Fu*king Cyclists

[plugboots]

You speak too much common sense for a lot of folks, goat.

[Rideski]

SHARE THE ROAD MOTHERFUCKERS!

I'm starting to see shit like this in my nape of the way. I'm convinced cyclists are rageaholics in spandex.

As long as there’s attitudes like this in the general public but especially on a fucking ski forum of all places, roads will never be safe for cycling. Are there some stupid cyclists? Of course. Are there more stupid drivers? Yup.

[char_]

Generally vehicles with an obstruction in their lane are required to make a safe maneuver to merge into the adjacent lane or pass using the oncoming lane. Users of those lanes are not required to yield. Common sense has something else to say about this of course. Does CA law say something otherwise?

The big issue is that we mix bikes and cars at speed differentials that are way too high. In the Netherlands bikes and peds get grade separated facilities when the vehicle traffic operating speed is above ~30 mph.

We need way, way more dedicated, protected or traffic calmed facilities for bike and pedestrians.

[char_]

As long as there’s attitudes like this in the general public but especially on a fucking ski forum of all places, roads will never be safe for cycling. Are there some stupid cyclists? Of course. Are there more stupid drivers? Yup.

The Dutch figured out 20 years ago that mixing bikes and cars in the same lane at Auto speeds greater than ~20mph is going to get people killed regardless of attitude.

[JongDoe]

One day someone is going to beat the shit out of VDH, take his camera, throw it in a sewer, and walk away scott free.

You must have missed the vid of him getting pummeled in front of the strip joint that he was stalking at night. They came up behind him and smacked him around and stole his bike. Cops came, but they could not locate the bike either. Not sure how hard they tried to help VDH out as I'm sure he was a huge PITA for the police force and everyone else in Minnesota.

[Rideski]

The Dutch figured out 20 years ago that mixing bikes and cars in the same lane at Auto speeds greater than ~20mph is going to get people killed regardless of attitude.

I mostly mountain bike so I don’t have to deal with it. Don’t even really like road riding much. But it sure is convenient to go grab some groceries or my mail at the post office, and yeah, I have to deal with a lot of bitch ass attitudes while on slow residential roads. If you don’t think cars and bikes can both be on 25mph roads without people dying, you’re part of the problem.

[old goat]

You speak too much common sense for a lot of folks, goat.

And too much bullshit for the rest of the folks.

Generally vehicles with an obstruction in their lane are required to make a safe maneuver to merge into the adjacent lane or pass using the oncoming lane. Users of those lanes are not required to yield. Common sense has something else to say about this of course. Does CA law say something otherwise?

The big issue is that we mix bikes and cars at speed differentials that are way too high. In the Netherlands bikes and peds get grade separated facilities when the vehicle traffic operating speed is above ~30 mph.

We need way, way more dedicated, protected or traffic calmed facilities for bike and pedestrians.

In California, and I suspect most states--bicycles are allowed to occupy the car lane when there is no bike lane or shoulder. In CA cars are required to pass them by at least 3 feet. If 3 feet are not available they are required to slow down and pass safely--that is up to the judgement of the driver apparently. The penalty for passing too closely is severe--$35.
In the case of an obstruction in the bike lane the bike can merge into the traffic lane as long as it can do so safely--ie without forcing the car to slam on the brakes or swerve out of its lane. If the following car has to slow down while the bike clears the obstruction that's fine. It's no different than if a car on a 4 lane road comes across debris in its lane. It can merge into the next lane as long as the cars behind are far enough back to slow down safely if necessary. No one expects the car to stop and wait until all traffic is gone, and you shouldn't expect a bike to do that either.

Also in CA, vehicles going below the speed limit on a two lane road are required to pull off the road when it is safe to do so when followed by 5 or more drivers. Bikes riding in the traffic lane should do the same. Of course cars almost never follow that law so it's unlikely bikes will.

We are starting to see more separations between cars and bikes in california, both physical barriers and virtual barriers in the form of striping. Of course car drivers don't like that because it often eliminates or shrinks a car lane. If cars truly looked out for bikes the separations wouldn't be necessary; losing space on the road is the price cars are paying for not being careful around bikes.

