Maria L. La Ganga of the Los Angeles Times has the story: Link Previously on Neatorama: Are Urban Bicyclists Snobs?The bicyclist was zipping south on Castro Street at the end of his twice-weekly ride to the Marin Headlands, blowing through red lights and stop signs.
But the Market Street crosswalk was filled with pedestrians, and Chris Bucchere, 36, allegedly was riding too fast to stop. So he aimed for the least populated spot and plowed on through.
"In a nutshell, blammo," a blogger purporting to be Bucchere wrote that March day. The man he hit, Sutchi Hui, 71, died four days later. Bucchere was charged Thursday with felony vehicular manslaughter and is scheduled to be arraigned next week.
Post-crash commentary, angry and profane, didn't just call for Bucchere's head, although there was plenty of condemnation for him and the rest of the Lycra-and-toe-clips set. Instead, the conversation became a fight about who owns public space — a scarce resource in the second-most dense city in America, where bike use is soaring and many motorists decry a war on cars.
There
are many more pedestrian fatalities involving cars, but the recent death
caused by an allegedly negligent bicyclist who ran a red light and plowed
into pedestrians crossing the street in San Francisco and actually killing
one man raised heat rhetoric over the behaviors of some cyclists and the
question of who owns public space:
Stupid people are a menace to society, in their many, many forms. Leave the majority of the people, bicyclists and otherwise, who are actually trying to be responsible out of it.
Allegedly?
Yes, allegedly. It's for a court of law to determine with certainty if he was negligent.