Two Fails Cancel Each Other Out

Hmm, I feel like the pedestrian is more in the right than the bike rider. Granted, the pedestrian was jaywalking but there are clear times when jaywalking is perfectly safe. No cars coming, middle of the night, etc. Still wrong but you know how it is. Why go all the way to the cross walk when there aren't any cars coming right now? Can't really think of a great reason to be biking the wrong way down the street.

I'm not really sure jaywalking cancels out riding the wrong way down the street,,, consciously no less. I mean... wow, you do that where I live and some cars might hit you out of pure spite. We're a very bike friendly town, but not always stupid friendly, and there's enough pent up bike anger in drivers towards bikers out there that it makes this almost an invitation. The pedestrian is certainly less deserving of a darwin award at least. Perhaps partial mitigation of blame? :)

People jaywalk all the time. That bicycle rider was a retard going the wrong way.

Yeah. It doesn't cancel out. The cyclist was being an idiot and a jerk. If he's going to play messenger and salmon up the street, he at least needs to have the reflexes to avoid a pedestrian.

Instead, he has a full 3 seconds to maneuver around the guy (which is way easier to do on a bike, than in a car). But nope, he hits him, and tries to play it off as a no-fault situation.

Jaywalking was a much lesser offense. And frankly, the jaywalker, who was looking for traffic coming in the other direction, didn't steal someone else's right-of-way (because you don't have right-of-way when you're going the wrong direction).

Oh but it DOES cancel out :) Both admitted they were at some kind of fault and went their separate ways. I'm glad they didn't try to have a discussion about who was more wrong in the middle of the street.

zeytoun, I hate to be the time pedant, but you're way off. I counted 1.5 seconds at most from the time the guy stepped into the street til impact, which was preceded by a vocal alarm by the cyclist as soon as he noticed him.

Jaywalking? Is it illegal to cross the road in America? Jeez, so much for the cradle of freedom.

Since they both sound like Americans the Bike is clearly in the wrong on many counts.
1. The bike is supposed to follow the same rules of the road as automobiles. Hes going the wrong way on a one way street. A cop could give him a ticket far it. They could give a ticket to the walker too but there isn't a judge on the bench that would enforce the jay walking ticket. They would enforce the driving the wrong way on a one way street to the bike rider. Not because he was in the wrong but because he would be causing traffic problems.
2. Believe it or not. Courts consider Pedestrians as having the right of way weather they are using a marked cross walk or not.
The pedestrian may be dead if he were hit by a car but when someone sued the driver far wrongful death of the pedestrian. The car driver would in most cases lose the civil case and also be put up for manslaughter charges. Same could have happened if the pedestrian was hurt by the idiot riding the bike.

Only thing worse would have been if the idiot on the bike would have been riding on the sidewalk and hit the walker.

wel the ped, should have looked both ways, no matter what the sign says. If im to belive TV high speed chases happen all the time an they dont mind one way signs :)

I can't wait for the decade of cyclist backslash. A lot of them need to behave like people who shares the road, not who owns the road or who abuses legal loophole for their needs.