A driver stopped to compliment me during my bike ride

Here’s an example, this happened last Wednesday night. At a stoplight, three-way intersection. I was on the street that dead-ended at the light. The only way for me to turn left was to wait for a green. The street I was turning into had red on both sides. When I got the green, checked other traffic was stopped or stopping on both sides, I proceeded with my left turn. I was more than halfway through the turn, so my right fender was approaching the right curb of the street, where I was just starting to straighten out. A guy on a bike appeared at my right fender. I had to yank the wheel even further into the turn I was already making and brake in order to not over-correct into the cars waiting at the red light.

It wasn’t a matter of the cyclist signaling. He completely ran the red light, with the assumption that either I could see him or I would just avoid him somehow. Which I did, but only because I’m a halfway decent driver. These are the cyclists I have a problem with - they just assume cars at intersections will yield to them. He could have been 5 cars back when I started the turn - there’s no way I could have anticipated him because I couldn’t see him coming on the other side of the street, behind a line of cars. This being Chicago, with good public transportation and plenty of bikes on the road, a lot of these younger cyclists are also (I believe) NOT drivers themselves. They have no idea how much havoc they’re wreaking on the car drivers because they haven’t been behind the wheel themselves.

One of these times, I really won’t be able to avoid a collision, and we will have to let the cops shake out who was in the wrong while the bike rider takes a trip to the hospital. Will I deliberately accelerate just to hit a biker? Well, no. But I’m anticipating the inevitability of a collision sometime, and when it happens there will be no regret from me!

I had a friend (well, that’s a strong way to put it… I knew a person) who, like many college students, rode a bike to get around town. One day she showed up to lunch to tell us that she had been in a accident with a guy in a car (whatever you call a fender bender for people on a bike).

Anyhow, what happened was they both ran stop signs at an intersection, and the guy clipped her back tire. Evidently nobody was going very fast, cause she didn’t get hurt that I can recall. She was very annoyed because the cop decided they were both at fault, while she felt that clearly HE was at fault because he ran the stop sign and hit HER. She refused to believe that bicyclists were required to stop at stop signs and otherwise obey traffic laws.

“But those laws only apply to vehicles!”

“A bicycle is a vehicle!”

“It is not! A bicycle counts as a pedestrian!”

“How do you figure that?”

“Because I use my feet to work the pedals.”

“:dubious:That’s exactly how my car works.”

“That’s not the same thing!”

“You’re riding a vehicle with wheels! You have to obey traffic laws!”

“Where did you hear that from?”

“I was talking to one of the local cops and he told me.”

“The cops aren’t going to know the bicycle laws.”

“He was a bicycle cop. I’m pretty sure they get a class on that sort of thing at least.”

EDIT: I feel obliged to mention that I never signal when I ride (as I mentioned before, I’m afraid I’ll lose my balance, so instead I just try to telegraph my intentions as best I can, and ride very defensively when it comes to avoiding cars and making my turns). I always stop at stop signs and red lights, especially after I almost got pancaked by a bus one time when I didn’t. I haven’t ridden in a few years, but when I did, I was one of those bike riders the pedestrians hated on campus, zipping around and narrowly dodging the pedestrians (99% of the time anyways).

For the last few years though, I haven’t had a bike, so I drive or walk everywhere. I give bike riders leeway whenever possible.

I only signal when I feel the safety gained by signalling outweighs the safety lost by taking one hand off the handle bar. Having only one hand on the bar while braking can be quite destabilising. There’re basically two situations when I signal. First, when I’m riding on a smooth road, don’t need to brake significantly prior to turning and I can see that someone is making a decision based on what I’m doing, e.g, a car is waiting for me at an intersection but I won’t be going through the intersection so I’ll signal my intentions. The other time is when I’m changing lanes and need drivers to be aware of my intentions so they don’t run me over.