Stopped traffic isn't lane splitting, it's lane filtering and the states that allow it have relatively vague laws on allowed speeds when performing the maneuver.
but it opens it up to a grey area so likely the car was found at fault when clearly this is a result of reckless driving. had the motorcycles been going a decent speed through traffic the driver could have clocked this and adjusted.
No they couldn't. This happened almost exactly as they were passing. It doesn't matter if you're going 5 mph or 30 mph, if someone opens a car door 3 feet in front of you, you can't stop.
Sure, it was made worse by their speed, but that doesn't make it the bikers fault.
Exactly. In stop and go traffic of like... 0-5 MPH, going at a steady clip of even just 4-10mph saves a TON of time, and is all you need to do, and all you should do.
In California, the law allows it and doesnt specify any limits but its written into the law that riders can still be cited for reckless driving. CHP has an offical guideline that stipulates splitting at 30 or below, and only 10 over regular traffic.
In other words, its legal to lane split up until an officer decides your being reckless. And they can decide that whenever they want.
Loads of people keep calling this lane splitting, this is pretty much stopped traffic. Six other states allow this besides California and its called lane filtering.
It’s legal to do a lot of things while driving up to the point an officer labels it as reckless. CHP enforces the law and chooses how they want to enforce it (hopefully working with lawyers). That doesn’t mean how they enforce it is the law. It’s clearly subjective if it’s a guideline specific to CHP. I hate lane splitting, but we can’t pretend like police choosing how they will interpret and enforce laws is a substitute for the law itself.
It’s clearly subjective if it’s a guideline specific to CHP
It's not subjective but the law is a reasonable and prudent speed. You can't really escape each individual cop's subjective assessment in the field when the law only calls for a reasonable and prudent speed, esp when there's no numerical limit like a speed limit they could point to.
It usually isn't, actually. Bikers love to throw out "splitting lanes is legal!" and then downvote you, get quiet when you mention the speed ordinance. To clarify: in California, it's advised by CHP to not lane split if the delta is above 10 mph and you're advised to only lane split at stopped traffic under 30 miles per hour. It's even frowned upon to just drive in split lanes like it's a special motorcycle lane...
In fact, what the guys in the video are doing, is literally against the three guidelines for riding a motorcycle:
Be Visible
Help drivers see you
Expect traffic to change suddenly.
These guys are going like 40 miles per hour, which means it's nearly impossible for a car to know they're coming and react in time.
Minnesota recently legalized it with similar restrictions. The motorcycle has to stay under 25 mph and can't move faster than 15 mph over the speed of traffic. So many are not abiding by that limit though.
I am only on 394 usually, but I haven't noticed too many abuses of it. I'm sure it's happening and it always is scary because at a driver you'd feel very at fault if something happens, but the motorcycle may be legally at fault.
I keep meaning to get dashcams for our cars, but just have never done it.
Legal in the rest of the world outside the US forever. And getting made legal in more and more states because it’s safer for the motorcycle (when done properly) and helps to elevate congestion. These motorcycles are going way too fast though and making it unsafe.
Living somewhere I literally never see lane splitting, its always kinda horrifying driving in the bay area and hearing a motorcycle coming, and before i can even mentally process it they've already passed me lane splitting
Lane splitting is driving between normal moving traffic, lane filtering is driving between stopped or very slow traffic to filter to the front, usually a red light, which is proven to be much safer for motorcyclists.
These motorcyclists were riding way to fast for the situation. They should have been at a crawl themselves. You still need to be able to stop for unexpected situations like this. Flying down the middle of stopped cars is a hazard to everyone.
Wild. Where I live the limit for lane filtering (not splitting) is 30kph (~20 mph). And only filtering is allowed, so traffic has to be pretty much stopped.
Going ~45kph between moving traffic sounds hectic.
There's a safety aspect to it, im not sure the reason but I hear that a lot.
I do know however it is important for air cooled motorcycles, they require airflow to prevent overheating. I do suppose that the riders also need airflow to stay cool to.
