https://nypost.com/2022/03/19/florida-royal-park-bridge-operator-artissua-lafay-paulk-charged-in-death-of-woman/
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Andrew Muzi
<www.yellowjersey.org/>
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On Saturday, March 19, 2022 at 6:14:15 PM UTC-7, AMuzi wrote:
> https://nypost.com/2022/03/19/florida-royal-park-bridge-operator-artissua-lafay-paulk-charged-in-death-of-woman/

We have draw bridges all over the bay area but none of them are designed so dangerously that someone could fall off of them. Worst case someone would slide down to the hinge mechanism. And the rails are such that if you were on the bridge when it raised you could not just hold on but stand on them. As a sailor I often signaled them open. We use steel grating and if you know what you're doing you can ride across the grating. If feels a bit unstable but the distance is rarely more than a couple of hundred yards.

On 3/19/2022 9:14 PM, AMuzi wrote:
> https://nypost.com/2022/03/19/florida-royal-park-bridge-operator-artissua-lafay-paulk-charged-in-death-of-woman/

So in effect, the bridge operator said "I didn't see her" (which really
meant she wasn't looking properly) and she's being charged with
manslaughter. Seems appropriate.

What's not appropriate is the hundreds of times per year that a motorist
kills or seriously injures a cyclist through negligence. Then "I didn't
see her" is often considered a perfectly good excuse.

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- Frank Krygowski

On Sunday, March 20, 2022 at 7:15:25 AM UTC-7, cycl...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Saturday, March 19, 2022 at 6:14:15 PM UTC-7, AMuzi wrote:
> > https://nypost.com/2022/03/19/florida-royal-park-bridge-operator-artissua-lafay-paulk-charged-in-death-of-woman/
>
> We have draw bridges all over the bay area but none of them are designed so dangerously that someone could fall off of them. Worst case someone would slide down to the hinge mechanism. And the rails are such that if you were on the bridge when it raised you could not just hold on but stand on them.. As a sailor I often signaled them open. We use steel grating and if you know what you're doing you can ride across the grating. If feels a bit unstable but the distance is rarely more than a couple of hundred yards.

It isn't as if the bridge in question wasn't designed by a mechanical engineer that didn't know what he was doing - he counter weighted the bridge by hinging it off the middle rather than the ends so that it required less power to operate. But these have been shown over and over to be extremely dangerous to pedestrians and vehicles. The engineer in question came up with what he considered to be an intelligent answer to power usage, never having the experience of real life vehicle and pedestrian mistakes.

So as a question: Do you charge the bridge operator for the mistakes of the bridge designer? Can you honestly believe that a bridge operator will be able to see everyone at any position on such designs?