Legalize the California roll
Bill to let cyclists safely roll past stop signs up for first hearing
This is the moment that people who ride bikes in California have been waiting for. Cyclists get scorned as criminals for cruising past stop signs, but state legislators on Monday are scheduled to debate letting people on bikes treat stop signs as yield signs.
Legalizing how the vast majority of people already ride bikes — maintaining some of their momentum through intersections when it’s safe to do so — could make bike commuting more attractive and undercut the public perception that cyclists are a bunch of reckless scofflaws.
Yet rather than a concession to the cycling community, the simple change in the Vehicle Code created by Assembly Bill 1103 can benefit motorists by making intersections more efficient and predictable and encouraging cyclists to use stop-sign-strewn side streets and avoid congested arterials.
California would become just the second state in the country to let bicyclists roll through stop signs when they have the right-of-way, a Holy Grail for many bike advocates commonly known as the “Idaho stop” after the state that legalized the practice way back in 1982. It’s been working well there ever since, with bike collision rates in Boise dropping after its passage and remaining lower than comparable California cities such as Sacramento.
Safety is why Assemblymember Jay Obernolte, the Republican former mayor of Big Bear in rural southeastern California, says he introduced AB1103. He told me that intersections are by far the most dangerous place on the roads, particularly for vulnerable roads users like pedestrians and cyclists, so the safest practice is to let them clear intersections as quickly as possible.
“As bicycle usage continues to increase on our roadways, we need to find ways to improve bicycle safety,” Obernolte said. “Studies show conclusively that allowing cyclists to yield at stop signs when appropriate is safer for both cyclists and motorists.”
The push to reform California’s stop sign law for cyclists has roots in San Francisco, the hometown of AB1103’s co-sponsor, Assemblymember Phil Ting, and its principal co-author, Senator Scott Wiener. The two San Francisco Democrats are well versed in how contentious bike issues can be — and how organized cyclists can be when challenged.
Almost two years ago, the San Francisco Police Department cracked down on bicyclists running stop signs on the Wiggle, a key East-West bike corridor in the center of the city. Cyclists responded with a “civil obedience” protest: hundreds showed up and followed the letter of the law, stopping completely at each intersection one after another, and it tied up traffic for everyone.
The protest illustrated a simple concept at the heart of the current reform effort. Bikes take a long time to get up to cruising speed after a complete stop, clogging intersections for all road users. So it’s better for everyone to just let them roll through when it’s their turn.
Writing about the protest at the time for Byline and Medium, I called it an “excellent conversation starter for a long-overdue discussion about equity among road users. For too long, cyclists have been vilified with paternalistic put-downs and sanctimonious blame-gaming, criticized for not obeying the letters of laws that disregard the dynamics of riding a bike…”
Several city supervisors then advocated for San Francisco to adopt the stop-as-yield standard for bikes, making headlines around the state. That reform effort was stymied by Mayor Ed Lee, who told StreetsblogSF, “I’m not going to be bending to interests that simply want to disregard public safety.”
Lee offered no evidence for his belief that it’s safer for people on bikes to completely stop at every intersection. But bike advocate Jason Meggs, who researched the question for the UC Berkeley School of Public Health, reached just the opposite conclusion: frequent stops and starts are more dangerous for cyclists, and letting them slowly roll stop signs is safer.
Now that the California roll reform has been offered on the statewide level, we’ll see how the competing claims play out. Some police groups have raised public safety concerns, but there seems to be scant evidence for that argument. Instead, it’s mostly an emotional reaction: cyclists should slow down and observe the same rules as cars.
But bikes aren’t cars. They function differently, and perhaps it’s time for the law to reflect that. Yet if opponents insist on making equity arguments, perhaps they should consider the equity arguments I made when covering the San Francisco protest two years ago:
“Right now, the transportation system discriminates against cyclists by failing to even consider something that it provides to every other road user: an accommodation toward what makes that transportation choice efficient, safe, and attractive. For cyclists, that’s a standard best embodied by the Idaho stop, which is how people naturally ride anyway.
“Think about it: government provides every other road user with the public resources needed to help them get from Point A to Point B as quickly as is reasonable and possible. For car drivers, that includes the Interstate Highway System, which allows motorists to rapidly bypass the intersections of every little town along their path, a system created and maintained at great public expense.
“Pedestrians are given sidewalks and their own signal and crosswalks at every major intersection, so they can safely cross the street without waiting for the flow of cars to stop. And when they use public transit, they’re given a choice of options (again, at great public expense) ranging from buses that stop often to express buses and trains, again operating on the concept that making frequent stops is an inefficient way to get around.
“So why then are cyclists expected to come to a full and complete stop at every intersection? Anyone who’s ever ridden a bike knows how impractical that is, denying the ideas of momentum and flow that are so central to the cycling experience and that make it by far the most efficient form of transportation.”
At moment when the country is grappling with climate change and congested roadways in an era of fiscal austerity, California should be doing all it can to encourage people to ride bikes. And this simple change might just go a long way toward meeting that goal.
The Assembly Transportation Committee will consider AB1103 at 2:30 p.m. on May 8 in the State Capitol Room 402, Sacramento. An audio livestream is available here.
Steven T. Jones is a longtime California journalist and cyclist who has been working with the California Bicycle Coalition to promote AB 1103.