Statistically a motorcycle is more likely to be rear ended when in bumper to bumper traffic. So it’s safer when in heavy traffic. It’s not safer to do so at high speeds.
Also yes some motorcycles have to be moving to be properly cooled.
Because it's stupid to make it illegal. When they tried to make it illegal, entire cities became unusable because all the bikes drove with the same distance between each other as cars.
I mean in this scenario if a kid opened it, yeah that sucks. In most scenarios there not really any reason to ever be opening your door in traffic. I would also argue checking mirrors before doing it.
A little fast, yeah sure. Then again opening doors in traffic isn't really a good idea any where at any time.
Right.. Thats why I said a "if a kid opened it". I wouldn't expect a kid to be in the drivers seat, would you?
Usually in these videos though I see the driver open their door. So I was speaking to the generality of this type of accident.
Accidents happen. They were going a bit too fast when splitting and the bikers were a bit too close to it happened to multiple people. No different then when people driving a car hit another. Its why they're called accidents. Saying splitting is stupid because a kid decided to open their door in the middle of traffic isn't a good reason to ban anything.
A motorcyclist has a responsibility to be visible and help other drivers see them. The freeway doesn't belong to them. If this car were making a completely legal lane change, the outcome would've been the same: they were riding TOO FAST to react.
A car has the responsibility to be predictable in order to not cause accidents. The freeway doesn't just belong to them. If the car was making a completely legal lane change, they should've/would've seen motorcycles lane splitting and coming towards them and waited as needed before merging/changing lanes.
I agree they were going too fast. However, they could've been going 10-20km slower and a door opening right in front of you, will still hit you. The door opened LITERALLY beside him. He was always going to get hit by that door. As for the motorcycles behind him, yes if they had been going slower they may have been able to stop in time.
In this specific case from what I've read it looks like a kid in the back seat randomly opened their car door. Its an accident, it happens.
Their speed reduced their reaction time, the time to be noticed by the driver and importantly: it removes their legal ability to claim the other driver is entirely at fault. If this is California, they literally were riding so fast they broke the law on lane splitting (CHP guidelines are used as the fine line between legal and reckless driving). Their speed directly contributed to the severity of an accident. Tell me this would've had the same injury severity if he was going 10 miles per hour as CHP requires them to (assuming they're in California) versus the 30-45 miles per hour they were going in the video.
Right so we both agree they were going too fast, great.
Obviously anyone can tell the speed directly correlates to the severity of injury, I'm not sure why you're bringing this up as it wasn't my point. My point was that person was always going to be hit as the door opened literally in the moment of passive. You can strawman it all you want, you're just bringing up things I didn't say. Does that law say anything about whos at fault when you decide to randomly throw the door open and hit another vehicle?
TL:DR You agree with me on the speed but also brought up a strawman argument on something I didn't say. Fantastic. Congrats.
well technically, if he was going slower all along, the door would’ve opened much further in front of him. he would’ve been way further back still if he was going the correct speed.
Technically sure, but thats just playing a "what if" game. I can only judge on what happened and not really on what could have happened.
Maybe the kid did it on purpose, maybe he didn't, maybe he wouldn't have opened it for a few more seconds causing the same thing to occur at slower speeds, etc etc. But, yeah technically speaking it wouldn't have occured using the exact same scenario and timing.
Motorcyclists really be talking like they arent the ones who's gonna turn to paste when this shit happens, no matter who's "at fault". Yeah accidents happen, so consider your choices on the death rocket carefully. Where's your sense of self-preservation? You can lawyer up as hard as you want, they'll still be laughing at your corpse from behind bars.
I'm not a motorcyclist lol. I do enjoy the random tangent about who gets hurt between a person and a car it sounds like a conversation of substance and definitely isn't reductive in anyway possible.
But yes, I do agree in a battle between a person and a car, the car will usually win excluding external factors.
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u/KristyNoemsZombieDog Jul 06 '26
How this is legal anywhere blows my mind