The Netherlands is a special case. At least in Amsterdam, I'd estimate bike commuters outnumber car commuters by 10 or 20 to 1. From videos I've seen that may be the case in some Asian countries but it's not in any other Western European city I've been in.

[char_]

Old goat - my only point is that the law is generally quite clear about obstruction in lane and who has right of way, not what is polite or not. We are on the same page.

The Netherlands is a great example because they figured out that a significant barrier to reducing bike and pedestrian fatalities is to design facilities with bikes and peds as a priority, not just expect that fatalities will go down if we increase enforcement and education.


They did science and stuff, figured out the way to reduce fatalities on their roads and implemented good solutions. It wasn't always a bike utopia. They had lots of bike and ped deaths relative to their population and completely reworked their roads.

Bike trips are ~27% of all trips in the Netherlands.

[Dantheman]

Old goat - my only point is that the law is generally quite clear about obstruction in lane and who has right of way, not what is polite or not.

You're right, the law is quite clear:

“I would say not everyone is aware that a bicyclist does have a right to take a full lane if they need to do so for their own safety — if there’s not an adequate shoulder or if there’s obstructions that keep them from riding safely on the shoulder or in the bike lane. Motorists should respect that and pass them safely in the other lane and bicyclists should know that they do have that right and they don’t have to ride in debris or in unsafe conditions.”

-Jack Lasley, program manager of bicycle, pedestrian and motorcycles for the Utah Department of Public Safety.

Dickheads parked in the bike lane quite explicitly qualify as an unsafe condition per UAC 41-6a-1105(1)(d)(ii). Personally, I merge 100+ ft ahead of said dickhead and claim the lane, or at least enough of the lane to stay out of the door zone. I have no idea how early or late the person old goat referenced merged around said parked vehicle, but I assume it was a late merge. Just another no-win situation. If you try to minimize the amount you inconvenience drivers by merging just long enough to get around the obstruction, drivers get pissed. If you merge early and legally claim the lane, drivers get pissed. Bikes have a full legal right to use the road; cars do not have a legal right to never be inconvenienced by bikes.

[AdironRider]

That isn't a no win situation in the slightest. The cyclist doesn't have a legal right to not be inconvenienced either. In this situation you completely ignore the possibility of the cyclist slowing down, or stopping even, and waiting to merge legally and safely to the other lane. In this scenario of the late merge the cyclist should fucking stop and wait, just like a car would in a similar situation where their lane is blocked and the other lane is already occupied.

[char_]

You're right, the law is quite clear:

“I would say not everyone is aware that a bicyclist does have a right to take a full lane if they need to do so for their own safety — if there’s not an adequate shoulder or if there’s obstructions that keep them from riding safely on the shoulder or in the bike lane. Motorists should respect that and pass them safely in the other lane and bicyclists should know that they do have that right and they don’t have to ride in debris or in unsafe conditions.”

-Jack Lasley, program manager of bicycle, pedestrian and motorcycles for the Utah Department of Public Safety.

Dickheads parked in the bike lane quite explicitly qualify as an unsafe condition per UAC 41-6a-1105(1)(d)(ii). Personally, I merge 100+ ft ahead of said dickhead and claim the lane, or at least enough of the lane to stay out of the door zone. I have no idea how early or late the person old goat referenced merged around said parked vehicle, but I assume it was a late merge. Just another no-win situation. If you try to minimize the amount you inconvenience drivers by merging just long enough to get around the obstruction, drivers get pissed. If you merge early and legally claim the lane, drivers get pissed. Bikes have a full legal right to use the road; cars do not have a legal right to never be inconvenienced by bikes.

Yes, absolutely bikes can take the full lane and other users should respect that. Like every other vehicle on the road they get that right after they make a safe and legal merge.

We should do more to eliminate the need for these types of merges by bikes by providing more protected infrastructure which would create safer streets and encourage more biking.

