If You Get Pulled Over by a Bicycle Cop, Don’t Freak Out

As The RaveUps are tuning up their guitars at 6:30 tonight for a little retro- British invasion, crowds will be hurrying across the crosswalks to get to Todos Santos Plaza.

Sometimes hurrying and heedless. Many plaza-goers will not make eye contact with motorists starting up again after stopping at the stop sign on Salvio or Mount Diablo or Grant streets. Maybe there will be a few anxious moments.

But some discipline will be enforced this evening by a Concord police bicycle officer like Gary Freedman. A bike officer is in place to help everyone focus on safety. Maybe the officer will dissuade a motorist from rolling into a crosswalk with “The Look.”

Freedman models The Look in one of the photos at right. Go ahead. Click on it. See the look.

“There’s so many pedestrians there, they get impatient,” said Freedman. “There’s a constant flow at the end of the show … Sometimes you just got to sit and wait it out. Sometimes someone behind the first motorist is honking.

 “We don’t focus on writing tickets,” said Freedman. “We focus on safe, fun family entertainment and it’s free. And the motorists need to make it safe. I advise the motorists to stop and watch for pedestrians. Knock on wood — no one’s been hurt this year or last year (at the popular Thursday concerts at the plaza).”

Freedman has been a volunteer reserve officer for Concord police since 2000. He is also a consultant in retail management and social media.

Freedman started doing bicycle duty for Concord police about three years ago, after a “grueling” three-day course. On the second day, trainees rode 25 miles to Walnut Creek and back the long way, throwing some mountain trails into the mix.

Freedman trains on the Bank of America building steps. Thump. Thump. Thump.

“I like it,” he said. “You’re in the outdoors. You get exercise. You meet more people (than you do in a patrol car).”

Freedman said he often gives motorists warnings, and tickets when they’ve done something egregious. Sometimes a car does something unsafe and pulls into the next block with Freedman pedaling in hot pursuit.

“They don’t expect me to pull up on a bike,” Freedman said. “Sometimes it freaks them out. ” The bike is equipped with a jarring siren and flashing lights (you can see the flashers in one of the photos).

One Thursday evening, there was a crash at Galindo and Salvio — a block away from Todos Santos Plaza — and Freedman said he was there in 45 seconds. He determined there were no injuries, got the cars out of the roadway, started collecting information and then turned the report over to regular beat officers in a patrol car.

Patch tagged along with Freedman June 7 for the Thursday farmers market combined with the free concert. Freedman had already had an active day — in the morning, he cruised in a car with school resource officers, working with troubled teens. In the afternoon, he sat at a desk going over paperwork with the financial crimes unit.

On Thursday music-and-market night, the duty includes frequent pedals around the plaza perimeter.

 “The bike is able to leave more impressions,” Freedman said. “People see you at Todos Santos Plaza.”

“There was a time in our history when the budget allowed for us to have two full-time bicycle officers working the downtown area at night, during the summer months in particular,” said Concord Police Lt. Tim Runyon.

“The advantage of having the bikes down there is it gives a rapid and dedicated response to our downtown, which hosts a series or special events and attracts many people. It provides for a visible presence to help deter crime, and to make attendees feel more safe. It also affords the beat officers who would normally respond to calls downtown to focus their efforts on the neighborhoods, businesses, and streets that are also in their beat, yet are outside of the downtown area.”

On Thursday evenings, more than half the motorists do rolling stops at stop signs, Freedman said.

Plaza-goers do the darnedest things. Some drivers roll their window down ask the bicycle cop for directions. “I don’t answer questions in the middle of intersections,” Freedman said, flashing a version of The Look.

One Thursday evening last year, Freedman noticed a driver approaching the intersection of Mount Diablo and Salvio with a beer in his right hand. The man stopped the car, put down his beer, and came to Freedman to report that he’d found somebody’s lost wallet.

“I got his information and called for some backup,” Freedman said. “When he was done, then I said, ‘OK, now tell me about that beer.’ The patrol car dealt with it.”