Another bicycle versus cars rant.... WWYD, report them?

[85eurocarrera]

Chequamegon Fat Tire 2012 - YouTube

[Zeke]

A freaking Spandex convention. And look at those bright yellow shoes in front.

Maybe it was a clown convention featuring bikes. Lots of bikes in the circus.

[85eurocarrera]

Originally Posted by Zeke

A freaking Spandex convention.

The women wear Spandex too!

Plenty of opportunity to sit up and enjoy the view. IMO, women cyclists are just about as good as it gets.

[Joe Bob]

Who the hell is Richard?

[DanielDudley]

Richard Head ?

[mossguy]

Originally Posted by Joe Bob

BBWs.....nah.....Mongo like skinny minnies....

Going to a engagement soiree en la manana.... working on the tux or shorts and flip flops.....

For an old grumpus, you clean up pretty well, Mike.

[Zeke]

Stay thirsty, my friends.

[afterburn 549]

Little bit of Lee Marvin there!

[aigel]

I would report all the "how am I driving" fools. That said, as mentioned above by others, it is not going to change the situation: I don't know how and why you would submit yourself to grave danger of city traffic. Especially today when everyone is extremely distracted and swerving lanes while using their smart phones. It only takes a split second of someone not paying attention and you are dead or seriously injured. If you don't worry about being dead, that's fine, but you may be seriously effed up, where you'd really wish you would be dead.

I almost lost a close family member to a city bike accident long time ago and the effects last to this day. Ever since, I am spooked to ride on the street. I only MTB on roads closed to traffic. If forced to ride in town, I only take sidewalks - nobody walks in L.A., so it is easy - if there is foot traffic, I get out of their way or stop for them to pas.

The other day I wanted to do a big loop over the local hillside and had to take a country road without any space for biking to get there. 5 miles of high pucker factor for me even at 6 am. I won't do that again. Next time I drove my car there and picked it up later.

G

[mikesride]

Roads are for cars..... I ride a bike for recreation now and then (3 -4 times per week), always on a bike path or a trail. Anybody who drives a bike on main drags during the morning and afternoon peak times is plain stupid. (not calling anybody stupid, but really......just think about it!)....I often do ride the bike on the street (5 - 6 residential blocks) to get to the bike path, I give each and every motorized vehicle the widest berth.

[enzo1]

[Nostril Cheese]

Yet again today, I had some uber-elitist douche in head to toe spandex come out of NOWHERE from behind me ON THE LEFT, smack my car with his fist while im driving 20MPH in traffic and yell "My LANE, ***hole"

[jyl]

In a previous thread, I showed you guys the fatality data. Riding a bicycle is far safer than riding a motorcycle. It is only moderately more dangerous than being a pedestrian. This is in deaths per million trips.

As another factoid, 5.8% of Portland commuters do so by bicycle, and there are typically about 5 bicycle traffic deaths per year here (varies, some years none, some years several). Even one death is too many, etc, but that strikes me not a very high number. (About 60 pedestrians die in Oregon each year, vs about 10 bicyclists statewide, this is strictly traffic deaths.)

It is in fact possible for cars and bicycles to co-exist pretty well. It happens here. But it takes work. Bike lanes, bike signals, bike route maps, bike boxes at certain intersections, etc. It helps that we don't have 50 mph surface streets and people here are fairly uncrazy. But that's true of many cities and towns.

Roads are for cars..... I ride a bike for recreation now and then (3 -4 times per week), always on a bike path or a trail. Anybody who drives a bike on main drags during the morning and afternoon peak times is plain stupid. (not calling anybody stupid, but really......just think about it!)....I often do ride the bike on the street (5 - 6 residential blocks) to get to the bike path, I give each and every motorized vehicle the widest berth.

[enzo1]

[Joeaksa]

Report everyone of the jerks and ask if their bosses want to see the video tape.

[fintstone]

Just drive by any wrecking yard and see the hundreds of cars crushed by accident...and imagine if you were involved in a similar accident while on your bike. Face it, people have accidents. Keeps me off the busy thoroughfares on a bike. It is suicide.

[Joeaksa]

Originally Posted by fintstone

Just drive by any wrecking yard and see the hundreds of cars crushed by accident...and imagine if you were involved in a similar accident while on your bike. Face it, people have accidents. Keeps me off the busy thoroughfares on a bike. It is suicide.

Same here. Its just not worth it, especially in busy traffic areas and places frequented by jerks. You might be in the right.... but you also might be dead right.

[DanielDudley]

Originally Posted by enzo1

And why wouldn't you stop your bicycle and get off the road for a minute ? I know I would stop and get about five feet off the road. We honestly can't know what caused this situation, or if there was some previous interaction that caused this behavior in the driver. What we can know is that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result.

If you ride in dangerous traffic conditions, and you expect something to change, well, that's crazy. I used to ride in city traffic, and I know how it is done. In fact, I am very good at it. But things seem to have changed in the last few years. I don't know what has happened in this country, but people seem to have lost their grasp on what constitutes proper social behavior. It seems that today, it is all about ME. Doesn't matter which side of the coin you are on.

So, either ride or don't ride. I don't do some of the fun things I used to, because they just aren't fun or safe anymore. The things I do do, I don't get worked up about or complain about. I was forced off the road and into a curb once. I found out later that 11 people on bicycles were killed at that intersection. No lie. Believe me when I tell you I found a different way to approach that intersection.

Find a different way to ride. Or somehow wake up and smell the coffee. It isn't the same coffee you were used to. I am sorry about that.

Ride safe.

[Zeke]

Originally Posted by enzo1

That's a ticket waiting to be written. All the bikers have to do is give the video to the cops or the DA.

But, yeah, I think I would have slowed to a crawl and just let the azzhole go. In my younger days when I had an outrages temper, I likely would have pulled over in front of the car, stopped and thrown my bike through the windshield. I did do stuff like that and I paid the price.

But it was worth every penny.

[mikeferg75]

I know the rider who shot that vid, this is my area, the driver of the explorer was reported to police and turns out has had many similar episodes with cyclists, more riders are coming forward about being harassed by the same grey explorer. Sounds like the police are taking it serious and opened a case.