I almost killed a guy who was splitting lanes on his high end bike in all his cycling gear, pedaling at high speed down the middle of the road between two lanes of traffic, one totally stopped, as I pulled through a hole in stopped traffic to take a left turn.
It was the most congested and dangerous intersection in my commute.
I had PSTD for about six months over that. Sure. I wasn’t injured and that guy nearly got killed.
But for about six months, every time my mind was not occupied, that super slow motion high definition video of the guy somersaulting over the hood of my car in tandem with his somersaulting bike, his bare calves, his biking shoes, spinning through the air. After a while, I thought I was over it, until I was totally relaxed watching a movie where a cyclist hit a car, and I nearly had a nervous breakdown, almost breaking the television controller in half to shut the TV off.
But I am sure there are cyclists who would label me an “idiot driver” too.
And I have to deal with that because that guy was splitting the lanes which is absolutely insane and irresponsible especially where he was doing it, and doing it during rush hour. I had to go to court against my insurance company to contest a surcharge, and my insurance company dropped me after nearly fifty years of no accidents. The court ruled for me, but I bitterly resented having to go to court for that. I felt anger at that guy having the gall to sue my insurance company for money, and me having to go to court, getting dumped by my insurer and losing a day of pay at work.
I understand why he did it, if I had a debilitating injury, I might go after any money I can as he did. I try not to hold it against him.
While I felt terrible about the guy, the cop interviewing me told me with a degree of sympathy as I stood there in shock, that cyclists “sometimes don’t obey the rules of the road”, and I do feel anger about that guy driving his bike like that at that time, in that place.
I began getting up at 4:30 AM to go to work to avoid hitting any traffic at that intersection, and my heartbeat actually picks up as my anxiety ramps up, even today. And when I see bikes on the road as I occasionally do when there are twenty of them at a time on a curving back road where I cannot pass, and am forced to do 18 mph in a 30 mph zone for about a mile, I feel extreme anxiety, anger and resentment, because my Leftist state has seen fit to allow them to take the entire lane on this road.
I don’t ride my bike on any roadways anymore if I can avoid it, only bike trails. I don’t begrudge cyclists the road, and when I drive my bike on a road, I put myself in danger by squeezing as far to the right as I can, even hazarding potholes and such in the narrow foot-wide area to the right of the solid white line.
All that said, this driver should pay the price for what he did, if he was indeed drunk, or if he was even just looking down at his cell phone. I don’t think the cyclists should be there, and I don’t think they should be able to take up the lane, but if that is the law that they can, then that is the law, however stupid I or others might think it is. I am on the side of the cyclists here and I don’t see how anyone can be on the side of the driver, if that is the law.
This was a terrible experience for you. I am so sorry that you had to go through all that and are still ( very reasonably) struggling with PTSD.
I commute about a mile on my electric assist tricycle to my university classes.
We live on an urban street with little traffic. I have excellent mirrors that I check constantly. When I see a car coming from behind I pull over and stop even though I am in a designated bike lane. I think the motorists appreciate my doing that. Everyone is on the same schedule and over the past 2 years I have come to recognize many of the motorists and their cars. They know me, too, and often wave.
Those cyclists who don’t follow the traffic rules are very irritating to me.