Huge thanks to our friends at Golden Police Department, Oxotic, Panache, and Bionic Giant, for their help on this project!
Enjoy ; )
Commendation Award - Boulder County Sheriff
I have been working alongside the Boulder Sheriff's Office for a few years now, helping sort through some of the bike law nuances here in Colorado in what is arguably the most densely-cyclist and triathlete-populated county in the state. Her primary point of contact in this endeavor, Sgt Lance Enholm, nominated her for a Sheriff's commendation award. This was definitely a career highlight for Me!
With Sheriff Joe Pelle
With Sgt Enholm
Hottman Teaches Cycling Laws at CTLA Convention
August 6-8 the CTLA (Colorado Trial Lawyers' Association) met for its annual conference, this year in Steamboat Springs. The conference features law updates, trial strategy presentations, and experts in various fields who present on their topics to assist the entire CTLA membership in their handling of Plaintiffs' cases.
This year, Megan was asked to present on bike laws, based on her expertise in this field. Her talk was titled, "Strava, Carbon, and Garmin, oh my!" and during it, she spoke of Colorado laws applicable to cyclists and motorist, as well as the nuances of bike cases. In 20 minutes she compressed her normally-hour-long talk (by speaking fast!) in order to assist lawyers with the nuts and bolts of these cases.
It was an honor to be asked to present and many members told Megan afterwards that they learned some new things from her talk and would consider her a reference if they found a bike case coming into their office.
HBO Real Sports: "Bike Wars"
It was really a pleasure working with HBO Sports on this episode - of course, much of the content we filmed wasn't ultimately used in the show, but they had a lot to cover and many interviews to include! I hope this will help continue moving the bike discussion forward in meaningful ways!
This is the bonus clip - but the entire episode can be viewed at HBO Real Sports
Bike Law Talk | City of Golden, Colorado
Come and learn the state and city laws regarding bicycling so you KNOW your rights and obligations as a cyclist! Megan Hottman, aka TheCyclist-Lawyer, will inform you and provide you tips for riding safely and confidently . Whether it's riding for fitness, recreation, or transportation, you'll leave knowing more about safe and legal cycling practices!
More info here: http://www.cityofgolden.net/event/bike-law-talk/
Education... it's working!
When I returned home from the National Bike Summit, I vowed to commit my firm's time and resources to teaching cyclists the rules. It is my opinion that there are 2 types of cyclist:
(1) those who know the rules and CHOOSE not to follow them -and for those cyclists, we rely on law enforcement to correct that behavior; and
(2) those newer riders who truly don't know -and want to learn the rules.
For the latter group, we began to tackle the "I don't know" problem by offering Biking 101 classes at local bike shops and businesses in April.
Full Cycle, Boulder
I'm proud to say that after last night's huge turnout at Full Cycle in Boulder, we've now taught over 130 cyclists. In just a 3 months! Kudos to the following businesses, who hosted us for these classes and found them worthwhile and a great way to connect with their customers and/or employees:
Trek Store of Kansas City
Full Cycle, Boulder
Treads, Lakewood
Big Ring Cycles, Golden
Peak Cycles, Golden
Oz Architecture, Denver
In addition, our office has hosted two TS101 (traffic skills 101) classes for citizens who wanted to learn bike basics including the laws and skills, as well as the riding etiquette on the roads in a short group ride format. These were full classes and through them we trained another 25 cyclists. This weekend our office is hosting the League for Instructor Certification Training. By Sunday assuming we all pass, most of the Hottman Law Office staff will be certified and so will 6-8 more local residents! This means more people certified and empowered to teach to more and more cyclists! WIN WIN!
Finally -a key component of the education goal is to work with enforcement and be sure we are all on the same page. I am proud to say that our office is helping law enforcement by providing training to local officers on bike laws. We use our own case examples to show how the accident occurred, what citation was issued and how the ensuing traffic case/trial played out. We had over 20 officers attend our Badges on Wheels event in April, and since then we've been invited into two departments to provide bike law ed during their officer briefings. All told, by the end of July we will have helped teach this information to over 100 law enforcement officers in Colorado. This is incredibly exciting -and it shows a desire on the part of these officers and departments to learn the laws to apply them appropriately.
Briefing officers at their 6:30am day shift briefing
Bottom line, we are making cycling safer and more accessible by teaching people the rules and HOW to follow them, one cyclist at a time. It's powerful stuff and I'm so excited with the momentum we've seen already!!! Look for more events at our office...coming soon!