Blog Topic

Bicyclists Strike Back
Posted by: Claude Wyle
September 13, 2007

The San Francisco bicycling community is in an uproar after the latest truck bicycle crash which occurred this last Monday, in which a woman was struck by a truck while her bicycle at the intersection of Octavia and Market Streets in San Francisco. The truck driver was making an illegal right hand turn, and fled the scene without stopping. He was later stopped by police and cited for the illegal right turn.

The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition held a demonstration Friday to demand that the City fix what they call a "dangerous situation" at the intersection and freeway on-ramp.

The bicycle coalition also issued a statement. "This is the latest in what has become an all-too-frequent series of bicyclist knock-downs in this famously dangerous intersection, and we're absolutely fed up with the city's tolerance for a known dangerous condition on San Francisco's premiere bicycling, pedestrian, and transit street," "Join us this Friday at a public demonstration to demand that the city address this dangerous condition.

"It's not only bicyclists who are dissatisfied with the design of this intersection. Drivers are likewise upset that they cannot legally turn right because there is a bike lane.

As San Francisco bicycle attorneys, we look not only at the liability of the truck driver in making his illegal right turn, but also at the safety of the intersection. If indeed this is a dangerous condition of public property, the City must also be made accountable to this seriously injured woman, and this intersection must be changed before more bicyclists are hurt.

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