Man says bus operator cut him off while riding in Vancouver Ave bike lane

I’m always weary of Tri-Met drivers in this spot. I wonder if they could build a transit island to avoid the criss-crossing.

This seems so trivial..slow news day? This was a formal complaint? Everyday traffic for bike lanes. We are not riding separated lanes, the video does not look that close to me. Bus driver cut it close but this is just whiny….unless that women was fast walking the video was also sped up… embarrassing for Jason..

Except the bus signals before even moving over which suggests to me that they didn’t see Jason. Since he was out of view of the mirror and too far back when the driver has to look over. Never assume anyone sees you. There is a lot more going on in the road than just you. Sounds like an adult temper tantrum to me.

.
I’ve added another video below. Trimet should at least give you an ID and system to look up prior infractions.

I have so many bus driver deadly moves on camera. Here is one. The bus leaves a parked spot at high speed and should then move into the BUS ONLY LANE, but he sweeps out to run me down. In the HD video I can clearly see the bus driver in their mirror the whole time and they can see me. These are repeat offender bus drivers. Trimet does not let you know the name or ID number.

https://youtu.be/4r1fGWeASfE

Video URL above. Pardon the profanity in my near death.

What is the significance of the flickering taillights on the bus? Is it just an artifact of the cameras shutter speed?

I may be wrong but it appears the cyclist is on an e-bike riding preeeeeettty fast. I’m wondering if maybe the Trimet drive miscalculated the speed the bike was traveling relative to a non e-bike. If this is correct, perhaps the e-bike rider needs to be aware that others may not immediately recognize the speed they’re traveling?

Never assume any driver sees you and never assume which way they will go. Especially large vehicles like trucks in which the driver has more blind spots and it is harder to see if anyone is next to them, especially bicycles. I try to stay out of their way especially when they are moving.

Why would you try passing a bus ON THE RIGHT when it is clearly headed for a bus stop? The bus stop is visible just seconds into this video. Then actually file a complaint about your own poor decision as a rider? Then make a public show of it? Everything about this is incomprehensible to me.

When you all get done blaming the victims, can we talk about how this is clearly a design failure? Traffic engineer could not be reached for comment?

It would be very helpful to put a huge pink “B” in a circle in front of bus stops so they are more visible to people biking.

Seems like a design failure. The previous island prevents the bus from merging, and then they have the bus stop ALL the way to the right (looks like a pullout as well). The bus lane should be moved behind the bus stop.

Can someone re-post the video at the correct frame rate? The current version makes it difficult to judge how quickly the events are actually occurring. (I’m not accusing the original poster of deliberately speeding it up – sometimes cheap gopro/action-cam knock offs don’t encode things properly.)

This is news? Seeing Tri-Met buses/drivers is like living out the Steven King movie “Maximum Overdrive.” It’s lame, but unfortunately that’s been my experience biking in Portland since the mid 90s. I just get away from them ASAP. If I can.

My prediction: they will never tell the cyclist what disciplinary action, if any, the operator was subject to.

The flashing red stop lights are visible 4-5 seconds into the video. If he was looking ahead, rather than trying to race a bus up the short hill, he would have already stopped pedaling in anticipation of slowing/stopping for the flashing red lights. Considering the speed he was still going even after slowing for the bus, this was not part of the plan. Also, with how wide the bike lane swings to the right of the traffic lane for the crossing island, I doubt he was even in the side mirror of the bus until the driver started to make the merge (granted late on signaling). File under: “Play stupid games, win stupid prizes”.

You can first see the signal (over the wheel well behind the front door) at the 9 second mark prior to changing lanes. I suspect the cyclist is invisible to the bus at that point, since they are separated by the road furniture. Tough spot for the bus driver, since they need to swing right to make the stop. It was good for the cyclist to be defensive, but I don’t know that there’s anything egregious here.

It looks to me like the bike is passing the bus as they approach the stop but instead of slowing down to let the cyclist complete the pass, the driver sees them and speeds up and to cut them off. It’s nice that people want to give the paid driver the benefit of the doubt but I hold professional drivers to a higher standard. If you haven’t dealt with an aggressive Trimet driver consider yourself lucky.

Why pick a beef with Shaq? He’s bigger than you and smarter than you.

Sit up and show the bus driver a little class. Are you delivering a fresh kidney or what? Sheesh. The 5th amendment says you don’t have to publish this stuff.