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Contributory Negligence

From the TheLegislative Wrap-Up

Maryland’s current common law doctrine of contributory negligence standard bars a plaintiff from receiving any damages for an injury if the plaintiff’s own negligence contributed in any way to the harm. Maryland is one of five jurisdictions, along with Virginia, Alabama, North Carolina, and the District of Columbia, that retains this doctrine. Forty-six states follow the doctrine of comparative negligence, under which a plaintiff’s recovery can be reduced if the plaintiff was partially at fault. The Maryland Judiciary recently began a study regarding the process and consequences of changing the Maryland standard from contributory negligence to comparative negligence through judicial action.

An emergency bill, The Maryland Contributory Negligence Act (HB 1129), codifies the contributory negligence standard so that it remains an affirmative defense that may be raised by a party being sued for damages for wrongful death, personal injury, or property damage.
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This is sort of the official summary of the Legislative Session so far. I find it a bit strange that this got coverage and our HB 363 “Manslaughter by Vehicle or Vessel – Criminal Negligence did not.
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The conservative case for transportation is bifurcated and all mixed up

from Rebuilding Place in the Urban Space by Richard Layman
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Second, myriad subsidies of automobile-oriented land use and automobile-use itself exist throughout the "market system" but are not acknowledged and identified but taken for granted by so-called market proponents.
For example, roads are subsidized to the tune of 50% from general funds, from funds other than those generated by automobile registration fees, federal and local gasoline excise taxes, and tolls.
Gasoline is subsidized to the tune of $4-$5/per gallon in terms of the development, environmental, and military costs that a separated use, automobile-centric transportation and land use paradigm imposes on the system.
Third, not paying for these subsidies is increasingly bankrupting government, and supports the rise of China and other countries at the expense of the U.S. As Thomas Friedman writes in the New York Times, in "If Not Now, When?":
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Continue reading “The conservative case for transportation is bifurcated and all mixed up”

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Subliminal messaging?

"Krasnopoler ran into the front passenger side of the car and landed in front of the car."

Reads one paragraph from the ABC news coverage. But don’t get so excited, if you take the paragraph above and remover the paragraph break it reads rather fairly:

"According to police, 20-year-old Nathan Krasnopoler was riding his bicycle last Saturday afternoon in a bike lane on W. University Parkway when an 83-year-old woman driving the same direction passed Krasnopoler and turned right into a driveway, crossing over the bike lane in the process. Krasnopoler ran into the front passenger side of the car and landed in front of the car."

I’m not sure there is a point to the errant paragraph break but without it it is a fair summary of the accident.

(Why do newspapers overly stress one sentence paragraphs anyway?)
Continue reading “Subliminal messaging?”

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Cyclist Attacked After Asking Driver To ‘Put Phone Away’

DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. — A father and daughter are accused of assaulting a 13-year-old cyclist after he told them to watch out for cyclists on the road.
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Hartley, a competitive cyclist who trains every day with a daily 10-mile round trip, said a white pickup truck came within a foot of him and passed by. Hartley said he met up with the truck at the next stop light and noticed the driver looking at his phone and texting.
"I just tapped him and said, ‘You almost hit me back there. Could you put the phone away?’ And he told me, ‘Pull over.’ He was going to talk to me," Brody Hartley said.
Brody said he pulled over at a gas station just up the road and pickup truck driver, 45-year old William Tinnell, got out of the vehicle, enraged.
“He was just saying I shouldn’t be on the road, it’s not a vehicle. I shouldn’t be on the road because I’m a kid," Hartley said.
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Continue reading “Cyclist Attacked After Asking Driver To ‘Put Phone Away’”

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Highlights from Maryland Statewide Student Travel Policy Survey

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Cars pay for roads and they don’t pay for bus service. We want more of our education money being spent on bus service! There is no problems continuing funding this pattern from the General Budget. [/sarcasm]

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Really, so few have encouraging activities?

“Principals are concerned that students lack the skills needed to walk and bike safely.”

Gee, where can we find someone to teach them the skills? [/sarcasm] (I know, they blew the budget with bus service and can’t afford to teach any thing else.)

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Pretty much what I expected but there it is in black and white. MDOT’s policy (used to be?) to only accommodate bicycles and pedestrians where practical and feasible, which roughly worked out not practical in rural areas and not feasible in urban areas, that fact that wording has been edited out of the States 20 Year Bike Master plan is encouraging.

