“The city of Chicago is openly proclaiming itself as a bike-friendly city. Is that an indication of the city’s intent?” Justice Liz Rochford asked a lawyer for the city.
“No, your honor,” replied Stephen Collins, Chicago’s assistant corporation counsel.
Any lie necessary to avoid reasonable infrastructure. Especially with bicycles banned on the sidewalk.
Stop stealing all the taxpayer money, and provide the bare fucking minimums.
Alave filed suit later that year, arguing that the city meant for bicycles to be rented and operated in the area and city officials therefore had the duty to exercise reasonable care for intended road users, as required by state law.
The city isn’t trying to avoid building reasonable infrastructure, here, they’re trying to avoid liability for cyclists hitting potholes.
Their argument seems to be that unless a road is included on the official bike plan, it shouldn’t count as one intended for biking on for the purpose of legal liability, regardless of if there’s a nearby city-operated bike rental.
Honestly, unless the ruling were that “the city is liable for bike injuries anywhere in it”, holding the city liable here might produce perverse incentives to make bike infrastructure worse.
Depressing article. Freshly reinforced legal deterrent for anyone who might suggest that bicyclists are actually intended to use the roads. Can’t say that or you might be liable.
Lived in Chicago. The drivers there are fucking savages.
Uber driver side swiped me today on Rush St during my ride home from work.
What a shithole.
Chicagoan here: ride around in the Loop everyday. This is shitty to see and i can understand the City needing to defend itself against people crashing into pot holes for a paycheck.
Wish the language was different. This language disempowers the thousands of people who ride on Chicago streets.
Chicago needs to understand that they are defending against the very things that could help them thrive as a city. It really doesn’t take much to start looking like Detroit.
Of course when you have blatant liars representing your case in court and you’re selling off the rights to public parking to a bank and foreign financiers, I guess you have a lot more to be concerned about than potholes.
