Cycling, traffic safety, traffic justice, and legal topics; energy, transit and transportion economics
ADOT has released Crash Facts 2016 in the later part of June (of 2016), a bit later than normal; and I received the database from them sometime in July.
The graphical crash map has been updated and now contains 2009-2016 for both MV-bike and MV-ped crashes.
The Fatality Grid has been reconciled and contains some specifics on every bicyclist fatality in Arizona from 2009-2016
Some dangerous driving knocked down a traffic signal in the median of Warner Road at I-10 sometime 8/1 or 2. It’s not known is the responsible person hit-and-ran or what.
This is right down the same road where a dangerous driver killed the Childtime sign in July 2016, and also where a dangerous driver killed a bus stop in Feb 2015.
Apparently, this sort of driving goes on all the time, but no one seems to care much. Lots of property damage. Continue reading “Signals knocked down by driver”
“Keaton Allison, 21, had a BAC level of 0.25 percent, according to blood-testing results from the Maricopa County Office of the Medical Examiner.” — azcentral
see more at 3-dead-in-wrong-way-wreck-i-17-phoenix Continue reading “Report: Wrong-way driver who killed 3 very high BAC level”
7/26/2017 ~ 8:40am. News reports Eastbound Bus on McKellips near Country Club crashed headon with a cyclist traveling westbound in the eastbound lane.
It was approaching the intersection of McKellips with Grand according to the map location in the news story. In a later news story a police spokesperson identified the bicyclist as Shedrick Galloway, 46/M, and said he “was hit when he veered in front of the bus”.
Wrong-way riding is a pretty common contributing factor in bike-mv collisions, however this type where the bicyclist is thought to have veered into the path of oncoming traffic is pretty rare. Another later news story relates that the bicyclist wasn’t feeling well and had already called a friend to come pick him up; so perhaps (speculation) he suffered some sort of medical emergency that caused the veering.
Continue reading “Bicycle rider killed in collision with bus in Mesa”
fatal incident 8/27/2016; This was reported in the media at the time but I had missed it.
Cyclist Thomas J. Butler 39/M; 43rd Ave, just north of Bethany Home Road. It’s not clear when police say things like “The bicyclist tried to ride across the street, not in a crosswalk”; and there are inconsistencies in the data file; unfortunately the crash report itself is unavailable from the given file number, so the world will never know: Continue reading “Phoenix police: Bicyclist identified after being hit by suspected drunk driver”
Thursday 5/25/2017 morning. Driver WB on State Route 238 at milepost 43 struck and killed a bicyclist. The story doesn’t say, but the scenario suggests strike-from behind.
SR-238 (here it is near MP 42) is a high-speed rural highway.
Continue reading “One dead in Maricopa vehicle-bicycle collision”
This is an outline of each 2016 fatality that was unknown to me — or that could not be found by reverse-googling — until the database was released in mid-2017. See the full 2016 grid here.
There are 10 such incidents, not counting two additional exceedingly poorly-documented incidents that were also nowhere to be found in media report. That means that of total of 30 fatal incidents (31 fatalities, as one was double) in 2016, 18 were reported in the media while 12 were not — or at least not that I can find.
“Missing” refers to the database has these listed as not a hit-and-run, yet they are missing virtually all identifying data, except the victim’s demographics. The only thing I can imagine is they are hit and run, and are mis-coded. Continue reading “Two more “missing” hit-and-run fatalities”
Short answer: cyclists who also own automobiles should strongly consider buying additional UM/UIM coverage; this will cover you if you become involved in a crash caused by a motorist and they can’t pay, or reach their policy limits. Continue reading “A Quick Review of Important Auto Insurance Coverage For Cyclists”
This past Wednesday (6/28/2017) afternoon, another wrong way fatal crash and another driver is locked up. “Fixing” wrong way driving can most obviously be effected by removing impaired drivers from the road. Proposed, costly, technological gadgets to detect wrong-way can have only limited usefulness. Abc15.com reports that the wrong-way driver “… admitted to drinking before driving and blood tests came back with a blood alcohol level of .160”
Continue reading “Wrong-way driver faces homicide charge in death of motorcyclist on I-17”
Some recent news items. Also, be sure to check out the “cold medicine” guy from a few days ago…
6/6/2017 double-fatality ~8PM, began driving around airport, including through parking structures the wrong way and breaking through the arm/gate: Wrong way driver 56-year-old Ronald Wayne Mollenhauer killed another driver, Young Lee on a transition ramp between I-10 and SR51. A third driver was injured. Given the ww driver is dead, you probably won’t hear much about this again. Was he impaired by drugs or alcohol, or some other impairment? Most ww drivers are. We’ll have to wait for FARS to find out which will report any chemical testing results. Continue reading “More Wrong-way freeway driving; can detection help?”
Cold medicine? maybe, just maybe plain-old drunk. We’ll see. Interesting comment about victim’s rights, and appearing in court
A total of 13 people requested victim’s rights due to the driver using his vehicle as a deadly instrument… During Walker’s initial appearance, one of the alleged victims addressed the judge.
“We were inches from actually crashing into him, and that in itself is an emotional trauma,” the man said. “He’s not safe and he shouldn’t be out in society placing others in danger.”
It’s good to see ordinary people stick up for their rights and hopefully hold dangerous drivers responsible for their actions.
Despite all the hoopla surrounding wrong-way crashes “Wrong-way collisions are not a new phenomenon and statistically remain unchanged year over year in Arizona.”, nevertheless Gov Ducey wants action. It’s nice to focus attention on traffic safety but perhaps attention could be better focused on the vast majority of traffic fatalities and injuries that don’t involve a wrong-way driver? Continue reading “DPS: Wrong-way driver suspected of DUI blamed cold medicine”
Out for a Saturday morning group ride on Hardy Drive in Tempe July 2, 2016, cyclists had some sort of negative encounter with a motorist. Traffic would be light at 9AM on a Saturday morning in the dead of summer, except for the group of estimated 50 bicyclists (dispersed, not one group) and that motorist. The street here is very narrow, is traffic-calmed with ped islands and speed tables installed in a 2014/15 streetscape project, and has a speed limit of 30mph. Continue reading “This happened one day in Tempe”
6/1/2017 ~ 7AM westbound Alsdorf near Durango, Arizona City, Pinal County. victim: Susan J. Stanisich, 75/F. Struck from behind by 2nd vehicle. The position of impact on the vehicle (the driver’s side) seems odd.
Continue reading “Woman cyclist struck, killed in Arizona City”
5/31/2017 morning, 33/F victim Jenna Taylor was killed at the intersection of Val Vista and Ray Roads in Gilbert, AZ
A second bicyclist was involved but no info was released on them.
Continue reading “Bicyclist killed after colliding with commercial vehicle in Gilbert”