Thread: Lycra lunatic takes womans keys

I think we are missing the point. She was driving a KIA, mandatory upgrade time.
We will never know what happened, did she clip the cyclist, fail to indicate, fail to interprete his failure to indicate, or merely going too slow on a good fast bit, impedind his progress. Not that cyclists ever impede motorists,.
But ultimately theft is theft, and if tracked down, oopsno rego, he should be charged

VLAD laws for the cyclists might be a start. Seems to have reduced the bikie presence , so why wouldn't it work in reducing bicycles?
Emphasis on the sarcasm.

Originally Posted by bee utey

What about the 52%?

Collisions with cars, trucks, trains, trams, pedestrians and other cyclists.

Cyclist: (leaning in through car window and fiddling with keys) "is there a, ah, button that you have to press or something with these keys?"
Driver: "You have to push in and then turn."
Cyclist: "Ah, that's it." (removes keys and tosses them down embankment)

Recently in Victoria we have had TV ads instructing motorists they must keep at least a 1 metre between them an the cyclists, and even more when traveling over 60kph.. All well said and done , then you pull up at a set of traffic lights you are stopped , you are in the left lane. Then a cyclists comes along and stops at the lights. You find he /she is now less than a meter from you. Isn't the cyclist putting themselves in danger? Usually as the lights are about to change impatient cyclists start to pedal and pedal front of the car, the car then has to wait before they can either mover off or overtake the cyclist safely. A car can accelerate faster than a bike.
I've had situations when stopped at the traffic lights and a cyclists with all the gear, and has bike shoes and feet in his pedal stirrups to no lower their leg to support their bike, but lean on my vehicles to prop themselves up. This has happen on numerous occasions. Even seen the holding onto rear of trams and buses.

Shouldn't there be more education for cyclists that they need to be more careful and responsible also?

Remember, there are always 3 sides to the story: each of the aggrieved parties versions & the truth. In journalism, never let the truth stand in the way of a good story.
'Good men' are probably arguing as a result of the bad journalism.
I find it's better to go & fix the landy while waiting for the truth, that way the landy is always fixed as the truth never comes out.

Originally Posted by AndyG

But ultimately theft is theft, and if tracked down, oopsno rego, he should be charged

But was it actually theft? Yes, he took the keys but he did not remain in possession of them, presumably did not damage them, she witnessed where he then put them and she was free to retrieve them herself. And if it is considered theft, then it can only be for the value of the keys but wait... they were recovered. This is a fascinating scenario as I would love to know how the law actually views this.

Without knowing all the details I wonder what offence was actually committed. I will make some assumptions here since that hasn't stopped everyone else...

Assuming he didn't touch or threaten the driver - there can't be any assault charge (again, we don't know the details of what went on leading up to the incident).
Intimidation is also a shaky call because the cyclist was on a bicycle, and the driver was in a car so there is possibly a counter claim from the cyclist - we'll never know.
He chucked the keys but didn't physically detain her, so there was no deprivation of liberty.
I don't know whether reaching into an open car window counts as trespass.
And like I said above, assuming the keys and car weren't damaged, there is no property damage offence.

In Victoria there is no specific road rage offence as road rage is generally used to cover a variety of other assault or property damage offences none of which seem to apply here.

Lets' stretch the bow a bit further...
If someone threatens you with a loaded gun and, by some means, you empty the bullets and throw them away, are you liable?

There has been at least one occasion when I have seriously considered throwing a motorist's keys away. A mate & I were cycling and were threatened by a driver who repeatedly tried to run us off the road for no reason that we could fathom. The guy was hurling abuse at us and then stoped in the middle of the road 150m up ahead and jumped out ready to fight us. I am sure he was on ice as there was no logical reason for him to go off the richter scale like he did. Neither of us responded and we slowed down as we approached him. He then seemed to think better of the situation (my mate is quite solid and the driver would have been an idiot to try it on) and got in his car and tore off. I would have had no hesitation in chucking that guy's keys over the embankment for two reasons.
1. He should not have been driving as he was clearly having issues.
2. I would not have wanted him to follow us.
Having said that I would have ridden directly to the cop shop to report it.

My point is this. The driver must have done something to elicit the response from the cyclist. What she did we will never know and she surely won't tell. The result is we now will only ever get her side of the story and that, coupled with the media's eagerness to whip the motoring public into a frenzy whenever cyclists are mentioned, means the cyclist is 100% wrong and has no justification for his actions - period. But I hope that people here are smarter than that and can see that this is a lopsided incomplete story and anyone calling for the cyclist to be lynched based on 50% of the information is just hopping on the media fuelled hate bandwagon.

Let's face it - if motorists & cyclists stopped hating on each other, what would the media have to report? I wonder if it was a pedestrian who threw the woman's keys away would it have even made it into the news?

Originally Posted by Roverlord off road spares

Recently in Victoria we have had TV ads instructing motorists they must keep at least a 1 metre between them an the cyclists, and even more when traveling over 60kph.. All well said and done , then you pull up at a set of traffic lights you are stopped , you are in the left lane. Then a cyclists comes along and stops at the lights. You find he /she is now less than a meter from you. Isn't the cyclist putting themselves in danger? Usually as the lights are about to change impatient cyclists start to pedal and pedal front of the car, the car then has to wait before they can either mover off or overtake the cyclist safely. A car can accelerate faster than a bike.
I've had situations when stopped at the traffic lights and a cyclists with all the gear, and has bike shoes and feet in his pedal stirrups to no lower their leg to support their bike, but lean on my vehicles to prop themselves up. This has happen on numerous occasions. Even seen the holding onto rear of trams and buses.

Shouldn't there be more education for cyclists that they need to be more careful and responsible also?

I think you'll find that below 30kph the 1m rule doesn't apply, for that exact reason. At least that's how it is in Qld. And it certainly doesn't apply when traffic is stationary. Besides that, it's a one way rule and bicycles can go as close as they like to vehicles because, well, they're only bicycles and generally not capable of causing death or injury to a motorist.