I have to point this out just because MDOT is really behind the curve with the web stuff and could use some more encouragement to put more effort into the web:

“Recommendations: 1a. Create a webpage on MDOT’s site for the State’s Safe Routes to School program (currently no site exists)”

But it is great that they did this to create a nice base line, though I am disappointed they did not track kids being driven to school.
Continue reading “Highlights from Maryland Statewide Student Travel Policy Survey”

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MBAC to the Police about the Krasnopoler case update

Thank you for meeting with Councilwoman Clarke and the members of the Mayor’s Bicycle Advisory Committee on Thursday. I appreciate your efforts to keep us informed about the developments in this tragic case. As I understand it, the investigation continues and only after it is complete will information be passed to the State’s Attorney and MVA for a determination as to whether charges and/or license action are warranted. For now the appropriate response to questions is, "The investigation process is continuing, and we have no comment at this time."

I trust you have shared this guidance with your staff. Much of the uproar among the cycling community stems from statements made to the media by Detectives Kevin Brown and Donny Moses, saying that no charges would be filed against the driver and implying that the fault for the collision lay with the cyclist. Obviously these statements were made well in advance of the investigation’s completion.

The detectives’ statements are not the only reason cyclists are apprehensive about the results of the investigation. In an analysis of MDOT-compiled statistics, Baltimore City stands out from the rest of the state with respect to the percentages of crashes in which fault is assigned to either the cyclist, the motorist, or unknown. For example, in MontgomeryCounty the percentages are 43% (cyclist fault), 55% (motorist fault), and 1% (unknown). The percentages for the state (not including Baltimore City) are 58%, 38%, and 3%. For Baltimore City the numbers are 43% cyclist fault, 9% motorist fault, and 48% unknown. Clearly, these numbers are out of the norm. In fact, over 80% of unknown-cause bicycle crashes are in Baltimore City. It could be that Baltimore City motorists are much better drivers than those in the state at large, but I don’t think so. Baltimore cyclists fear that the anomaly results from the BPD being either reluctant to assign blame to drivers, or not up to speed on bicycle law. This is something we hope the future roll-call training videos will improve.

I am heartened to hear that Nathan’s condition continues to improve. We all hope for a full and speedy recovery. The cycling community of Baltimore also hopes that this unfortunate incident will provide an opportunity to improve relations and communications with the BPD.

Greg Hinchliffe, Chairman
Mayor’s Bicycle Advisory Committee

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You could save 86% or more by switching from AAA

from Greater Greater Washington by David Alpert

Are you a AAA member? If so, most likely you joined for the roadside assistance, as opposed to the relentless lobbying against transit or walkable streets. But did you also know you can probably get the same service from your insurance company?

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Photo by Mr.Thomas on Flickr.

I was recently updating my auto insurance and found out that my insurance company, which uses a lizard mascot, would charge me $7.40 per 6 months, or $14.80 per year, for their towing and lockout service. That compares to $65.50 for one person or $104.00 for two in a household for a AAA basic membership.

AAA also has discounts of various types and other services, but most people just join for the peace of mind that they won’t be stranded on the road. With an insurance plan, you can have that confidence and also the security to know you aren’t paying an organization to fight against any pedestrian, bike, or transit programs being a part of the federal transportation reauthorization, as AAA is doing.

If you want the discounts and the extra services, there’s Better World Auto Club, a direct alternative to AAA. If you join using this link, WABA will get a small donation from them, so you’re doing good twice over.

Some articles from several years ago online warn against using the insurers’ plans because some companies have used the information to raise people’s rates after they use the service. However, my insurer and several other leading ones said they stopped doing that years ago. I called and they confirmed that this does not happen. The service is limited to 4 uses per year, just like AAA.

Continue reading “You could save 86% or more by switching from AAA”

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Nathan Krasnopoler March 5, 2011 Update

Nathan is stable. Today is a very quiet day.
They removed the ICP (brain pressure) monitor yesterday because he is no longer in danger from a swelling brain.

Nathan is still unconscious, but yesterday he opened his injured eye once and his other eye multiple times. I did not see him open his eye today. But the nurse saw his good eye open when she changed a wound dressing.

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Some math

Lets say a right turning motorist is doing 35 mph that’s 51 feet a second so it would take 0.14 of a second to get 7′ of their car in front of the cyclists.

Now let’s say the right turning motorist is doing 20 mph that’s 29 feet a second so it would take 0.24 of a second to get 7′ of their car in front of the cyclists.

OK this is a bit over simplest so lets double the numbers to get a rough maximum time which would give us a range of 0.14 to 0.48 of a second

So the big question on everyones mind is why didn’t the cyclists stop in time or avoid? After all he had a half a second. 🙁

The wrong question to ask is how much negligence the cyclists had by not hitting the front of the vehicle.

What should be ask is how much negligence the motorist had because of how far up from the rear bumper the cyclists hit.
Continue reading “Some math”