Los Alamos and Santa Fe Bikes

Saturday, November 23, 2013

Its "AFLAN" Season Again (As Far Left As Neccesary)

Bike Lane on Canyon in wet winter conditions.
Ice, especially after road salting or in the evening and
morning, add to winter's hazards. Shaded or
topographically low lanes,
such as this one, get the brunt of ice.

I took this picture a couple years ago after a winter storm, over on Canyon near the Catholic Church. Once again, due to a storm that could dump as much as a foot of snow over the next couple days, we can expect snow, ice, plowed snow, and other conditions to be present that will make some or all of the bike lanes, road shoulders, and in general, the areas near the right side of outboard lanes unfit for riding much of the time. Therefore, both bicyclists and motorists need to be aware that cyclists will be riding As Far Left As Necessary for our safe passage.

If you get out the two wheeler to get around town, be equipped for winter conditions and be careful out there. Don't feel compelled to ride on bike lanes like the one shown here or to try to thread the needle along the edge of ice and deep snow. AFRAP means as far right as practicable, (our AFRAP law in Los Alamos is pretty accommodating to adverse conditions). AFRAP does not mean to ride as far right as is suicidal.

If you are out in your four wheeler, be prepared for that road to be a little bit narrower than the last time you saw it; you really will have to "share the travel lane" even if it had a bike lane yesterday. Regardless of who you are, take it easy and don't get on each other's case.

Meanwhile, what trees that are left up there in the mountains are rejoicing at the moisture and I already feel my cross country skis calling me.

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

"A Law Like No Other", by Keri Caffrey: A discussion of the flaws in AFRAP and Bike Law

In the Commute Orlando blog, author and Saavy Cyclist co-founder Keri Caffrey discusses, in the context of her appearance as an expert witness in a court case, how traffic law that regulates cycling activity promotes confusion among the courts, police, cyclists, and motorists, and because of that, contributes to a decrease in cycling safety and enjoyment. Indeed, we have seen the results of both the confusion and the hazard right here in Los Alamos.

In a comment after Keri's article, John Geminder notes that AFRAP ("As Far Right As Is Practicable") and generic FTR ("far to the right") laws may be challenged under the Void for Vagueness doctrine, i.e., laws that are so vague that they cannot be clearly understood by the public are unconstitutional as violations of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments.:

John Geminder November 20, 2013

"I have observed this problem of inequity for years and have wondered why this FTR law and all of its corollaries have not been challenged as unconstitutionally vague. If experienced cyclists cannot agree on how to legally operate a bicycle on a given road, something is wrong with the law."

I have observed this problem of inequity for years and have wondered why this FTR law and all of its corollaries have not been challenged as unconstitutionally vague.
See – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Void_for_vagueness
http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Void+for+Vagueness+Doctrine
http://law.justia.com/constitution/us/amendment-14/54-void-for-vagueness-doctrine.html
If experienced cyclists cannot agree on how to legally operate a bicycle on a given road, something is wrong with the law. - See more at: http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2013/11/19/a-law-like-no-other/#comment-22683

Should be required reading by serious cyclists and advocates. Go here.

I would add that when not just experienced cyclists, but experienced police officers cannot agree on what the laws mean (case in point: Joe Wermer being cited for jaywalking because while riding in a marked bike lane, he didn't stop and yield for a motorist turning right across the bike lane), we are in real trouble. We need to work to reform the laws and educate both the public and the law enforcment/judiciary community about cyclists rights and responsibilities, but most importantly, our rights.

Note added later. I spoke via email with one of the attorneys who advises LAB, who suggested the laws will stand up just fine and are deliberately written to allow discretion rather than bright lines. What is really needed is more understanding of cycling by the law and citizenry.

Monday, November 18, 2013

League of American Bicyclists Board Elections-Two Endorsements

There is a LAB Board election in progress. I urge any LAB members to vote for the candidates of their choice.

As some of you know, I've had my bones to pick over the years with the self-selection process employed by the LAB to keep the Board on the straight and narrow, i.e., to protect present policies, procedures, and political points of view by having the Board approve candidates, internally select increasing numbers of its own successors (50% of the present Board members!), and making it practically impossible for an outsider to challenge the status quo. Some think I am being charitable in not being nastier here.

Having said that, the present slate of candidates is very good, there are some fine people on the Board, and LAB remains an organization deserving of our support, albeit not unqualified support for its official points of view. Politics (short of war, as Clausewitz might say) is the art of peaceful struggle, and that is what is needed here. I especially urge any LAB members out there to vote, and to vote for two candidates who have the North Mesa Mutts Seal of Approval (i.e., I don't speak for Greg, Neale, or Scott if they are still lurking). Those candidates are Diane Albert, our own BCNM President, and Georgette Yaindl of Hilo, Hawaii.

