Can you fix the link to ‘Cyclists’ Bill of Rights’ ? Or, can someone else post it here?

Thanks,
AC

9-52-040 Yielding right-of-way.
…(c) Every person operating a bicycle upon a roadway shall ride as near as practicable to the right-hand side of the roadway, exercising due care when passing a standing vehicle or one proceeding in the same direction and at all times giving the right-of-way to other moving vehicles.

Added Coun. J. 7-12-90, p. 18634
9-52-050 Riding in single file required—Exceptions
Persons riding bicycles upon a roadway shall not ride other than single file except on paths or parts of roadways set aside for the exclusive use of bicycles.

Where’s the cyclist friendliness in these laws? A police officer can always choose to cite the cyclist in any crash as not having yieleded the ROW to any other moving vehicle (so much for the 3′ law). Furthermore, cyclists are never allowed to control narrow lanes or ever ride side by side in a narrow lane in Chicago; is this bicyclist friendly? So much for a mayor who rides a bike; the cyclists will always be second or third class road users so long as the laws are so brutally hostile.

This is just one example of the many states, and states that allow cities to create bicyclist hostile laws that treat bicycle drivers differently than other drivers, and almost invariably worse.

We have a long way to go in CA before the promise of 21200 is a reality. We should start by chucking the discriminatory laws like 21202 and 21208, and make 22400 only apply to motor vehicle drivers (like the other 45 states that do so) so bicyclists will have the same legal rights, not less, than motorists.

Every other one of the remaining 5 Es is diminished by these hostile inequitable laws, and as an advocate that regularly participates at the state and local levels with CBAC, Caltrans D7 BAC, the CTCDC, etc., I can tell that many transportation professionals use 21202 and 21208 as convenient excuses to simply ignore, or worse still work agasint the interests of bicyclists when designing and constructing public road infrastructure.

http://www.bikeleague.org/images/equality_article_nov-dec_07.pdf

This idea in turn lead to the Equity Statement which was adopted by the LAB board in early 2009:

http://www.bikeleague.org/images/equity_statement_1-05-09.pdf

The Equity statement does at the national level what the local Cyclist’s Bill of Rights is attempting to do here in LA County, but with an explicit 6Es approach, which Enci’s article mirrors.

So while we’re on the subject of “Equality”, sadly the photo used for this blog is incorrect. CVC 21200 is the law gives us equal driver rights, OTOH CVC 21202 takes most of those rights away by forcing us to the edge of the pavement like the road rats many people believe us to be. Associating CVC 21202 with a cyclist’s right to the road is just like associating a Jim Crow law with racial minority’s right to use the bus. So the photo used in this article is mute testament to the general lack of understanding, that even many cyclists lack, of cyclists’ legal rights.

Thanks again Enci, for discussing these subjects.