You are herePolice Chief Acevedo responds to the issue at hand, and the bigger mess that is the mass.
Police Chief Acevedo responds to the issue at hand, and the bigger mess that is the mass.
About 3 hours ago I received an email from none other than Austin's own Chief Art Acevedo. He addressed the arrest and police behavior, promising to look into it fully, critically, and to take corrective action if needed. He also had a few things to say about Critical Mass. Rather than paraphrase his statements, I figured I'd just show y'all the email:
Jason,
We would be interested in obtaining all available information in order for us to critically evaluate the incident and take appropriate corrective action if needed.
I have to be frank however about critical mass rides. These rides do very little to garner public support for the riding community, and I believe that they tend to foster ill will with the none cycling community. The last thing people want to see is cyclist or motorist disobeying the rules of the road.
We are committed to treating all people with respect and dignity and to operating within constitutional requirements, and look forward to reviewing the actions of our personnel. Although I can't assure you of a specific outcome, I can assure you we are committed to gathering the facts and to critically reviewing the facts in this and all cases.
Thanks for bringing your concerns to our attention.
Regards,
Art Acevedo
I've gotta admit, Acevedo is good. He says all the right things, but in the vein of typical upper level management, stays ambiguous and noncommittal, beyond fact gathering and internal (peer) review. I work in the corporate world and know how it all works, so I'm not faulting him for this, just commenting on his style. His views on Critical Mass are important because this is the opinion from the TOP of the APD food chain, and go beyond the views of the cop on the street in affecting and molding departmental policy. I'm not saying we HAVE to change how we ride, but the word these days seems to be "progressive", maybe it's time we think about how we roll and how we interact with the traffic landscape around us. If we get on Acevedo's bad side, we're in for a world of hurt. Even if we win in the courts, who wants to see dozens of cyclists go to jail for red lights infractions? Good food for thought, and I appreciate his candor on the subject.
I figured it wouldn't be too big a faux pas to post this message in its' entirety, as besides the usual cycling suspects like Leslie Luciano and myself, this message was cc:d to city manager Marc Ott (and staff), police monitor Clif Brown (and staff), councilman Chris Riley (and staff), and for completness' sake, ALL of the APD chiefs. I mean geez, who hasn't seen it at this point, but talk about bending ALL the right ears!
And now this all get interesting, eh? I cannot even begin to guess what the future will bring, but it looks like there are a lot of influential people joining the conversation. I'll be sure to keep y'all updated as I hear more.
Thanks again, Jay and Rob. Without you two a fellow cyclist would be spending another night on a cold, hard bed that isn't his. This should buy you cats at least a few months of flat-free good bike karma.
Does anyone have any ideas for how to keep the ride together without corking? I don't forsee APD stopping arrests on this, particularly downtown. Not that the two arrested this time were doing it....but just to pose the question.
It doesn't need to happen. Especially if the ride slows down a bit so there aren't so many stragglers at the end of the ride -- they're the ones that really benefited from corking anyways.
I think it would be interesting to see how it would all work out if we rode to the letter of the law- two abreast, stopping at all lights, etc. Seems like it would be a bigger hassle for traffic if we were filling, say three blocks of the right lane on Congress, all stopped at reds than when we try to get everybody through. Plus, if we played the car game of getting "caught" in the middle of an intersection because of a red light, with nowhere to go... cars "cork" intersections like this all the time, and I've never seen any of them go to jail or even have to talk to a cop because of that infraction. I regularly see signs all over town directing traffic to not block that intesection if you're stopped at that red light, with some SOMV parked in the middle because they lacked the understanding... Just sayin', if we want to be treated like traffic, maybe we oughtta follow motorists' example and stop when it's red, whether it's better for the overall flow or not...
Am I crazy?
... you can only ride two abreast if you're don't `impede the normal and reasonable flow of traffic on the roadway.' Basically that means that if there's somebody behind you, it's single file. (Here's the law.)
So, 300 cyclists, single file, an average of eight feet per bicycle? That's a string of cyclists about half a mile long. Critical String?
Ultimately, obeying the letter of the law isn't likely to be practical, because the law discriminates against cyclists. Though we could come a lot closer -- the people in front stop at yellow and red lights, always. People in the middle of the pack stop when the light turns red in front of them. The mass isn't likely to stick to one lane, but make sure that at least one lane is always left open if there's at least two lanes available. The Thursday ride has been doing it, CM could do it too, if people agreed.
As for getting caught in an intersection, that doesn't really happen to bikes, because bikes can squeeze through much smaller gaps than cars can.
We seem to be having the most trouble downtown, especially congress. That's where I was thinking... Plus, like seven block's worth of two abreast might look pretty sweet!