I had an incident with a Frank B. Fuhrer beer distributor truck over the weekend on Carson Street down by the FBI building. The driver squeezed me off the road and I was nearly run over by his trailer. It was the scariest thing to ever happen to me on a bike. Luckily I wasn’t hit and I was able to follow the truck into the distributor’s warehouse two blocks away and tried to speak to the driver. It didn’t go well. The driver was arrogant and couldn’t have cared less what happened. I made a report at the guard shack and left. Today I talked at length with Mike Morgan who is in charge of operations and safety for the company (he is also an avid motorcyclist). He seems genuinely concerned about what happened and we talked on the phone for almost 20 minutes. I tried to convey how truly dangerous the driver was, and mentioned how several cyclist have been killed recently even though they were doing all the right things, just like some motorcyclist are likewise killed. Mr. Morgan agreed and was very sympathetic. The company has several security cameras and he said he would review them to find out who the driver was. Sure enough, Mr. Morgan called me back about an hour later and we talked some more. I tried to stress that I was concerned about safety for everyone, and I wanted to help make sure his drivers are operating with all road users in mind. I mentioned that there were some free internet videos for bus drivers ( I’m thinking of the good Chicago video from this thread ) and that I would email him the link. The driver is off today, but Mr. Morgan said that he will talk to the driver and get back to me. I’m sure he will, and I’m hoping for a good outcome.
p.s. Are there any other resources I could forward along to Mr. Morgan? I seem to have his ear, and I would hate to not take full advantage of an opportunity for some driver education. Especially since they have 72 delivery trucks and 100 sales vans acording to the website!
I'm so glad that Mr. Morgan (is he the owner, or a supervisor, or even better, a TRAINING manager?) handled it well, and it seems he was genuinely concerned. We could use a few more of him in the city.
EDIT: re-read it, and it seems like he could definitely help.
it might be worth directing them to PennDOT's "Smooth Operator" program.
http://www.pasmoothoperator.org/
it's not the sexiest thing, but it shows that penndot are at least taking this a bit seriously, and more importantly, that this kind of driving is not only dangerous, but illegal
It is pretty sad that speed traps and crackdowns on aggressive driving is a newsworthy occurrence in PA. No wonder people drive like jackasses.. they only hand out tickets a few days out of the year (and they aren't even that expensive to pay).
Fuhrer runs a tight ship. Always easy to order beer from them
With a name like Fuhrer it's no wonder...
Well played Marko, I don't have the patience for all that, I'm glad others do. Sounds as if the driver isn't concerned with saftey, not cyclists, not even his own. Commercial drivers are only allowed to kill people one time, then your looking for a new line of work, I think the steel bubble provides a false sense of security and a heightned sense of power. I drove a car about a month ago after not having driven for about a year, it was so easy, the car so powerful.
I tipped the seat back, turned on the AC, lit up the radio. I could barely see over the dash.
Bicycles, short people, strollers, all just in the way. You don't have to be aggresive to be a danger, cars are designed to operate at about 70 mph, 25 mph is totally unsatisfying, then some jack ass on a bike thinks he can go just as fast, no, not in front of my new Mustang.
They're timing all the lights on Butler, so there's cops on the major corners during rush hour. A cop is standing right there and people still go through the red, long after it's turned, The pedestrians still have no idea what a cross signal is and move freely and quickly into uncoming traffic. It's comical but terrifying at the same time. No one pays any mind to the law or even heeds good common sense. The proper crossing lights are now at 40th and Butler, finally, and it seems to confuse people even more.
speedtraps our bullshit plain and simple. IE town that lower the speed limit suddenly and without warning
Speed limits should be lower than they are for most urban and suburbans area and should be much higher if not unlimited on limited access highways.
The speed limits in cities or highways were never designed with safety in mind, just what the perception of safety is.
to the OP what exactly happened?
Not all, but most of the speedtraps I've seen could be better described as "inattention traps". If you're alert, you see them, and slow down. If you're too stoned/sleepy/distracted to notice, then you deserve a ticket.
At least there's one thing that drivers can't get away with whining "I didn't see it!".
what exactly happened?
The truck passed me in a narrow construction zone, which normally is ok (I travel this stretch several times a week). The truck was one of those long tractor trailer type city delivery trucks that's just a little smaller than a standard 18 wheeler. As the truck's cab pased me the driver abruptly moved over to the right. This caused his trailer to move to the right, and I was still beside it. I had to panic stop and ditch my bike to the foot tall curb. Even with this manuver the rear wheels of the trailer only missed me by maybe a foot. If I had reacted a fraction slower he would have definitely run me over with the rear wheels. I have had other near misses over the years, this one had my name on it.
Same thing happened to me maybe a month ago with a Pittsburgh public works truck, pulling a trailer. I really think the guys didn't remember they had a trailer, and pulled over as if there was none. I hope it was just an honest mistake. I emailed the public works people, the parks people and my city council person. All were very receptive to my complaint. Public works guy talked to the driver and reminded him of cyclists presence on the road. I hope it went the same way behind the scenes, and wasn't all for show.
Yeah, that's a classic 
I've had that happen two or three times over the years.
There's an argument for using a mirror (and controlling the lane whenever there's a vehicle with a trailer behind you), I just haven't broke down and done it yet.
so, no trailer, but today i'm sitting at the red light on walnut @ shady, and i see a mail truck coming up behind me. i was already pretty close to the yellow line but started to move over a little more in case he was turning right - which he did, by zooming around on my left (completely in the oncoming lane) and cutting in front of me without stopping.
i yelled something like "WTF" at him, and he said something back, so i decided to chase him down and get a picture of the numbers on his truck. he stopped and got out and we actually had a somewhat positive exchange. he was very apologetic and said he was trying to avoid squeezing between me and the curb, which i can appreciate - but i said i'd be much happier to move over than have him do what he did. probably it was more startling than dangerous, especially since i saw him in my mirror first, but obviously there was a lot of potential for trouble there. i'm not sure if i overreacted or not, but i was at least happy i didn't lead with calling him (profanity-laced) names...
I once almost got backed into by a post-gazette truck. It was on the wrong side of the road (so that it wouldn't have to waste precious seconds by turning around) dropping off the papers, when it went into the correct lane in front of me, and started to reverse without signalling.
I was able to get to the curb while it continued to back up, and when the driver was in view, I gave him the "What the fuck" look, and he looked shocked to see me, even though I had lights, reflectors, etc.
Some dork squeezed between me and the left lane on Negley yesterday afternoon. When I caught up to him at the next red, he was sitting there picking his nose, like really digging for gold. It was too pitiful a scene for me to call him out. I just shook my head
Copy of Email I just sent:
"Dear Mr. Morgan,
I am the bicyclist who contacted you back in September concerning a dangerous encounter I had with one of your delivery drivers. You took my complaint seriously at that time, and I thank you for that.
I just want to bring to your attention a GOOD interaction I had with one of your drivers on Tuesday. I was pedaling Westbound on Carson Street where it is narrow a few blocks before your driveway - which is very close to where the previous bad encounter took place. There was a lot of traffic Eastbound making it somewhat unsafe for a wide vehicle to pass me safely. I could hear a truck come up behind me and slow down. The driver waited until the road widened further up ahead to pass, and he did so in a very safe and polite way. He then turned into your driveway. Unfortunately I did not get his truck number, but it was a coors-lite trailer and it was around 10:30 in the morning on Tuesday the 22nd. Please let your driver know that I am very thankful for his courtesy."
nice. this type of communication is just as important as as its opposite. Glad you had a good experience Marko 
+1!
Yay, Marko!