Diane, who supplied her own blurb below, has strongly and tirelessly represented New Mexico cyclists at the state and national level. She was a key player in cycling issues in Los Alamos and later in Albuquerque before becoming active statewide and nationally as a BCNM and LAB Board member. She is also the only Board member who signed our petition in 2010, thus reaffirming her support of real, transparent LAB elections. She deserves your support.

Georgette, who I have known and consider both a friend and cycling advocacy colleague since the 1990's was, like me, a transplant to Hawaii from the East Coast. We worked together when I was President and she a staffer on the Hawaii Bicycling League. Geogette has been deeply involved in bicycling issues for over two decades, was a founding member of the Thunderhead Alliance, and recently obtained her J.D. from the U of Hawaii Richardson School of Law; she has established a law practice in Hilo on the Big Island. Hawaii is very isolated from the Mainland and is its own multicultural enclave with strong ties to both the U.S. and the Pacific Rim. I think Hawaii deserves a board member and Georgette will be an excellent one representing fairly the plethora of issues facing cyclists both in Hawaii and elsewhere.

If you are a LAB member, please vote for strong, independent voices on the Board.

Info here on the election process.

Now, Diane's blurb.

If you have been a LAB member as of November 1, 2014, you can vote in the Board elections until Dec. 27: see http://bikeleague.org/content/cast-your-vote-board-elections

I (Diane Albert) am running for re-election to another three-year term on the board, and I respectfully ask for your vote. I am the only Board member from the SW part of the US and believe that I represent your interests on the LAB Board. I am committed to continuing to fight for bicyclists’ rights during the next term, if elected.

One effort that I am interested in promoting this next term is establishing a strong LAB Legal Affairs committee that could help local bicyclists with litigation involving bicyclists’ crashes.

Please contact me if you’d like more info.

And, if you are not yet a LAB member, please consider joining!

Diane

Diane E. Albert, PhD

President and Board Member, Bicycle Coalition of New Mexico (BCNM)

League of American Bicyclists LCI #2292

LAB National Board Member

P.O. Box 30548

Albuquerque, NM 87190-0548

505.235.2277

www.BikeNM.org

join us on Facebook!

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Bicycle-Coalition-of-New-Mexico/116065978460766

Monday, November 11, 2013

11 November, 2013

The last of my uncles died this year, closing out my relationships with the blood relatives of that generation. In this life, anyway. Roy Bonati, who served under Gen. Patton in the European Theatre in a railway unit, actually took some incoming. Like most vets of WW II, he never talked about it. He and I got pretty shitfaced at my mom's, his sister's, wake in 1992 and Roy pulled out his picture book and explained some of the action he saw, where bullets were coming his way. Pages and pages in that album were carnage and destruction he photographed on his way across France and Germany. Uncle Roy later worked for Bell Aerospace here in New Mexico, as an electrician in Buffalo, once owned a circus shooting gallery, and finally retired in his late eighties as the host at the Anchor Bar in Downtown Buffalo. When I get to Buffalo, I'll see if my cousins still have that picture album.

Ralph Bonati during a happy moment in Southeast Asia

Uncle Ralph was more fortunate in avoiding incoming. With some engineering training, he landed a gig as an aide to Gen. Raymond A. Wheeler in Southeast Asia. I guess that's how my uncle then landed a gig as an Army Corps of Engineers guy at the building of the Mt. Morris Dam south of Rochester, N.Y. Uncle Ralph and his family settled down in Rochester in the 1960's, where he was an IRS agent. He checked out in 1990.

My first wife's father, John Zeh Jr, probably had the hardest job. He landed on D+3 on the Normandy Beaches and was involved with what one could euphemistically call the cleanup. I didn't know that fact until one day when my brother in law Jack and I made venison for the family. John found a piece of hair in his meat and suddenly left the table in silence. He told us later why he left, which was pretty much a flashback.

When John Zeh died in the late 1990's after a career as an architectural engineer, I gave my copy of The Greatest Generation to his wife Marie. It was the least I could do.

My good friend from my undergrad days, Police Officer Fred "Woody" Woodard in Rochester, NY, lived the most harrowing existence in WW II. As a member of the 101st Airborne Division, he fought in both Bastogne and Normandy, if I recall correctly. Woody would never tell serious war stories--he lived enough of them and came back with so much shrapnel in him he used his badge to board airplanes after setting off the metal detectors. He joked about the weird things soldiers did when they were not fighting for their lives. One day, for some reason, the Malmady massacre came up in a conversation, probably over one of those innumerable breakfasts we all ate when we got off graveyard shift duty as Univ. of Rochester Security Officers (Woody moonlighted there, which is how I got to know him). He got really quiet and then said something to the effect that any German soldier with SS emblems was wise to not be caught by the GIs wearing any of them.

