[hairylegs]

I was walking my dogs in the park last night when a tweeker riding a Walmart bike didn't see the woman walking in the opposite direction (even though she was in plain view). The tweeker saw her at the last second and screamed but didn't hit the brakes or even try to swerve. He just plowed right into her.

He wasn't more than 150 lbs and wasn't going more than 12 mph, and she was pretty um... sturdy but he still hit her hard enough that she left her feet, flew back, and hit her head on the sidewalk.

After the ambulance left and the police talked to everyone, they didn't arrest the tweeker even though he was clearly out of his mind. He claimed she just came out of nowhere which makes zero sense because this was in the middle of two empty baseball fields. So to come out of nowhere she would've had to sprint at least 100 yards and plant both her feet (in basketball it would've clearly been a charge call).

The thing that I can't help but think as a mountain biker is "there's a statistic that the Marin county crowd is going to use as a stick to beat us over the head with for years". They just see "mountain bike" and "injury to pedestrian" and present that as a case for mountain bikes being a reckless danger to public safety.

Oh yeah- I hope the woman is ok too. She was definitely concussed at the very least.

 

[MTT77]

If this was a clear line of sight, why didn't the lady move? Not saying it's her fault, just wondering. If I saw someone riding toward me on a sidewalk and not moving over, I'd take a step over...

 

[hairylegs]

I think she was assuming that the guy would see the heavy set woman in the middle of the broad sidewalk and go around rather than into her. Also, I think the fact that he screamed a beat and a half before he hit her made her freeze like a deer in the headlights. And finally, she wasn't exactly the personification of "spry".

 

[Jayem]

Lots of darwin types on bikes around here riding through traffic with earbuds checking their phones at the same time. One almost hit me a couple days ago. I won't feel much pity.

 

[Davey Simon]

I was walking my dogs in the park last night when a tweeker riding a Walmart bike didn't see the woman walking in the opposite direction (even though she was in plain view). The tweeker saw her at the last second and screamed but didn't hit the brakes or even try to swerve. He just plowed right into her.

He wasn't more than 150 lbs and wasn't going more than 12 mph, and she was pretty um... sturdy but he still hit her hard enough that she left her feet, flew back, and hit her head on the sidewalk.

After the ambulance left and the police talked to everyone, they didn't arrest the tweeker even though he was clearly out of his mind. He claimed she just came out of nowhere which makes zero sense because this was in the middle of two empty baseball fields. So to come out of nowhere she would've had to sprint at least 100 yards and plant both her feet (in basketball it would've clearly been a charge call).

The thing that I can't help but think as a mountain biker is "there's a statistic that the Marin county crowd is going to use as a stick to beat us over the head with for years". They just see "mountain bike" and "injury to pedestrian" and present that as a case for mountain bikes being a reckless danger to public safety.

Oh yeah- I hope the woman is ok too. She was definitely concussed at the very least.

Where did this happen?

 

[cmg]

post deleted, found it myself

 

[hairylegs]

This was in San Jose. Sorry for the location confusion. It didn't actually take place in Marin, I just took them as the epicenter of anti-mountain bike sentiment in America.