When I first read the post, I thought that the truck driver had failed to yield to the group of cyclists and that Bill Strickland's method of "Confronting The Cars" was incredibly noble. I happened back to the blog post today and it suddenly sunk in that it was the group of cyclists who had blown through a stop sign which lead up to the confrontation. Confrontation with motorists is something that many cyclists deal with on a regular basis. It's entirely different when someone confronts you for doing something wrong or illegal than if you are getting harassed for 'just riding along'.
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When you ride don't give motorists additional reasons to harass you and/or other cyclists; instead obey traffic laws.
My comment to Bill Strickland:
I also agree with the above comments about running stop signs. Although the circumstances surrounding the confrontation with the truck and its driver aren't entirely clear (the post doesn't come out and say "we ran a stop sign"), I have posted a link to a map (Emmaus, Pa) where it may have happened. If this is the correct location, it was a 4-way stop as indicated by the white bars on the pavement.
Might the truck have had its hazard flashers on and not its right turn signal??
I applaud that you apologized to the truck driver after what happened, but would like to point out that he wasn't a "motorist cuts you off, screams, flies the finger or throws something". Unprovoked harassment of cyclists by motorists (or the other way around for that matter) does no one any good, but this wasn't exactly the situation.
I too need to make it my resolution to stop at all stop signs and traffic lights; but, I would expect to be confronted by a motorist if I disregarded a traffic law and in the process almost caused an accident.
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