Six days after a friend of hers was struck and killed by a mail truck while riding his bike on West 32nd Avenue near Golden, Denver bicyclist Shelby Katz was nearly run off the road by someone driving a lawn-maintenance truck.
Katz believes the driver deliberately tried to frighten her and says motorists are getting “meaner and meaner” when confronted by cyclists.
“They honk at you, they think it’s funny if they swerve into you — not intending to hit you, but intending to scare you,” Katz said. “They’re spitting on you, they’re yelling at you, they’re throwing things at you. I had a boyfriend who got a Big Mac thrown on him. That is just disgusting, it’s horrible and rude, and it’s not right.”
Cyclists aren’t entirely without recourse, though.
Like motorists, cyclists are entitled to report aggressive drivers to the Colorado State Patrol by calling *CSP on their cellphones. Troopers on patrol or local police are alerted, and while chasing down the offending vehicle often isn’t possible or practical, there is another benefit of the program.
The State Patrol enters complaints from *CSP calls into a database. After three complaints, the registered owner of the vehicle gets a letter from the state patrol. After five incidents, a trooper will personally contact the registered owner.
“That’s been a tremendous success,” said Dan Grunig, executive director of Bicycle Colorado. “We encourage people to use this, because this person’s going to make a mistake down the road and we want to make sure they don’t get a lot of ‘get out of jail free’ cards.”
The State Patrol recorded 68,634 calls reporting aggressive drivers in 2007.
“Unfortunately, a lot of times they end up getting arrested or hurting themselves or someone else,” said Trooper Ryan Sullivan, a public information officer for the State Patrol. “That’s why it’s so important for us to get out there and try to curb their driving behavior before it gets to that.”
To take a complaint, the state patrol needs:
• The location of the incident.
• The license plate number and description of the vehicle in question.
• The direction of travel and actions of the driver.
• The complainant’s name and phone number (you may remain anonymous).
