Sir Spot of Borg wrote on Mar 19
th, 2014 at 5:54am:
Oh what compassion. So now nobody should ride bikes? Didnt your mother teach you to look before you open a car door? I saw a car door taken off by another car in front of a hospital in townsville once. Nobody was hurt but they could have been.
SOB
Look, I saw the footage of that incident and I saw the so called bike lane.
Seriously, it is only about a foot wide and right up against the gutter.
Those men were in a taxi that had pulled up to the side of the road to let them out. So they were getting out. It is perfectly possible they had no idea there was a little section there where bikes could go. I would not have had!
When a taxi pulls over, you assume you can get out.
The incident was not deliberate and in fact those men could potentially have been hurt more than that cyclist.
Having said that, if I opened a door and hit someone, I would help them up and say sorry, I didn't see you.
But I thought the cyclist was very aggressive too. demanding they hand over details. I would not have handed over my name and address either.
And if I were a cyclist, riding in the city, and saw a taxi stopped ahead of me-would I thunder past on the left side, on my bike? Nope.
Someone here mentioned the council stated the little section next to the path is not an official designated bike lane. It sure does not look like it as I have never seen one in such a location, on the left of where a car would park. The ones I have seen are all on the right of the parking lane. It would be a stupid spot on the left as drivers and passengers are used to checking the right side of a car before alighting, but not the kerb side.
I think the cyclist, even if it turns out she was technically in the 'right' needs to wake up and show a bit more caution.