We’ve got very few words for this. We just hope the skaters involved are OK. From the text along with the video, it seems that they are.
Follow-up:
Skaters are Danny Carlson, Lee Cation, and Keenan Macartney. Aside from Keenan’s road rash, they are physically OK.
I think that a few things are clear from this video. The longboarders in this video are fucking morons. They saw the police vehicle 7 seconds and 110 meters away and couldn’t negotiate a safe stop. Is that the cops fault? No. It is 100% the fault of the person on the longboard who cannot stop for an emergency vehicle with lights flashing. What kind of fucking moron thinks it is ok to do this in a residential neighborhood with children in tow? If I was part of your community, I would be trying to distance myself from fucking idiots like Danny Carlson, Lee Cation, and Keenan Macartney as they will likely tarnish any and all legal riders as it seems they are speaking on behalf of you all when they say things like “avoid cops”.
If you support them, and their breaking of the law, then consider yourself a fucking moron.
We appreciate your passion on this subject, but we do not appreciate the name calling & half baked assumptions you mention above. We have been to this area ourselves and there are no babies in the street. In fact, there are cars, bikes, skaters, and trucks—maybe a deer and a beaver at times too. You could (and you’d look foolish if you did) make a similar accretion as the one above in regards to skaters that “what are cars, bikes, rollerblades, and whatever else doing driving on a road where children live?” Aint gonna fly my dude! FACT: the unmarked vehicle clearly pulled into oncoming traffic; regardless of what was in that lane it is a risky and dangerous move. A very dangerous choice for any children, other cars, bikes, horses, turtles, and whatever else might possible have been moving in that opposite direction. What if the cop did kill a skater or even a child crawling (as you mentioned might be a possibility. Stoops!) when the cop swerved into oncoming traffic? From the looks of it, the cop made a bad and emotionally charged decision and put his fellow man at risk for a $20 citation. Also, you are using double speak (look it up); the cop cars were unmarked, not clearly distinguishable “emergency vehicles”—Just a car. Also, we did not see any emergency lights from the the unmarked cars via the video until once the skaters were right up on them. That said, there may very well have been some small dashboard lights? Anyway, here’s what we support: awesome people out there trying to enjoy themselves in a safe and radical way—finding new and untraditional means to explore public space and also test what’s possible. What we do not support: Tyranny, hate, name calling, assumptions, power trips, and general douchebaggery.
Peter Richie nailed it.
The kids in the video look like entitled brats.
If you can’t stop your “longboard” from 100M away to safely navigate around a vehicle, you shouldn’t be on the roads. Full stop.
Ironically, by posting this video, these kids just show they absolutely don’t get it and are actually weakening their positions.
No Peter did not nail anything. Not even close. The cop drove into oncoming traffic. Fact. The skateboarders stopped. One skateboarder was injured because the cop drove into oncoming traffic. Fact. That last part is particularly important because it reflects a dangerous act of entitlement from the officer. BTW, do you skate?
it was an unmarked vehicle that purposely pulled up and put them in danger therefore they were surprised and couldn’t react on time. So sir Peter if you know nothing of longboarding in traffic areas don’t comment or longboarding in general. I have my sure of drivers purposely putting me in harms way downhills. so yea…
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Skateboarding is not a crime. Though skateboarding parks are thankfully prevalent now in the suburbs, I do not believe that the sport should be duly confined. Though boarders should exercise respect for other pedestrians and their fears much as a bicycler must yield, I wish to see boarders enjoying every sidewalk and parking lot if their own recklessness could simply be properly contained.
Unfortunately, long boarding requires a long run-a defined space will not do. Unfortunately, one of the functions of the police is to protect us from ourselves. I sympathize with all of the motorbikers who wish to ride without a helmet-I support that freedom as long as you remove my liability when injury is maximized instead of minimized in a traffic accident. Legally, this has proved impossible to mitigate. I support base jumping as long as the jumper can properly protect bodily and property damage to those below the jump. Unfortunately, basejumping too has as legal risks that are not differentiated well. I would favor sport-specific insurances that do not necessarily protect the sportman, but the liability for their actions.
Specifically, in this video example, the policecar did infringe upon the oncoming lane, but not an unthinkable situation for any citizen preparing to turn left and did pause and wait for oncoming traffic to clear and pass. More shocking was the sportsman in the yellow helmet who failed to friction-skid to his right at this encounter. Insanely, he skids to his left into oncoming traffic and fails to stop until past the policecar. Though all of these sportsmen are making long, unsafe stops, they are responsibly merging to the far right to stop in the shoulder of the road. This situation is not too different from our ‘sled hill’ on a seldom-used side road in my suburb as a kid. However, we would have never sledded on the arterial road through the neighborhood that was perpendicular. These sportsmen are on less-trafficked roads, but on arterial streets. The policeman of modern day have a responsibility to protect us from ourselves. All of these guys should have been warned for safety and released without even a documented warning. The sportsman in the yellow helmet should have been cited for much more than $20 (red light violation in Oakland is $500) for careening recklessly into oncoming traffic.
“Let live the boarder, even if not long-lived”