State Court of Appeals right to reject Seattle traffic law

THE state Court of Appeals appropriately rejected a Seattle law that automatically criminalized traffic infractions resulting in serious injuries or death.

The court correctly concluded that the 2005 ordinance conflicted with state law decriminalizing most traffic offenses. Seattle's law was a knee-jerk response to tensions between bikers and motorists; it confers on drivers the risk of criminal liability for merely getting behind the wheel.

There is no disagreement that Clinton Wilson caused a fatal crash three years ago when he made a left turn and drove into the path of an oncoming cyclist.

But Wilson committed a traffic infraction, not a crime.

According to state law, when a person dies as the result of another person's operation of a motor vehicle, the driver may be charged with and convicted of vehicular homicide if the driver was under the influence of alcohol or drugs or was operating the vehicle in a reckless manner or with disregard for the safety of others.

The King County Prosecutor's office upheld this view, declining to file vehicular homicide charges. The city of Seattle invoked its traffic-law ordinance and charged Wilson with misdemeanor assault.

The appeals court judges disagreed. They have it right.

"The operation of motor vehicles in proximity to bicyclists and pedestrians sometimes results in appalling carnage," Judge Mary Kay Becker wrote. But "the Seattle ordinance appears to be an effort to lower the priority that motor vehicles presently enjoy in the competition for use of the public streets."

The court's ruling isn't anti-cyclist. It is recognition of the tensions created by traffic congestion and competition for road space. A female bicyclist suffered life-threatening injuries from a traffic accident in West Seattle Tuesday morning.

Bicyclists and motorists — along with pedestrians and runners — share limited space. The imperative for them to share it safely has never been greater.