May we all live up to the standards and dedication that generation laid down for us. Whether in peace or war, and much preferably in peace, let's work as hard as they did when duty called. But without taking away anything from those brave people who have served, let's not glorify war. One has to remember that war is a continuation of politics by other means. A continuation that involves immense destruction, loss of life, human and physical carnage, a waste of resources, and in the final analysis, it is brought on by a failure of politics involving more peaceful means or by a failure of conviction to solve a problem forcefully before it becomes more immense, i.e., the Munich Agreement.

War, in the final analysis, is only acceptable if the alternative is worse. That's gotta be pretty damn bad.


Today we took a hike. This photo is looking southeast from the Mitchell Trail above Los Alamos. In the background, the Sangre de Cristo Mts and Rio Grande Rift. The twin water towers in the center bracket TA-21, the first purpose-built nuclear research and development facility built at Los Alamos at the end of WW II.

Friday, November 8, 2013

New bike shop to open soon

While we were gearing up to ride home from CB Fox yesterday, a lady came running out of the building behind us with business cards. She wanted us to know that they were opening a new multi-sport shop, complete with ski and bicycle repair.

Brad Nyenhuis and his partner (whose name wasn't on the business card and, therefore, I instantly forgot, because I am lame) are new to Los Alamos, coming to us from Chicago. The couple is planning to provide ski, cycling, and running merchandise, just across the street from CB Fox. I heard the ski waxing machine running as I took this photo. There was even talk of the Los Alamos Co-Op helping them set up an espresso machine in the store.

My daughter checks out the wall of tools

I'm not good at writing copy, but I wanted to let our loyal readers know that this store shows all signs of really opening, hopefully before January.

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Does W16-1P do us any good?

W16-1P example

W16-1P is the classic "Share the Road" sign. Sometimes yellow. Sometimes otherwise. Its function is described in the MUTCD: " In situations where there is a need to warn drivers to watch for other slower forms of transportation traveling along the highway, such as bicycles, golf carts, horse-drawn vehicles, or farm machinery, a SHARE THE ROAD (W16-1P) plaque (see Figure 2C-12) may be used."

The problems I see with W16-1P are several fold. One, it is an advisory sign. Advisory signs carry no firm requirements as to how to follow them. While it may be wise to slow down for a hairpin curve, and if you eat it on the curve while speeding you could be cited for imprudent speed, the yellow speed advisory sign on the curve is...advisory. You can, if you are of the mind, continue at the posted speed limit albeit you are responsible for any damage that comes out of an ill-advised headlong rush around the curve. So what does it mean to advise motorists to share the road? Besides, what situations exist where there is NOT a continual "... need (for) drivers to watch for other slower forms of transportation...". So if there is not a "share the road" sign nearby, are motorists absolved from having a reasonable expectation to see a cyclist on the road? Can they be less observant?

Indeed, what does it mean in practice to share the road? What's your share? Does it mean you can only share it if you and the motorist both agree? Do you and the guy in the Super Duty agree on what's your share and what's his? What does this advise about how to pass a cyclist? How to pass a motorist when a cyclist is oncoming traffic? Where on the road you should ride? What are the criteria?

Share the Road doesn't say anything about your rights to the road as a cyclist. Sharing does not clearly define ownership. In fact, it is your legal right to be on that road. You own that right. No kindness by a magnanimous motorist is necessary for you to be there, and no grumpy motorist can rescind your right.

If instead, we posted W16-1P in white with black letters, it would be a regulatory sign, like those 35 mph signs on Diamond Drive (because the MUTCD convention is warning signs are yellow while regulatory signs are in white with black lettering). Share the Road because a cyclist has the legal right to be there and that's the law. At least then you could cite regulation.

My idea of a revised W16-1P
Its not an option. Its the law.

That's why black on white signs like R4-11 (Bicyclists May Use Full Lane or BMUFL) carry some teeth--they have the force of law and regulation behind them. The five foot rule when passing (LAC 38-545) sign, if you can still find one, has force of law. An AFRAP sign ("As Far Right As Is Practicable") onerous as it can be, would at least have regulation written to explain it.

W16-1P may have a technical basis in the advisory lexicon of the MUTCD, but in practice, I think it is a nice, feelgood political sign whose meaning has been muddled. The technical basis, if backed up by well understood rules, is good as far as it goes, but without all that other detailed stuff, one might just as well post the Golden Rule. They both say what we ought to do, but have no teeth behind them (at least in this life) and I'm not sure we agree on what exactly S-T-R means as far as implementation. Perhaps we should dispense with it and stick to signs that tell us something that actually has the force to regulate behavior (like BMUFL) or that at least don't ask us to do something that is so ill defined. W11-1 is simply a picture of a bicycle. Just to remind people we are there.

W11-1, R4-11, and W16-1P, respectively. Illustration from Streetsblog.

Thanks and acknowledgements to Streetsblog and Angie Schmitt for the interesting discussion, which came out of Delaware's decision to drop the W16-1P.

Link to MUTCD sign descriptions.

Your thoughts?