Mr Dresser,
Thanks for following up on this. Whether or not one can characterize your column as pro or anti anything is beside the point. People are ignorant about their legal responsibilities under MD traffic code and your column (and the MVA's blundering amateur legal speculation) made it worse, not better. I will grant that your subject matter is new law (always trickier) and your intent and tone quite civil and admirable...but you or the MVA read into the text of the law an intent that was not there and conjured up legal situations that do not exist in the traffic code. Two main errors: 1. The 3 foot buffer law does not add any new requirement for bicyclist behavior in order for motorists to be bound by it....just because a bicyclist isn't at the right edge of a lane does not mean motorists are free to buzz them. If you look at the 'ride to the right' regs anytime the lane is too narrow for a car to safely pass (ie 3ft buffer+2ft biker+9'11" max car room=14'11"), then the bicyclist is NOT obligated to ride far to the right. So to speculate that if a biker was "hogging" the lane is to suggest a scenario that virtually cannot exist in our 11' traffic lanes.
2. To suggest that the impeeding traffic provision in 21-804 applies to bikes because bikers are "subject to all the duties required of the driver of a vehicle" (21-1202) is to ignore the rest of that part of the code that states " except:
(1) As otherwise provided in this subtitle;"
and section 21-1205 specifically addresses what bicyclists are supposed to do when traveling slower than traffic (ride to the right with 6 exceptions).
To sum up, there are almost no lanes wide enough to give a bicyclist 3 feet of buffer and fit the bicyclist and the cars (unless one of them isnt really in the lane), so it is virtually always legal for a cyclist to take (you say hog) a lane. In those cases motorists have the same obligations to pass safely as if passing a car (ie use another lane to pass),
AND
cyclists can not be legally impeding traffic, they can only be failing to ride to right.

Considering the amount traffic on the roads these days, this is absolutely stupid. At best, bicycles belong on the shoulder only. If bicycles want to be on the road proper, then they need to pass a test, be licensed, pay registration fees, have license plates, and carry insurance. The police need to enforce helmet laws, and impedance of traffic laws. Now we are on an even field.

The police enforce traffic laws? The Baltimore City police haven't made an effort to enforce traffic laws since Don Pomerlau was Commissioner.

Mr. Wilson,
I'm willing to bet you that if you stop a bike commuter in the street (and I'm not talking about teenagers, kids playing in the road, etc...I mean regular adults trying to get safely from Point A to Point B via bike) you'll find that most of them own a car, and thus, have insurance and passed a license test, as well as pay registration and licensing fees on the car. Not to mention paying taxes on the gasoline which fund roads. So we pay our share of fees and taxes. Many of us bike commuters are choosing to leave the car parked at home to save on some or all of the following:
parking fees, highway tolls, gasoline, wear and tear on the vehicle, heart disease and obesity, and polluting the environment. And just remember, every bike commuter you see out there is one less vehicle clogging up your precious highways.

As for helmet laws, although I ride with one all the time, in reality, they won't save your life except in low speed crashes. Ask the families of Jack Yates, Larry Bensky, and Natasha Pettigrew, to name just a few. Helmet or not, being crushed by a 2 ton or more vehicle will do more damage than a styrofoam shell can prevent. What WOULD have prevented their unncessary and untimely deaths is driver caution and awareness. If the drivers in each situation had bothered to either pass safely, turn properly (turn signals on, making sure that the cyclist you just passed is not beside you), or not mistaken a human being for a DOG (how you can mistake the scraping and dragging of a metal bicycle under your behemoth of a vehicle for a dog and not stop is way beyond belief), each of those wonderful and contributing members of society would still be here today. But due to bad driving and inattention, they are sadly not. And that's why Maryland needs a 3-foot rule, among other laws such as more severe punishment for murdering someone with your vehicle, intentional or not. Drivers today are always rushed and selfishly think that he/she is the only person who matters in the world and needs to get to Point B safely.

If Maryland ever needs more revenue, instead of just setting up red light and speeding cameras, equip cyclists with cameras to catch all the road violators. Cameras worked to slow people down on the Beltway to protect highway workers, so maybe it'll work to protect cyclists. After all, it seems the only way to get through to a driver's head to drive sensibly is through a financial penalty.

Essentially, cyclists want the protection from bad drivers without being held responsible for running stoplights, impeding traffic, and a host of other bad cycling practices. I propose a set of modifications to the law: (1) any bike on any public road must have a license plate for identification, (2) cyclists must carry insurance, (3) any video of the bike violating any motor vehicle law is acceptable for a minimum $25 fine, (4) all violations are reported to the insurance company.

Steve -- read the law, or the comments above. In most cases on most Maryland roads, cyclists are by definition incapable of "impeding" traffice. We ARE traffic. And as far as not wanting to be responsible for running red lights and stop signs -- we ARE responsible for that, and if a police officer sees a cyclist doing that, he or she can write the cyclist a ticket. Some cyclists (I am not one of them) do take their chances on red lights and stop signs -- AS DO MANY MOTORISTS. The difference is that if I run a red light, I'm very unlikely to kill or seriously injure anyone but myself. (P.S. I am a car driver, too, and love cars.)

