Raise the Hammer

A cyclist hit me in my SUV in early May. He was barrelling down the sidewalk at a decent clip. I was doing about 10-15km/h as I was coming to a stop sign. There is still a black scuff mark on the the driver's side front panel, just beside the front wheel. He clearly hit me, and I was about 4 feet in front of the stop sign, which was before the sidewalk as well. However, I was subjected to his verbal assaults, blamed by him to watch where the *eff* I was going (I was coming to a full stop and my car doesn't drive SIDEWAYS, so who hit who here?), and I called the police. I was not charged, the officer asked me if I saw him on the sidewalk and although I had not, it was assumed because where he hit me was about 8 feet from the curb of the road I was turning on - where his path SHOULD have been had he been following the rules. He hit me as he torpedoed off the sidewalk to cross the street - doing maximum speed - where he should NOT have been. He could not stop in time, and I had the misfortune of being in his pathway.

I would not cycle on the roads because there is no infrastructure for cyclists that I find safe, and to be honest, aside from my own recent experience, I find there are too many cyclists who operate on half pedestrian/half vehicle status, blazing trails on the sidewalks (hitting people or forcing them out of the way) and into roadways with impunity, believing that they've got all the right of pedestrians on roadways and subject to no rules of the road like the rest of us. They ruin it for other cyclists with common sense (and no desire to argue on principle with a 1,200 pound vehicle coming their way). It's because of these people that I bus it to the GO station in Hamilton instead of cycle (and I am in very decent cycling distance from Hamilton GO).

The rules of the road need to be vigorously applied to them, and a massive campaign province-wide needs to occur to make cyclists, pedestrians and drivers aware of the laws. I have seen plenty of accidents between pedestrians and cyclists and drivers and cyclists and ALL have been the fault of the cyclist. I began my working life in downtown Toronto and was there for 11 years and saw these accidents happen so painfully often and it was always the cyclist. I don't mean it to sound bias, it's just what I've seen. Either they were barreling down sidewalks and collided with a pedestrian, or cut across traffic, getting hit (one was hit by a bus I was on). I am all for bike lanes. I it would make my much less apprehensive on the road as a driver and as a cyclist.