Friday, August 24, 2007
By Lawrence Walsh, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Bicyclist Elijah Matheny was in the right lane of Baum Boulevard at South Graham Street on Aug. 1, waiting for the traffic light to turn green, when the driver of a gray Pontiac Grand Am cursed and shouted at him to get off the road.

Mr. Matheny replied in kind:

“I’m allowed to be on the road,” he said, and cursed back at the driver.

After looking both ways on South Graham, Mr. Matheny decided to run the red light and pedal up a short incline toward South Aiken Avenue. He had just passed South Aiken when he heard a car coming up behind him “very fast.”

“I looked back real quick and it was the same car,” Mr. Matheny said. “I hopped up on the sidewalk along the [Don Allen automobile showroom] because I didn’t want him to run me off the road.

“I didn’t want him to throw anything at me, either,” he said, referring to water, empty soft drink cans and trash that some thug-minded motorists have been known to hurl at bicyclists. “I didn’t want a confrontation.”

Mr. Matheny, who said he was pedaling as fast as he could to escape, was trying to get to the corner of Baum and South Atlantic Avenue and make the right turn onto South Atlantic.

He never made it.

The car drove up on the sidewalk and hit his rear wheel so hard that the impact knocked the bike right out from under him. He landed hard on his left side and slid on the sidewalk between a steel utility pole and the side of the building. Fortunately, he was wearing a helmet.

The driver of the car stopped, put it into reverse and zigzagged backward in rush hour traffic — it was 4 p.m. — to South Aiken Avenue, narrowly missing several cars. He turned right onto South Aiken and disappeared.

Someone called the police.

After giving a statement to a police officer, Mr. Matheny walked to UPMC Shadyside, one block away. He was there for eight hours while doctors treated him for injuries that included two broken bones in his left wrist. It wasn’t the way he had planned to celebrate his 25th birthday. His left leg was so badly scraped up that walking was “very painful” for several days.

He returned to the hospital a week later. A CT scan showed a third bone was broken. He had surgery and was in the hospital for a few days. He returned last week for more surgery.

He now has three pins and one screw in his wrist. He said the doctors told him his recuperation time will be measured in months, not weeks. There will be extended rehabilitation.

The bike, his only means of transportation, was totaled. He keeps the contorted rear wheel at the house he shares with several friends in West Oakland. He showed me the wheel yesterday afternoon. It was gruesome.

He borrowed my notebook to draw a diagram of the scene of the crime — aggravated assault.

When I went there, I saw a black mark about 20 feet long on the sidewalk in front of the auto showroom. It appeared to be from Mr. Matheny’s rear tire. Once the car hit it, the wheel was so badly twisted that it no longer could rotate and scraped along the pavement.

I drove to the East Liberty station to see if the police had any more information about the incident. They didn’t. Mr. Matheny described the driver as a black man in his mid-20s. A witness, a Fed Ex driver, concurred. Unfortunately, no one got a license plate number because the driver had backed away from the scene.

Anyone with information about the incident is asked to call police at 412-665-3605.

And, for the record, the Pennsylvania Driver’s Manual states: “Bicyclists are vehicle operators, and they are expected to obey all traffic laws and regulations. As a motorist, you should know that a bicyclist has the same rights, privileges and responsibilities as you. Respect for each other will aid in the smooth flow of traffic.”

Yes, I have seen bicyclists blatantly disobey traffic signals and signs, weave in and out of traffic, and turn sidewalks into their own bike lanes.

But I also have witnessed the me-first mentality and/or mean-spiritedness of too many motorists who drive as if the road belongs only to them.

First published at PG NOW on August 23, 2007 at 11:51 pm
Lawrence Walsh can be reached at pyp@post-gazette.com and 412-263-1895.