The matter of the DA pleading the matter down notwithstanding his ADA originally charging as a felony (from what I have read) is a simple matter of prosecutorial discretion wrongly execised on the part of the DA

It is entirely a local issue that the citizens/voters need to consider (assuming that the DA is an elected office)

If anyone thinks complaining about it is gonna change anything, it ain’t!

http://www.edhat.com/html/california_stop.html

“…Another popular, but illegal, California driving habit is the legendary California Stop, the act of slowing down but not fully stopping at a stop sign. The dedicated staff of edhat.com wanted to see how prevalent this behavior was in our fair city. Maybe in LA, we thought, where rushing is a way of life … but in Santa Barbara? …In a sample of 300 cars, the dedicated staff only saw 50 full stops (16.67%)…”

Seventeen percent compliance? Looks to me like motorists are as bad as bicyclists. Not surprising, since both classes of vehicles are operated by the same human beings.

Here in Alabama, if you run over a cyclist, you can only be charged if you are drunk or on drugs, a police officer witnesses what happened at the time, or if it can be proved that the motorist has “willful intent” to kill you.

That leaves free any motorist to be on their cell phone or texting away, kill a cyclist without so much as a manslaughter charge.

I count how many people I see texting on my 8 Kilometer route to work. The lowest was 3, the highest was 34. That is seriously dangerous distracted driving. In my 15+ years of bicycle commuting here, distracted driving by people texting and on their cell phones is the number one hazard I have to watch out for avoid every single day.

Here in Huntsville, Alabama, we now have texting as secondary offense, but how is that going to help me or my family when a distracted motorists kills or injures me?

This needs to change and while the BASC and Alabike are doing what they can, what can the individual cyclist do to get the message across that the laws need to be treated equally for bicyclists in these situations? What wording can we use to make our legislators pay attention and do something about this inequity?

http://labikes.blogspot.com/2010/11/lucky-you-dont-live-in-toronto.html

http://www.bikewalk.org/tji.php

Our city recently put up nice numbered bike route and Share the Road signs. Sadly, these mean nothing if the law doesn’t enforce our rights by prosecuting drivers who are criminally negligent.