©Toronto | Biking in Kensington Market
16 years ago ago at Kensington Market, Toronto, Ontario, Canada by ardenstreet.
(Photo: ardenstreet

The Star last week counted cyclists at stop signs and found: " We watched 159 cyclists approach a busy intersection. Only 21 came to a full stop." Despite making motorists crazy and being illegal some make a counter-argument for the rolling stop, also called the Idaho Stop:

The rolling stop – or, in some cycling circles, the Idaho Stop – is as popular as it is illegal, and there are those who will tell you it's also perfectly safe. Bambrick, among other cycling supporters and bloggers, is advocating its legalization, citing common sense and a compelling precedent.

Cyclists in Idaho have been legally permitted to treat stop signs as yield signs since 1982. And though the Idaho law was brought in by legislators to help relieve the pressure on a crowded traffic-court system, cycling-savvy proponents of its further spread argue it would make cycling more efficient, more appealing and ultimately more popular. In places bent on curbing car usage, it's a compelling argument.

There was a flurry of letters supporting and opposing the Idaho Stop. One argued "zero tolerance" and that bicycles are vehicles under the Highway Traffic Act:

In this, the police should set an example and prosecute more often. The "zero tolerance" policy has been proven to work exceptionally well in the few places it has been pursued rigorously.

Joe LaFortune (commenter on this forum), argued that rolling stops by cyclists are no big danger compared to motorists doing the same. Cyclists need to maintain momentum yet are relegated to quieter residential streets with an abundance of stop signs.

While the offence may be identical for both vehicle users on paper, it really is not the same thing. Cyclists in Toronto tend to use one-way residential streets for the bulk of their riding, avoiding main roads whenever possible. Traffic is simply too heavy and too fast on major arterials and motorists regularly fail to afford cyclists the space they are legally entitled to, making it unsafe except for experienced cyclists.

Residential streets, the preferred routes for many if not most cyclists, feature stop signs at every cross street for the most part, but there is usually little or no cross traffic. A cyclist rolling through a quiet intersection is capable of stopping within a meter of applying brakes as the average bike is only travelling at about 15 km/h and weighs less than 10 kilograms.

Another argued that full stops for cyclists slows traffic:

The Idaho Stop is indeed interesting and, for many, safer. De-cleating, de-clipping and coming to a full stop means that a cyclist ends up rolling through an intersection at a much slower speed, which slows traffic and offers less safety to the cyclist. I hope you will run the same study on motor vehicles.

When cycling, I nearly always try to go through an intersection next to a car (safer) and the number that come to a full stop is close to zero. More and more cars, in Ottawa at least, jump orange and red lights, roll (not to a stop) through stop signs and cut cyclists off on corners.

One commenter went out and did the work of the Toronto Star by counting motorists:

Inspired by the article, I went out to a four-way stop near my home and counted the number of automobiles that came to a full and complete stop over two hours. Result: of 72 cars, zero came to a full stop. So, by this reasoning, cyclists on average do a better job at stop signs than car drivers.

He concluded that "it is high time to replace all stop signs with yield signs and roundabouts at four-way stop intersections and stop this ridiculous and fruitless debate about who did or did not stop totally or maybe kept rolling a couple of inches, and focus on measures that actually boost safety."

Kathy Hall countered that Toronto is much bigger than Idaho, and where Idaho stops may work in Boise, they won't work here. Instead we should focus on education for cyclists:

The ideal would be that all cyclists using Toronto's streets take a course similar to Humber College's motorcycle training program. Many of the safety and defensive techniques taught to would-be motorcyclists in a course like this would make cyclists much more aware of the road and traffic conditions around them.

The problem seems to be that cyclists don't see themselves as being on a vehicle. If we can educate them, at the same time as educating drivers to be more aware of them, we might see a decline in cyclist/car accidents.