This summer, the state Executive Office of Public Safety and Security awarded grants to 19 communities, including Arlington, Brookline, Cambridge, Franklin, Holliston, Hudson and Wellesley, to crack down on those types of violations. Cambridge police issued more than 250 tickets to cyclists over several days last week alone.
A total of $125,000 in National Highway Traffic Safety Administration funds was distributed to help police departments ramp up enforcement efforts focusing on pedestrians and cyclists who put themselves in danger, and drivers who do not share the road appropriately, according to Cindy Campbell, a spokeswoman for the state agency’s Highway Safety Division.
Arlington, which received $7,500, is using the money for a variety of measures, including sending police officers in plain clothes through crosswalks to see whether drivers and cyclists stop for pedestrians, said Officer Corey Rateau.
The department is also attempting to crack down on cyclists who violate traffic laws, such as riding on sidewalks in Arlington Center, where the Minuteman Bikeway crosses Massachusetts Avenue.
Rateau said cyclists obeying traffic laws is always a “hotbed” topic, but with the rising popularity of cycling there has been an uptick in violations.
The biggest complaints, the Arlington officer said, involve cyclists ignoring red lights and not yielding to pedestrians in crosswalks.
However, Johnson said he thinks the majority of cyclists obey traffic laws.
Chad Gibson, cochairman of the East Arlington Livable Streets Coalition, which advocates for a number of pedestrian and cyclist issues, said he has not heard that riders failing to yield for pedestrians is a serious problem in town, but has no doubts there are complaints.
Gibson said improving crosswalk safety is important, and targeting jay-walkers, speeding cars, or cyclists brazenly running red lights is a good idea.
