Earlier this evening, around 6:15pm, my fiancé and I decided to ride our bicycles to Miami Beach from Brickell. While riding on north on NE 1st Ave we were nearly sided swiped by two cars within a 30 second period. The first car got away. The second driver wasn’t so lucky. I caught up with him and we exchanged a few words. I told him he almost ran me off the road. He literally came within a foot of hitting me. He proceeded to tell me that I had no idea about what I was talking about because he was a lawyer. My fiancé informed him about the three foot law, and his response was to say that we should be riding on the sidewalk. When my fiancé countered that statement with the fact that riding a bicycle on the sidewalk was in fact illegal he decided to roll up his window and speed off. All the while I proceeded to take a photograph of his SUV and write down his tag number down.
He was driving a white BMW X6. I believe the tag number is D59ZE on a Miami Dolphins license plate. My fiancé and I would make two good witnesses.
Boy, it sure would be nice if us bicyclists could do something about this.
TAG # D59ZE
16 Responses to Transit Miami Driver Wall of Shame
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Again, someone posing as a lawyer in Dade County. Whether it’s unlawful or not . THERE IS A HUMAN LIFE ON THE ROAD WITH YOU> RESPECT THEM!
I’ve often wondered about starting to tweet license tags of cars I see flagrantly breaking the law, to let both the general public and @MiamiDadeCounty know.
!!!
Good grief…
We need proof if he is a lawyer or not. That is not acceptable.
Felipe, do you have a copy of the statute (Florida Bicycle Law Enforcement Guide) and Florida Bicycle Street Smarts from Florida Bicycle Association?
http://www.floridabicycle.org/rules/bikelaw.html
I’m sorry to read what happened.
there should be a bicycle shit list keeping track of bad drivers!
Prem, there’s such a thing… It’s just not used.
http://miami.mybikelane.com/
As to “Bike path, what bike path,” does it get very annoying for pedestrians not being able to cross the street because of cars that block the crosswalk?
I can’t stand drivers that do that in Orlando. My opinion is, they just don’t care for pedestrians. They think pedestrians don’t exist in sidewalks so they just block the crosswalk!
I’m visually impaired, though.
You were very brave to do that, but I really recommend you do not put yourself in this situation again. You _never_ know who you are dealign with, It may be a crazy nutjob with a gun. It’s not worth it. Please stay safe out there and just ignore the idiots.
RG,
it’s a tough call. I think gun carrying nut-jobs are far outnumbered by your run of the mill ass hole. And although the ass hole may not care to hear my side of an argument, if he’s going to put my life in danger, I owe it to myself and all other cyclists to attempt informing him about what’s going on.
I have a right to the road, a whole lane even, if I need, and if he’s going to honk distractingly behind me or pull up next to me and shout he’s contributing to a dangerous street. It’s perhaps an unfortunate reality that my presence, whereas I once did not bike, creates a net increase in “dangerousness” on the road, but that’s not because I’m a bad rider, but because many people are BAD drivers.
Or mediocre drivers. Or nervous drivers. Or drunk ; distracted; tired; sleepy; rushed; hungry and generally just run of the mill drivers.
It has been my experience after many years of biking and riding a small scooter in the US that people here are the most aggressive and violent towards smaller vehicles of any other country I have biked/scootered in. People have intimidated me, thrown beer cans at me, cut me off deliberately, and once even opened a car door at me while I was approaching (on prupose). All of this has taught me that:
1. Driver here are either assholes or ignorant
2. I cannot fix that.
3. They are bigger than me and I will get hurt no matter how upset I get
So – while Americans slowly get used to the fact that they need to share the road – I stay out of trouble, and let them speed off. You must remain stoic on the road, otherwise you will get upset every 5 minutes or so of driving on the roads of Miami. You will _not_ educate anyone. You’re just putting your own life in danger.
One of our readers has provided Transit Miami with the name of the attorney that nearly ran me over. Ironically, his law firm specializes in Criminal, Traffic & DUI law. It’s sad to see that a traffic and DUI attorney is not aware that bicycles legally have the right to be on the road and not the sidewalk as he suggested we ride.
Perhaps you can report it to the bar. http://www.floridabar.org/DIVCOM/PI/WebNodes.nsf/Nodes/2A18E429E69155BF85256FEF005FDA9C
Also, it is not illegal except in certain cases by ordinance to not ride on sidewalk. When you ride on sidewalk you are supposed to cross the street like a pedestrian.
Perhaps you can report it to the bar. http://www.floridabar.org/DIVCOM/PI/WebNodes.nsf/Nodes/2A18E429E69155BF85256FEF005FDA9C
Also, it is not illegal except in certain cases by ordinance to not ride on sidewalk. When you ride on sidewalk you are supposed to cross the street like a pedestrian. It is also generally more dangerous to ride on the sidewalk.
Felipe,
Be safe out there, and I second what RG was saying – you never know who you are dealing with. I nearly had my face beaten in by a tow-truck redneck on Las Olas back in December. Dude cut me off twice and got out of his vehicle to confront me on the sidewalk (his truck had completely cut me off at this point, so I had no other choice).
Perhaps Transit Miami can help resuscitate http://miami.mybikelane.com/
If enough people start to use it, perhaps we can expand the dialogue on bicycle safety awareness for more people in South Florida.
The fact that this idiot thought he was right is most likely jackassery, but there is the possibility that he is ignorant of the law (lawyers can be ignorant fools too). Increased dialogue certainly cannot hurt.
Like man others, I am sick and tired of dealing with the awful drivers in Miami. Many are either (or a combination of) reckless, braindead dumb, overly macho, too busy ‘txting’ or even have no regard for human life.
I have actually started a Facebook page entitled “Stop Reckless, Drunk & Dangerous Driving in Miami”:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?v=app_2373072738&gid=269269848951#/group.php?gid=269269848951&ref=share
Feel free to contribute, if you wish. I would actually like some input so that I could provide names & addresses of city, state & county officials to complain to. Also, I am going to try to post pictures (license plates) of any cars I see driving in a reckless manner, that is of course if I manage to capture them on camera.
Anyway, this problem has really got out of hand. Driving on the Palmetto is like driving on a NASCAR circuit. No one is safe here, whether you’re a pedestrian, cyclist or motorist. What happened to Mr. Le Canne could have happened to anyone who just happened to be in the path of one of the many asshole drivers here.
What we really need are far tougher laws to protect us all from these imbeciles. Caught DUI once = automatic 1 year ban & community service. Caught twice = ban for life & jail. Reckless driving should also be punished accordingly. Carlos Bertonatti had actually racked up over 40 CITATIONS before he killed Mr. Le Canne. WHY was this allowed to happen?
Сегодня я специально зарегистрировался на форуме, чтобы поучаствовать в обсуждении этого вопроса.
Please type in English. I don’t read Russia.