[old goat]

You're right, the law is quite clear:

“I would say not everyone is aware that a bicyclist does have a right to take a full lane if they need to do so for their own safety — if there’s not an adequate shoulder or if there’s obstructions that keep them from riding safely on the shoulder or in the bike lane. Motorists should respect that and pass them safely in the other lane and bicyclists should know that they do have that right and they don’t have to ride in debris or in unsafe conditions.”

-Jack Lasley, program manager of bicycle, pedestrian and motorcycles for the Utah Department of Public Safety.

Dickheads parked in the bike lane quite explicitly qualify as an unsafe condition per UAC 41-6a-1105(1)(d)(ii). Personally, I merge 100+ ft ahead of said dickhead and claim the lane, or at least enough of the lane to stay out of the door zone. I have no idea how early or late the person old goat referenced merged around said parked vehicle, but I assume it was a late merge. Just another no-win situation. If you try to minimize the amount you inconvenience drivers by merging just long enough to get around the obstruction, drivers get pissed. If you merge early and legally claim the lane, drivers get pissed. Bikes have a full legal right to use the road; cars do not have a legal right to never be inconvenienced by bikes.

The cyclist in question drifted into the travel lane next to me. If he had signaled before that I would have been happy to slow down and let him have the whole lane. I do what you do. If I see a bike lane obstruction I signal and get into the car lane the first chance I get to do it safely and I get back into the bike lane as soon as I can.

A lot of people seem to think that any time they are inconvenienced by a bike, no matter how briefly, the bike is breaking the law. BS. OTOH a lot of cyclists seem to have a death wish and take the attitude that doing anything that acknowledges that cars have rights too is violating some sacred cycling principle.

[Dexter Rutecki]

Came to this thread this evening because I almost hit a cyclist today (he would have actually been going faster than I was driving had we collided, so maybe it woulda been him hitting me). Coincidentally slightly similar to what you're discussing--cyclist does that thing they do all the time where they blow through a red light from a side street to merge into traffic on a large avenue (this guy was making a left onto the road I was driving on). Nothing would have happened except the cab in front of me happened to slam on his brakes so he could try to cut across two lanes to get a fare, and I had to slam on my brakes and began drifting left to avoid him, which was about when the cyclist was blowing through his red light and suddenly found himself with about 10" of space between my fender and the row of parked cars. It got to the point where I began trying to figure out if I should nail the cab in front of me or run into the cyclist--fortunately I was able to slow just enough to allow the cyclist to get ahead of me and not hit the cab. But WTF is with these cyclists who literally fly through red lights and don't even bother turning their heads to see oncoming traffic? It's like they assume drivers will always see them and avoid them, or like they're daring someone to run into them. And I think it's worse now with more bicycles out there than it used to be--a few days ago I witnessed three cyclists basically collide with each other when two of them were riding the wrong way and another cyclist was coming toward them alongside some road construction that left a very narrow lane for car traffic--so no room for the morons on the bikes to pass each other. Kind of satisfying watching them almost fall over, but too bad for the guy on the bike riding the right way.

[ill-advised strategy]

I continue to have recurring issues with a particular group of 3 ebikers, 2 recumbant trikes and a 2 wheeler, one of these douches on yhe trike wears a fullface with goggles....doing 30mph all over the place, scattering pedestrians and kids and dogs on the sidewalk. They’re too pussy to ride in the street and they basically have electric motorcycles the police disregard, so they blaze around causing chaos on the sidewalks.

I’m kind of building up a real strong hatred for these people and I really hope they just go back to wherever they came here from before I can’t help myself from knocking the living shit out of the motocross helmet recumbent trike guy as he tries to blow past me on the sidewalk.

[KQ]

I’m kind of building up a real strong hatred for these people and I really hope they just go back to wherever they came here from before I can’t help myself from knocking the living shit out of the motocross helmet recumbent trike guy as he tries to blow past me on the sidewalk.

[old goat]

Reminds of the bike pump through the spokes scene in Breaking Away. Great movie.

