Fallsnewspress.com - Smoke Signals: Bicyclists must obey traffic laws

by Tim Troglen, Reporter

Bicyclists, listen up.

The same rules of the road I'm supposed to abide by in my car, you are supposed to abide by while pedaling. It's the law.

And just to make sure, I recently asked a spokesperson for the Hudson Police Department.

"Bicyclists on the roadway do have to follow the same traffic laws as motor vehicles," she said.

Now, I'm sure most bicyclists obey the traffic laws, but it seems I keep running into the riders who don't (figuratively, not literally).

The latest was a few weeks ago.

I was driving east on Commerce Drive from our offices in Stow, heading to an evening meeting in Hudson. I stopped at the red traffic light at Route 91 and Commerce Drive. So did the four or five cars around me.

But a man on a bicycle, while initially stopping, decided he didn't want to wait for the light to change. He pulled out around the stopped traffic, while the light was still red, and pedaled north on Route 91, into oncoming traffic.

The guy was lucky. Lucky the drivers saw him. It's not always the case. Watch the news, read a paper. When cars and bikes collide, people die.

A few days later, I watched a potential tragedy unfold as a bike rider zipped down a south Akron hill, breezing through the stop sign as other cars approached the intersection.

Another lucky rider.

The cars slowed and stopped as he laughed, riding on to his destination.

It could have been worse.

And about a year ago it was.

I saw a boy who was not as lucky as the others I've mentioned.

It was late afternoon and I was a few blocks from my Akron home. To my left I saw two boys, one looked to be about 10, the other about 7, riding bicycles down a hill, toward a busy four-lane road. I was driving behind an Akron Metro bus as I watched the boys ride past the red stop sign and head toward the bus.

As they disappeared in front of the bus, I waited, hoping to see both boys emerge unharmed, on the other side of the bus. But only one made it.

As the bus driver slammed on his brakes, metal crunched and onlookers screamed, I knew what had happened.

The older boy was hit by the driver, knocked into the air and was laying about 15 feet in front of the bus.

As I got out of my car and called 911, I could see the boy on the ground. He was alive but appeared to be in bad shape. I later found out that he survived, but ended up with broken bones, peeled skin and hopefully a new respect for traffic laws.

If he had just followed the laws and stopped, the boy would have been saved an ambulance ride.

E-mail: ttroglen@recordpub.com

Phone: 330-688-0088 ext. 3146