Once Again Credit Cards In NYC TaxisAs the TLC will soon be requiring all NYC Taxis to accept credit cards, I sincerely hope they get it right this time. Based on what I am seeing however, I don't have much hope...
I believe on of the site I read indicated that the incident occurred between 5:45 and 6:00am. I don't live all that far from New York City and leave for work around 7:00am and it's still quite dark. Why is it necessary to buttign blame? The way I remember the previous episode was that the fellow paddlers here were not claiming that the police patrol boat was not at fault, but that ultimately that we are all responsible for our own safety. Legally, a motor vehicle must stop for a pedestrian in a crosswalk, and if I'm in a cross walk and am run over by a motor vehicle the fault would be attributed to the driver of the motor vehicle. Pragmatically, when a collision involving a 2 ton motorized vehicle and a human occurs, the human suffers the greatest amount of damage. Subsequently buttigning blame isn't as much an issue as who might be living the rest of their life crippled or have their life ended right there. Similarly, in a collision between a large power boat and a small paddle craft the operator of the paddlecraft is going to suffer the greatest damage. While maritime right-of-way laws might give the right of way to the paddle craft, those that take responsibility for their own safety take whatever precautions are necessary to ensure their safety rather than buttume the rules of the road are going offer complete protection. That means that carrying a light might meet a legal obligation but if the light is not sufficient enough to prevent a near collision, most rational people would conclude that having a brighter light (or maybe just not paddling at night in certain waterways) will going further in preventing a future incident than getting a bunch of people to support you in buttigning blame.
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