Lately there's been an epidemic of large groups of heavily spandexed boomers on road bikes stopping on bike paths and bike path access roads, completely blocking both bikes and cars as they chit chat. Asking them to move doesn't work. For Tahoe locals--its happening at and near the bike and river access lot near the Tahoe City transit center. Anyone know these clowns?

[digitaldeath]

Sounds like the cyclists punked you. Lol.

[old goat]

Sounds like the cyclists punked you. Lol.

Nope--3 of them are in the hospital. They won't try that crap on me again.

[Dexter Rutecki]

Reminds of the bike pump through the spokes scene in Breaking Away. Great movie.

Lately there's been an epidemic of large groups of heavily spandexed boomers on road bikes stopping on bike paths and bike path access roads, completely blocking both bikes and cars as they chit chat. Asking them to move doesn't work.

Bike pump still works but needs to go to the head instead of through the spokes.

Have regularly wished for something to stick through the spokes watching guys fly through crowded crosswalks inches from people (making them almost fall when they react). Like drivers who disregard pedestrians when turning.

[Dexter Rutecki]

you sound like liam neeson just waiting to get into a fight with ‘some black bastard’. thank god you haven’t thrown an elbow at some random cyclist yet.

Not talking about a random cyclist, obviously--but yeah, there are some dipshits out there who probably deserve to be laid out. But you seem pretty worked up about all this--maybe Minneapolis is the place for you. (Hyperbole much? Liam Neeson and black bastards? Don't even know what to make of that.)

And while I'm here, still waiting for enlightenment on what I posted earlier:

But WTF is with these cyclists who literally fly through red lights and don't even bother turning their heads to see oncoming traffic? It's like they assume drivers will always see them and avoid them, or like they're daring someone to run into them.

[FLS]

Reminds of the bike pump through the spokes scene in Breaking Away. Great movie.

One of my all time favorites. So many great scenes and a great story too. Maybe I'll have to break out my DVD.

[Dantheman]

But WTF is with these cyclists who literally fly through red lights and don't even bother turning their heads to see oncoming traffic? It's like they assume drivers will always see them and avoid them, or like they're daring someone to run into them.

People in NYC are just fucking crazy in general?

[Benny Profane]

It does warp people's minds, for sure. It's like living in a 24/7 gangster rap song.

[gravitylover]

I mostly mountain bike so I don’t have to deal with it. Don’t even really like road riding much. But it sure is convenient to go grab some groceries or my mail at the post office, and yeah, I have to deal with a lot of bitch ass attitudes while on slow residential roads. If you don’t think cars and bikes can both be on 25mph roads without people dying, you’re part of the problem.

25=40. I challenge you (or anyone) to find someone doing less than 10-20% above the speed limit on most streets in the suburbs. Around here it's generally more like if the limit is 30 you're good up to ~40 and the PD won't give you a hard time unless you're driving erratically or do something really dumb.

That isn't a no win situation in the slightest. The cyclist doesn't have a legal right to not be inconvenienced either. In this situation you completely ignore the possibility of the cyclist slowing down, or stopping even, and waiting to merge legally and safely to the other lane. In this scenario of the late merge the cyclist should fucking stop and wait, just like a car would in a similar situation where their lane is blocked and the other lane is already occupied.

The thing is the cars don't stop they just move where they need to be because they think they're entitled to.

[Tamburello Rouge]

And while I'm here, still waiting for enlightenment on what I posted earlier:

But WTF is with these cyclists who literally fly through red lights and don't even bother turning their heads to see oncoming traffic? It's like they assume drivers will always see them and avoid them, or like they're daring someone to run into them.

Those cyclists are entitled assholes with zero situational awareness. They exist. For every shitty cyclist I see on my daily bike commute I see dozens of dumb ass people driving cars. They're texting, swerving into traffic, not using their turn signals, not stopping at stop signs, driving over the speed limit, blocking the bike lane, etc, etc. It seems like there's assholes and idiots everywhere, no matter how they choose to get around. Who knew?