Motorist in Roundabout Comments on Cyclist Losing a Shoe

A kind letter to the editor of the Coloradoan on October 22nd expresses the opinion that there may be a better or safer route for bikes through the roundabout at Vine Dr. and Taft Hill Road.

Roundabout at Taft Hill and Vine Drive (looking west on Vine).  Note how the bike lanes disappear so that cyclists are forced to decide either to take the lane as a motorist or to go onto the sidewalk as a pedestrian.

The week after we took students through here the County put up this sign to make it clear that cyclists have two choices on how to handle this. The Larimer County website has further instructions on how to negotiate a roundabout.  

To the Editor:
I am the motorist that Rick Price noted in his Monday column. I am also the motorist who was paying enough attention to wait while a boy, who had lost his shoe, stopped in the middle of the traffic circle and got off his bike to pick it up. I know that roundabout well. Cars zip around it. When it was built, I was pleased to see that it had been designed to let the bike lanes on Vine and Taft Hill flow out of the circle, around the edge on a "sidewalk" and then back on to the bike lane. If the volunteers leading the students had scouted the route, they would have noticed this safety feature and encouraged young riders - who might not think to just leave the shoe and keep moving - to use it. It might be true that the boy had a right to be in the roundabout, but there was a safer, bike-friendly alternative available.

All that said, I am glad that Rick lends his voice and knowledge to the promotion of bicycle safety in Fort Collins.

Jane Albritton

Taking 337 Middle School Students Bicycling through a Roundabout

First published in the Coloradoan October 17, 2011

By Rick Price, Ph.D.

I began writing my Smart Cycling column in January of 2010 after several people advised me that College Avenue in Old Town “isn’t a bike lane.”  One City employee actually explained to me two years ago that it was illegal for me to ride my bike on College Avenue even though, in reality, College is open to bicyclists except from Laurel to Harmony.  Other bicycling “dos and don’ts” need clarifying as well, for both motorists and cyclists.  This column is an attempt to help clear up some of the ongoing confusion. 

Two weeks ago Bike Co-op volunteers took three hundred thirty seven Lincoln Middle School students on bicycle rides through Old Town in groups ranging in size from ten to twenty-five.  Our ride included the roundabout at Vine Drive and Taft Hill Road, a ride through City Park and the shared lane arrows on Mountain Avenue. The only real problem we had was when one student lost a shoe in the middle of the roundabout and was advised by a motorist the he “should be on the sidewalk!”  The student had every right to be in the roundabout, although I advised him to keep his shoes on next time.

Many people believe that bikes should be on the sidewalk or at least as far to the right as possible on the roadway.  This is actually wrong, since bicyclists have a responsibility to be visible and to ride on the road where they feel “safe.”  Many people still think it is ok to bicycle against traffic so they can see cars coming toward them.  This practice is both dangerous and illegal.  The erroneous ideas about where cyclists should ride come from our rural roots where we learned that cyclists were merely “pedestrians on wheels.”

Several people have commented to me that they see bicyclists signaling right turns incorrectly with their right hand extended.  This is actually legal for cyclists as an alternative to raising their left hand.

Another behavior that you might see that is illegal or inappropriate is bicycles “splitting the lane” by sneaking up along the right hand curb along a line of cars at an intersection.  This is both illegal and dangerous since cyclists can be cut off by a right turning vehicle in this position.  Boulder allows cyclists to do this as long as they stop just behind the front-most vehicle, in full view of the second vehicle.  We should think about adopting this rule in Fort Collins. 

There is still a lot of confusion out there as we mature as a bicycle friendly community.  What about those bicyclists not stopping at stop signs or lights?  Many of us wish we had the “Idaho stop law” which, since 1982 has permitted cyclists to treat stop signs as yield signs and since 2006 has allowed cyclists to treat red lights as stop signs.  But that will be a while in the coming to Fort Collins and is a topic for another time.

Pedestrian Review for Older Children

Help kids and parents review safe pedestrian behavior. 

By 3rd grade most kids know what a pedestrian is. 

Go over these terms in class, make sure all children know to look left, look right, then left again before crossing the street.

Then challenge them to find the words on the left in the grid of letters.

The rest of the sheet is self explanatory.

All of these exercises build awareness for bicyclists as well as pedestrians.  

