in general tend to have this antagonistic attitude when dealing with a majority. Examples include: Mac vs. PC, AMD vs. Intel… the minority groups are always trying pick a fight with the majority. Cyclists are no different.
Original Article:
Vancouver Sun Critical Mass Bike Ride