No more waiting for Go

Two cycles and you're off

Come July 1 you won't have to wait at the stoplight for a cage to come up on your butt and trip the light devices. Now you can run the light legally.

Gov. Bob McDonnell has signed legislation that allows SOBs, mopedders and bicyclists to go when the lights say stop. The law allows two-wheelers to ride through a red stoplight providing that they have sat through two cycles of the light, that they have come to a complete stop and that it's safe to do so.

“The bill is designed to increase the safety for those riders who ride motorcycles, mopeds or bicycles,” said sponsoring legislator Delegate Tag Greason, R-Potomac Falls.  “When they approach and are stranded at an intersection, and the weight of their vehicle is not great enough to trigger the light, and so they’re stranded at a red light, and they really don’t have any legal options available to them under today’s code.”

The new law won't be law until July 1 and it doesn't give riders a Visa to blast  lights. Any accidents caused by running the red after waiting two cycles will have fault determined by police officers who investigate.

Bicyclists are also happy about the new law.

“If you’re on a bike and you get to a stoplight – and I stop for stoplights religiously – it puts me into a difficult position," said Champe Burnley, president of the Virginia Bicycling Federation. "Because if the light doesn’t change, I’ve either got to wait for a car to come up behind me to trip the stoplight, or I’ve got to break the law – and I don’t like to do that.”