Save this image and print it from Windows Photo Viewer or visit Safekids.org and print it directly from their website:  http://www.safekids.org/assets/docs/for-educators/activity-pedestrian-activity-sheets.pdf

Bike Helmet, Skateboard Helmet or ?? Help Kids Tell the Difference

Parents and kids need to understand the difference between and among helmets so they pick the right one for the specific activity.  Let kids match the right helmet to the right sport, then take this home to show their parents.   For use in your class you can "save image as" and print from Windows Photo Viewer or you can visit Safekids.org and print it directly from there:  http://www.safekids.org/assets/docs/for-educators/activity-helmet-activity-sheet.pdf.

Helmet Exercise for K thru 3rd Grade

To print this for use in your class simply save this image and print it from Windows Photo Viewer.  Alternatively, you can visit http://www.helmetsrus.net/maze.pdf and print the pdf directly from there.

In a bike club with mixed ages older kids can help the younger kids complete this maze as time allows.

From www.HelmetRUs.net

Rainy Day Bike Education Activities for Middle School Students

What to do on a rainy day when you've got a classroom full of rowdy 7th and 8th graders who should be out on their bikes!?

1)  Rules of the Road:
Show this YouTube video of a bike/ped crash in NYC:  http://platinumbikeplan.blogspot.com/2010/11/bicycle-safety-new-york-style-how-wrong.html 
Then talk about why we have rules.

2)  Another good video, although longer, is the 1963 film "One Got Fat."  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQgAMkMmsfg

It is 15 minutes long but pretty entertaining.

3) Of course - if you have enough tires and can either demonstrate or use a YouTube video you can show how to change a tube or patch a tire.

Try to let students who have done this before lead and demonstrate.  Get them to talk about each step they go through.

There are lots of YouTube videos on this.
Here's one on changing a road bike tire:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5K-DXt9djA&feature=related

Here's another on a hybrid bike:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oFXewhx3BE

CSU Can Avoid Being a Chaos Box for Cyclists

 by Rick Price

First published in the Fort Collins Coloadoan, Sept. 5, 2011

One of the bicycle handling and safety drills that we do with elementary kids is called the “chaos box.” It teaches younger children, especially, why we have rules of the road.

A chaos box involves the creation of a thirty to forty foot square or circle on the playground or in the school parking lot. Participants are encouraged to ride anywhere inside the box without putting a foot down or losing their balance. The more kids in the box the more chaotic it becomes, sometimes to the point of gridlock which, of course, is the whole point.

The chaos box works best with younger kids since they don’t know the rules of the road. Older children or adults know, for example, to keep to the right while younger kids haven’t yet figured that out. The result with older children and adults is that soon everyone is flowing in a counterclockwise direction around the box because they know to keep to the right.

With the younger kids a teaching moment occurs when you stop everyone and suggest they try keeping right. Immediately they find that they can continue pedaling without running into one another.

I am reminded of the chaos box when I pedal across the CSU campus this time of year. The entire campus is a gigantic chaos box where the rules of the road are unclear to many. What a teaching and learning opportunity! How can we make the most of this?

With elementary kids we let chaos reign for a few minutes in the box and then we stop everyone and talk about rules of the road including keeping right, signaling, not tailgating and so on. A chaos box needs a coach or referee, in short.

Getting scofflaw cyclists to stop to hear about rules of the road doesn’t work well as they’re gone before you can say “excuse me.” So we need a plan B to stop cyclists in the CSU chaos box so we can talk to them about rules of the road.

So here’s a thought. Just two weeks ago Trevor Hughes reported in this newspaper that Molly North, Assistant Bike Coordinator for the City of Fort Collins, took up a position at West Plum and Shields Street to coach campus-bound cyclists on how to use the newly installed “bicycle box”. Mr. Hughes produced a video that may be the perfect example of how we could deploy “bicycle ambassadors” to educate novice bicyclists on how to ride before they become scofflaws.

Bicycle ambassadors teach bike safety and provide information on rules of the road, best practices, and smart cycling procedures. Imagine a cadre of 30 bicycle ambassadors deployed at most of the thirty-nine streets leading onto the CSU campus to share the smart cycling story with new students during the first two weeks of CSU classes.

This is the type of outreach that a “bicycle friendly” university should be undertaking. When can we start?