Mr. Wilson,

Way to address ackermal and commutergal's well thought out and well stated points.

Let me ask you this Mr. Wilson. When was the last time you exceeded the speed limit, or rolled through a stop sign or red light while turning right?

How many times a day do you see motorists do this...or perhaps it would be easier to quantify if I said how many times a MINUTE do you see motorists do this?

And generally I've find that bicyclists don't impede traffic. Its the volume of other motorists on the roads that cause and impede traffic.

While you may not believe this, roll through stop signs, or red lights while turning right. I've seen too many others doing it. I rarely exceed the speed limit because I plan where I am going and allow time to get there. And while I agree that that are many more drivers on the road than cyclists, I contend that the percentage of "bad" cyclists exceeds the number of bad drivers. The key point is that given the volume of traffic and the number of bad drivers, cyclists should be on 2 lane roads without a shoulder. They should not have special laws to protect them. I have NEVER seen a police officer give a cyclist a ticket.

Mr. Wilson says that bicycles belong only on the shoulder. I would be happy to ride on the shoulder - if it existed, was wide enough to ride on and wasn't full of potholes, debris, "road furniture" and broken glass. Most Maryland roads don't have such a shoulder. If there were such shoulders or better, dedicated bicycle lanes, cars and bikes would co-exist better. As long as these things don't exist, bicycles are forced onto the roads. Licensing bikes is pointless as Denver and other cities realized years ago. Enforcing traffic laws can be effective - most MD drivers would get a ticket every day if we had traffic enforcement like Denver does. Aside from hazardous riding by teenagers who never got bicycle safety training in school (why is that?), the biggest complaint I hear from drivers is that cyclists run stop signs and red lights. Like Mr. Dresser suggested earlier, most cyclists treat stop signs like yield signs - stopping if there is traffic; slowing down and going through if there is none. This is because stopping and accelerating from zero is a HUGE expediture of energy compared to accerating from 2 or 3 mph. Going through when there is cross traffic present is rightly condemned. Red lights should never be run - but I cannot too harshly condemn a cyclist who is ON THE SHOULDER, not in the traffic lane, who runs a red light at a T-intersection where the shoulder is continuous and traffic never crosses it, especially if it's a deserted intersection. Another problem for cyclists at red lights is that many lights can only be activated by a giant steel object like a car - an aluminum bike won't trigger the light. So, the cyclist must either wait for a car to show up, or run the light when the traffic clears. I concede that these things can be hazardous in the presence of traffic and should not done by cyclists. But, I see far worse from motorists every day whether I'm on a bike or driving. And, I'm not calling for all cars to be banned from the roads.

Mr. Wilson,

You're right. Special laws should NOT be necessary to protect bicyclists from motorists. Apparently these laws ARE necessary because there are too many self-absorbed, distracted motorists driving two-ton machines that are capable of killing pedestrians, bicyclists, motorcyclists, and operators of other motor vehicles.

Once people with attitudes like yours look at the reality of the situation, the roads will be a safer place.

I believe that bicyclists should only be allowed to ride on roads with a shoulder. I have had too many close calls with bicyclists on narrow 2 lane roads....the cyclists are swerving back and forth and have no concern for their safety much less mine.

Kate,

Your statement is like saying "I believe that cars and buses should not be allowed near schools because too many children get hit" (in that your statement is a knee-jerk, poorly thought out comment).

What EVERYONE who uses the roads needs to do is exercise caution and be aware and observant ALL THE TIME.

Most bicyclists that I know are also drivers. Are they careful drivers? Some probably are and some probably aren't just like the rest of the population.

Do they get frustrated when they're "stuck" in a lane of traffic behind a slow moving cyclist? I'm sure...I know I do. But I also get frustrated when I'm behind a commuter bus that is stopping and blocking the lane every half mile while bus riders get on and off. Is the solution to remove buses from the road? I don't think so.

So what do we do?

We deal with it. You're not going to get wherever it is you're going any slower because of a cyclist. Case in point...drive down 270 any morning between 7:30 and 9:00 AM, and tell me who's causing traffic problems.

Too bad Mr. Dresser never specifically mentioned the error in the original column, where he wrote: "Now let's say the bicyclist is in the wrong — blithely hogging the travel lane while slowing the motorist to 20 mph under the speed limit. In that case, the buffer rule does not apply..."

I would like to know whether that is what MVA told Mr. Dresser, or if that idea was what Mr. Dresser inferred. Of course, there is no exception in the statute for drivers going less than the speed of traffic in this statute, merely a requirement to comply with the a specific law, which itself contemplates narrow lanes where holding up traffic will be unavoidable.

I like Steve Wilson's proposal in theory, but it can't be implemented without a fascistic state. Video cameras providing a ticket for every vehicle that violates a law would probably raise enough money to replace the gas tax, at least the first year. No problem with ticketing red-light running bikes or speeding bikes, we just need more red-light cameras.

License plates are unlikely to happen for every bike, for this narrow purpose. But it would be feasible to require license plates and perhaps special licenses for riding bikes on the shoulders of designated expressways (e.g. US-50, US-15, ICC, I-95 section over the Susquehana). If those cyclists were caught.

Do you understand that it's correct time to get the mortgage loans, which can make your dreams come true.