Right on red project Ver 1. In the span of 20 minutes, I filmed 36 people turning right at an intersection. 22 of those had a green light. 14 were turning right on a red. Of the 14 that turned right on red, only 2 came to a complete stop. Only one of those two stopped behind the white line painted on the road. One of the 14 right on red drivers turned right from the left turn lane. The average bicyclist travelling at 12MPH is moving at 17 feet per second. The people turning right on red on average spent 6 seconds looking left for an opening in traffic and only gave cursory glances to the right. Some did not even glance to the right at all until they were 3/4 of the way around the corner. All but one were completely in the crosswalk and their wheels were still in motion. In 6 seconds time, the average bicyclist will travel 102 feet. The average city block is around 300 feet. That means the average bicyclist can cover a third of a city block while the driver of a motor vehicle isnt even looking. If you increase the bicyclists speed to 17MPH, he/she will travel 150 feet in 6 seconds. Thats about half of a city block. If the Bicyclist leaves a parking lot and rides against traffic, the driver of the motor vehicle might not have seen the bicyclist on the first glance, and by the time they look again, that bicyclist could be right in front of them. To be safe while riding on the sidewalk, a bicyclist must travel at pedestrian speed, stop at EVERY intersection (that one is the law), and ride with the flow of traffic, not against. While working on this project, I was approached by a young woman. She asked me what I was up to. I explained my research. Turns out, she was a close friend of Natasha Adams, the young woman killed while riding her bike on a sidewalk against traffic, a half block away from where I was filming this morning. She went on to say that Natasha had made some poor choices in her past and was just starting to get her life turned around. She had just been recently reunited with her son. Her bike and trailer were her only transportation. She had a job that she was riding her bike to. She had just dropped her son off at a day care using that same bike and trailer. This little boys father is locked up, so with no parental guardians of any kind, this little boy is now an orphan. I want everyone to think long and hard about checking that text message, or trying to beat traffic and get around the corner before their light turns green. We all have rights to operate vehicles on the roadway; both motorized and non. Those rights do not come without responsibilities. I also filmed at a second intersection that is a marked bicycle route. The video is a slowed down, zoomed in video to show what the average right on red in Sioux Falls looks like.
Posted on: Fri, 01 Aug 2014 17:18:07 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015