Category: Uncategorized

Mission: To promote driving less so all may live more.

My ride in a driverless taxi confirmed my thought that machines are safer than human drivers. I had arrived in San Francisco to visit a friend in December, 2024. While walking through a neighborhood, I was encouraged when a driverless taxi stopped at a crosswalk (“Hallelujah!”).

A couple of days later, I hailed a ride using the “Waymo” app and enjoyed the ride (whose video is embedded below).

Waymo was spun off from Google and has made deals with Lyft and Über to work in partnership. The cars, modified Jaguars, are very expensive and currently operate in a couple of cities in California and in Phoenix, AZ. China and Singapore are also among the first countries to develop and use driverless taxis. Tesla plans to have two models available in 2027.

For anyone concerned about pedestrian and bicycle safety, these are a big step forward. Removing the human element greatly increases the precision of the driving. The taxi will drive at the speed limit or under, monitor sidewalks and crossings for pedestrians, (usually) avoid bicycles, and never engage in road rage.

Mission: To promote driving less so all may live more.

May, 2024, Gary Robinson, a seasoned bicyclist, was hit from behind by a Ford F-250. Gary was thrown 60 feet and yet survived without a broken bone. He was rushed to the hospital with bruises, blood loss, and road rash.

All that was bad, but soon Gary learned he was being defamed by the driver of the truck on social media. That hurt worse than the physical pain of the accident. Worse, still, was the vitriol from many of those who commented on the post. This distress was compounded when Gary read several comments to an unrelated Douglas County sheriff’s Facebook post on bicyclists. The reaction of the driver reminds me of an earlier post in which the man was hit by a motorcycle in Spain. After the man recovered from a traumatic brain injury he was unsuccessfully sued by the motorcyclist for damages to the motorcycle!

By some kind of grace, however, Gary turned this bad mojo around. Already, Gary was fully invested in the bicycling community, having founded the comprehensive web site Colorado Avid Cyclist in 2022. This site shows the depth of his passion for riding, replete with useful articles on many topics, including buying used bikes, the best bike locks, and making great meals.

Situated as he was and finding himself an object of hate in an accident that could easily have killed him, Gary reached out to the sheriff’s office in Douglas County, Colorado. He initiated a partnership with the sheriff’s office to educate both drivers and bicyclists ways to respect and not hate each other. The partnership is called Colorado Avid Cyclist Community Outreach Program. On that web page are three videos that report on both the accident and the partnership.

Gary refuses to allow hatred to poison his world and is glad that his purpose in life has been expanded to promoting not just bodily safety but social safety among the biking and driving communities.

The “versus” in the title of this article, then, is not fully accurate. Instead of focusing on revenge or self-vindication, Gary chose and chooses to negotiate the tricky and sometimes brutal interface between automobiles and people. Yay!

Here’s on of the videos mentioned above:

Mission: To promote driving less so all may live more.

The safety of Planes, Trains, and Buses is stunning, relative to the risks of dying by Car.

The graph on this page was referenced in a footnote in my previous post. It deserves a post of its own. The graph is displayed below, but the original is from the National Safety Council (https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/home-and-community/safety-topics/deaths-by-transportation-mode/):