Thread started by mattspeed at 02.11.09 - 3:20 pm

City panel backs protection from opening of car doors

Kristin Czubkowski — 2/11/2009 7:15 am

A proposed ordinance that would protect not only bikers, but also pedestrians and drivers, from carelessly opened car doors received an endorsement from the city's safety board Tuesday night.

The Public Safety Review Board voted unanimously to recommend the ordinance for approval by the City Council. It will be taken up by one more committee -- the city's Pedestrian-Bicycle-Motor Vehicle Commission -- before it goes to the council for final approval.

Ald. Robbie Webber, a sponsor of the ordinance, stressed that the ordinance protects any users of the road from being hit by a car door. The ordinance calls for a $100 ticket for a motorist opening a vehicle's door unsafely or interfering with traffic and a $50 ticket for leaving a car door open longer than necessary.

"It's really just a question of common sense," she said. "People thought it was on the books already."

There is currently an effort at the state level to pass a similar law, which would likely supersede a local ordinance, but Webber said she was encouraged by state Rep. Sondy Pope-Roberts, D-Middleton, to pass a local ordinance in the meantime. Many other states have similar laws on the books, with Ald. Eli Judge calling the car door lesson a "staple" of Illinois driver's education.

Capt. Richard Bach said Tuesday the Madison Police Department is "supportive of any measures" to keep streets safer, but the proactive enforcement of the ordinance will likely be difficult, and the ordinance will more likely be used as a tool in crash investigations.

Committee member Michael Scott said even that use would make the ordinance "more than symbolic" by shifting how insurance companies see these kinds of crashes and how fault is determined.

Members of the biking community who attended the meeting stressed the need for public education beyond citations in getting the word out to motorists to begin exercising more caution with car doors.

"If you get doored, it's not going to help you to have the law on the books," said Madison resident John Jacobs.

There have been incidents of crashes between car doors and bicyclists resulting in fatalities, particularly when bicyclists are pushed into traffic by the impact.

The ordinance was written after an incident last summer when a bicyclist who was hit by a car door opening and suffered fractured vertebrae was ticketed for biking too close to a parked car. State law currently requires that bicyclists remain at least three feet away from parked cars, but Webber said the state law is hard to adhere to due to insufficient bike lanes and narrow roads that bring bicyclists too close to cars.

"A lot of bicyclists have been bullied into riding as close to cars as they can, and that's even more true in big cities," she added.

The state law will likely be repealed in the Legislature this year because it does not pertain to any other users of the road, she added.

Also at Tuesday's meeting, the board decided to wait an additional month on another ordinance sponsored by Webber. The ordinance would eliminate alternate side parking in Madison except during snow emergencies. Madison residents who park on the street are currently required to move their vehicles every day between Nov. 15 and March 15, with odd or even dates matching the side of the street with odd or even addresses.

Webber said she introduced the ordinance after the city increased parking fines between 200 and 300 percent during snow emergencies, from $20 or $30 up to $60 per violation. Removing alternate side parking during non-snow emergencies would allow residents to maintain the current 48-hour rule and give them a break from potential parking fines when the weather is clear.

"People have frequently said to me, 'Why am I moving my car when it hasn't snowed in three weeks and it has been drizzling?'" she said. "This is wasteful environmentally, it's wasteful of gas, and it's just plain silly."

Streets department staff, who were unable to attend Tuesday's meeting, have cited the importance of training people to use alternate side parking rules as one reason to keep the ordinance as well as the source of revenue the tickets provide the city. The city currently makes about $400,000 per year on alternate side parking fines during non-snow emergencies.

Bach said police were concerned about eliminating the ordinance for its impact on public safety and the current city routine for checking winter parking. He pointed out that snow emergencies only come into effect with more than three inches of snow, and eliminating alternate side parking could result in a buildup of snow that the Streets Division would not be able to plow effectively.

"Our concern is that if we don't have the alternate side parking where (the Streets Division) can routinely plow the streets, the streets will begin to narrow," he said. "The issue there is to the keep the streets clear enough to get fire trucks and emergency vehicles" through them.

The city also currently hires 11 hourly employees each winter to administer the alternate side parking fines, and those employees also help during snow emergencies by doing preparation work for towing cars.

Without the ordinance, those employees would likely not be hired, and the Parking Utility would need to pay its full-time workers significant overtime to do the work. Even with overtime, lower staffing may require snow emergencies extended past the day or two they currently operate and may take away from regular parking enforcement during snow emergencies, parking officer Stephanie Niesen said.

Webber said that keeping the ordinance for the revenue it provides would be poor public policy and that more public education and increasing snow emergency parking fines even further would provide better compliance than "training" people to use the rules for four months each year.

"When you need to plow, fine people as much as you need," she said.

Board members delayed the vote one month to ensure that the Streets Division had a representative there and requested more information from both sides of the debate regarding what other major cities that see regular snow do to ensure cleared streets.

"I just don't feel like we have quite enough information, and I'd hate to turn this into a simple thumbs up or thumbs down on what's going to be a very important issue," board member Michael Scott said.

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the posted article was 5 paragraphs too long.



_iJunes
02.11.09 - 3:25 pm

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Is this from Wisconsin?

The city is Madison...I assume thats in wisconsin.






stillline
02.11.09 - 3:27 pm

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yeah Wisconsin, forgot to mention that.



mattspeed
02.11.09 - 3:34 pm

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