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T.O. group announces BikeSafe education campaign
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A year and a half after a popular Thousand Oaks dentist was struck and killed by a vehicle as he rode his bicycle, the city has unveiled BikeSafe, a new campaign designed to educate cyclists and drivers on how to safely share the road.
The first phase of BikeSafe was unveiled a week ago at Thousand Oaks' Arbor Day event, with brochures and fact sheets handed out to thousands of attendees. A Web site was also introduced.
"The information got out there and it's starting to be used," said Kathy Lowry, an associate traffic engineer and bike safety coordinator with the city. "This is just the very beginning."
In the summer, Thousand Oaks Boulevard will be outfitted with sharrows. A sharrow is a street marking, a stencil design of a bicycle with two chevron markings above. The sharrow, which proved successful in San Francisco, indicates cyclists and drivers are to share the road.
David Chambers, chairman of the city's Bicycle Advisory Team, said the group's study showed that locally, cyclists do not follow the rules of the road. In many cases they do not ride on the road but travel on sidewalks or they ride on the streets going against traffic.
"The cyclists who do ride against traffic pay a much higher cost in terms of injuries," Chambers said, adding that sharrows have proven successful in getting people to ride with traffic.
"They (sharrows) help cyclists be secure in riding in a safe situation. The sharrows pass the message that they are supposed to be there. It's a good place to ride."
The Bicycle Advisory Team was formed after the death of dentist Glenn Garvin, who was struck and killed by a vehicle while cycling on Sept. 16, 2006.
The BikeSafe Campaign is the fruit of the team's work. The brochures target two groups. The first is in English and Spanish and is designed for children and parents, while the other is written in Spanish and targets workers who ride their bicycles to and from work.
For more information, visit the city's bike safety Web site at http://www.toaks.org/bike.
Posted by tsetsaf on April 29, 2008 at 10:07 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I hope Mr. Chambers was taken out of context when quoting "...the group's study showed that locally, cyclists do not follow the rules of the road..." if not then their study is completely flawed.
As a member of the local cycling club I can tell you first hand that there are a large number of active cyclists who continuously obey all traffic laws while practicing our sport. If their study did not capture this then it is invalid.
Posted by davechambers on April 29, 2008 at 12:07 p.m. (Suggest removal)
What I told the Star was that most cyclist injuries were due to cyclists not following the rules of the road. Most injuries were due to wrong way riding, riding on sidewalks (legal but dangerous), riding out from between parked cars, etc.
Many cyclists do follow the rules of the road. Please join me in encouraging other cyclists to ride on the street, not on the sidewalk, and to ride with traffic, not against it!
Posted by hercules360 on April 29, 2008 at 1:53 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Always the same blame game, Cyclists are to blame for not adhering to the rules of the road. I don’t think that is really true just some ones opinion. The last time I was out driving around Westlake I saw probably 50% of the drivers not following the rules of the road, anything said about that? Not much heck just look how many drivers use the bike lane to drive in. Maybe if people realized there are two types of people who ride bicycle, cyclists who know how to follow the rules of the road and know the dangers of cars, and then the locals who don’t have drivers licenses and use a bike to ride back and forth to their job, now I think we can all agree these folk need to be taught a few rules of the road or even rules of how things are done in the USA. But please stop saying all cyclists don’t follow the rules of the road, we all know enough that car drivers kill cyclists, cyclists don’t kill car drivers. Just go out to Hidden Valley on any given day and watch the speeders inches from cyclists, is there ever any cops out there to stop speeders, I don’t think so.. Perhaps if the local bicycle safety committee addressed the main issue of cyclist deaths and injury it would be to educate drivers that it is not okay to drive within inches of cyclists, not to cut off cyclists in the bike paths, not to pull out in front a cyclist thinking they can stop or slow down. Car drivers are basically cowards when it comes to terrorizing cyclists because they know they are not going to be injured in their car, but they don’t give a dam about a cyclist out there.
Posted by davechambers on April 29, 2008 at 3:16 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Many cyclists follow the rules of the road, but it's not surprising that many don't. They get plenty of dangerous advice. "It's not safe to cycle in the street". "Ride against traffic, so you can see them coming". "Ride like you're invisible". "Forget right-of-way, you can't win against a car". So, many cyclists flee to the sidewalk or hug the curb, and suffer a disproportionate share of injuries as a result.
Posted by sparks240 on April 29, 2008 at 6:57 p.m. (Suggest removal)
On the sidewalk, there are less pedestrians than there are in the bike lane. Too many joggers, power walkers, dog walkers, and baby stroller pushers think the bike lane is a sidewalk.
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