"Great and Sudden Change"

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Me enjoying my now-stolen bike.  Photo credit:  Barry Germond.

Some days start out great and then something happens that flips it on end.  

I finally had some time to myself this morning and it was a beautiful day.  I woke up without an alarm clock, but with enough time to bike to one of my favorite yoga classes.  The bike ride there was perfect.  The yoga class exceptional and the bike ride back, just as good.  The weather today was inspiring. I then took a longish ride into work and got in at about 11 am.  

I couldn't have asked for a better morning! 

I had an unusually productive day at work and left shortly after 9 pm, having finally gotten slightly ahead on the pile of things I needed to do and feeling good about that.  

When I stepped out of my office building I noticed that the evening was just as beautiful as the morning and I was thinking of taking a slightly long ride home so that I could bask in it a little longer, even though it was getting late and I have to wake up early tomorrow. It was just that nice out.

I could not have asked for a better day. 

Up until that very moment, that is.   

When I arrived at the rack where I parked my bike this morning there was something noticeably missing -- my bike.   

In disbelief I called Bill, convinced that he had come and gotten it because he didn't want me to ride home. He swore to me that he didn't. 

It had been a long day and I tried to convince myself that maybe I walked in? No, I distinctly remember biking in.  Maybe I parked somewhere else? No, I remember pulling into a very full rack, but happily finding that the end where I like to part was empty.  

I eventually came to intellectually accept the fact that it was probably stolen. I don't think I've quite accepted the fact emotionally, even as I write this. 

I called Hofstra's public safety and filed a report. It took a very long time. (It is now very late, considering the fact that I am waking up at 5:30 tomorrow and I've given up trying to get enough sleep tonight.)  When he finally found me, the public safety officer was very friendly and suggested I file a report with the Village of Hempstead PD tomorrow. 

I had become incredibly fond of that bike and I feel a deep sense of loss.  I've put 2000 miles on her since I bought her in April.  She has become very much a part of my life.  I was so fond of her that I had been looking for a name for her, but at this point, she is still unnamed.  

However, things could be so much worse.  

The first thing that occured to me when I was realizing how much worse it could be is that there is likely some financial recourse I can pursue through either my homeowner's insurance or maybe the credit card I used  when I bought it for myself as a birthday present last April.  But even if there isn't, I am not destitute.  That bike was not my only means of transportation and I am financially stable enough that I can replace her without bankrupting myself.  

I see so many people in Hempstead who bike, pretty obviously using that form of transportation because that is what they can afford.  If you are a dishwasher or a gardener or a fast food worker, it is a big deal if even a cheap bike gets stolen.  Bikes are stolen all the time.

I don't know even what to advocate for to make it less likely for bikes to be stolen.  I actually thought the place I was parking at work was safe.  It was in the interior of campus.  There were always a lot of people around (even as I sat there waiting for public safety, there were a lot of people around). I used my cheap cable and lock rather than the expensive (and heavy) kryptonite that I bought for trips to the city and other places that seemed more dangerous.  Often when I park my bike elsewhere, I can't find a bike rack to park it on and end up trying to lock it to a telephone pole or bench, but my bike was locked to a bike rack today. 

In truth, I don't know what we can do as a society to make it less likely our bikes will get stolen.  

The second thing I had to appreciate from this situation was that this was only my bike that was lost. As fond as I have become of her and as much of a financial burden it will be to replace her, she was only a bike.

For the last month and a half I've been recording crash after crash that took lives or left them in critical condition.   

The list of vehicular crashes with pedestrians or cyclists since September 13 is now up to 22, 15 fatal, that I know of.  (One of the things I managed to get done today was to call the hospitals where the critically injured were sent to try to find out if they survived, only to be told that they can't give me that information.) 

The loss of my bike was a great and sudden change. I feel it deeply and am experiencing a sense of shock from it.  Loss of my life or of the life of someone I loved, would be even more so.  That is happening pretty regularly on Long Island.

The title is a quote from Mary Kelly's Frankenstein: 

 " Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change."

Failure to yield pedestrians when turning is actually a crime

This morning I received a Google alerts email about the 21st crash that seriously injured or killed a pedestrian or cyclist on Long Island since September 13th of this year. This crash took place on Horseblock Road in Medford at 7:45 Monday morning and left cyclist Julien Robinette critically injured. 

The motorist who injured Robinette was attempting to take a left from the southbound lane and collided with Robinette, who was riding north in the northbound lane.  If this had been an automobile accident, the driver would have been at fault for cutting in front of northbound traffic during the turn, but for this incident no charges were filed. 

Charges were filed in only two of the twenty-one crashes this month, both of which were suspected DUI's.  Five of the crashes were hit-and-runs, the perpetrators as yet not apprehended. No reported charges were filed in any of the other fourteen crashes. In fact, in all but three it was specifically reported that no charges were filed, this last crash being among those.

On my bike ride home from work last night along Hempstead Turnpike, I was in a situation very similar to the one that left Robinette critically injured yesterday morning. There was a pedestrian walking the other way who was also almost a casualty.  As I was nearing the intersection of Surrey Lane, heading west, I noticed a tow truck hurrying toward me with his blinker on, clearly intending to turn into Surrey Lane in front of me. I slowed down because it was clear he had no intention of giving me the right-of-way to which I was legally obligated and I had no intention of fighting him for it. At the same time there was a pedestrian heading east on the sidewalk who was just getting to Surrey Lane. The pedestrian was not facing the tow truck and did not notice that the tow truck was turning in front of him. The truck did miss the pedestrian, but barely.  It was close enough that the pedestrian jumped back some.

From what I've seen this month, it seems that as long as the driver was not intoxicated and didn't leave the scene, he wouldn't have been charged if he had hit me or if he had hit the pedestrian.

Drivers who ignore cyclists and pedestrians when turning should be charged and they should be ticketed even when there is no crash. Negligence should be charged.

The photo above is of me waiting at the corner of Old Country Road and Glen Cove Road.  My husband Bill and I went there specifically to take pictures because we didn't have to worry about who to give photo credit to for traffic scenes. However, at this particular time, I have the light to cross Old Country Road, but there were so many vehicles taking rights in front of me that I did not get into the intersection before the countdown was over. This was the worst case of all the experiments I did at that crossing, but in every single one of them, when I tried to cross from south to north, I had to wait for so many turning cars that I barely made it across before the countdown.  Here is a video of one of those crossings.

To be certain, I believe many of the motorists who turned in front of me at the Old Country Road/Glen Cove Road intersection during that day of filming were doing so because they were intimidated by the entire culture around that intersection, not because they wanted to cut me off.  They did so because they were afraid of getting honked at or even rear-ended. They may have even been afraid that if they were to stop and wait for me, the car behind them might race around them and hit me. I have had cars pass me while I was waiting for a pedestrian to cross at a crosswalk more than once on Long Island. During that day of filming there was actually one motorist who tried to wait for me to cross, but he was honked at and quickly went on again before I had a chance to.  

We cannot let a few very aggressive drivers dictate the culture of driving on Long Island. Most of us want to live in a friendlier place.

We, as Long Islanders, need to make a concerted effort to remind motorists that it is their responsibility to watch for pedestrians and cyclists, but we also need to start really enforcing the existing laws that protect pedestrians and cyclists.