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AG: Country Roads
On Sun, 29 Mar 2015 23:58:06 -0400, Frank Krygowski
wrote: On 3/29/2015 7:54 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote: On Sun, 29 Mar 2015 12:37:48 -0400, Frank Krygowski wrote: On 3/29/2015 8:54 AM, smharding wrote: Frank Krygowski wrote: On 08/03/2015 03:31, Joy Beeson wrote: On a lonely country road, ride far enough to the left -- this being a multinational forum, make that "close enough to the center" -- that you can make a dramatic and visible move toward the edge of the road. When you hear a car coming, watch it in your mirror until you are quite sure the driver can see you turn your head as if looking back before you move toward the edge of the road. On Thu, 26 Mar 2015 21:47:37 +0000, Andy Morris AndyMorris@DeadSpam wrote: Why do you feel you are responsible for the car behind? If they want to overtake they can change lane, if its not safe for them to do that do you really want to encourage them to squeeze by? Then, On 3/26/2015 8:41 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote: for one thing, the car behind you is bigger, stronger, faster and harder then you are. The proverbial 600 lb. gorilla, in other words. It is usually suggested that he gets to do whatever he wants to while you the smaller, weaker, slower and softer creature stay out of the gorilla's way. It is often argued that if the gorilla stomps you into the ground like a grease spot that the LAW will punish him. Which would seem to be of little interest to you as you'll be dead. Well, having tried pretty much every reasonable strategy, I've formed these opinions: First, if the lane is too narrow for safe passing within the lane, I stay pretty much lane centered. As Andy said, I really don't want to encourage them to pass until they can move over. But if the lane is wider, and especially if it's of marginal width - i.e., I might share it with a Geo Metro, but might feel uncomfortable with a Cadillac Escalade - I find it's helpful to ride lane centered long enough that the motorists visibly slow. Then I move right, as Joy said. Almost all motorists seem to interpret that as "Oh, what a nice guy." And the result is almost always a slow, careful pass. And speaking of Escalades: It's _finally_ half-decent riding weather here. Yesterday, riding to the hardware store on the normally busy 5 lane road (12 foot lanes, IIRC), I happened to be almost alone... except for a white Escalade that came up behind me. Despite the open left lane, he blared his horn in an unfriendly manner. I stayed where I was (lane center) and waved a couple times, something like either "Hello" or "Of course I know you're there." Then I gave what I hope was an obviously displeased motion saying "So pass me, dammit!" Which he did. No further trouble. And no conceding anything on my part. It's like this every spring. The Escalade drivers have had a whole winter to glory in their supposed superiority and privilege. It takes a few weeks for them to remember that "Oh yeah, those guys have a legal right to the road, too." Cowering at the right just slows their learning process. While I generally agree with what has been said about being more assertive in the lane to avoid those close shaves many motorists seem willing to inflict upon bicyclists, I've always gotten some amusement out of the vilification of the "guy in the Escalade" when describing bicyclist-motorist negative interactions. It reminds me of some movie plots where bad guys doing evil things are given the final negative character flaw of using a racist remark, making the audience feel that guy really deserves to be taken out. I live in a heavy college age driver environment and I quite frankly worry more about the five college area kid in a small Honda or Toyota pulling that stuff on bicyclists than people driving those oh so awful big SUVs. It could be interesting to start an online project, where volunteers would catalog the vehicle models used by impolite motorists. Maybe we could learn something. Online sociology! But the incident I described above really was an Escalade. Pearl white, IIRC. Although it appears to be the custom for cyclists to always blame "the other guy", particularly when he/she is in a motor vehicle, the California Highway Patrol study demonstrated that in more than half of the motor vehicle - bicycle accidents the cyclist was in violation of traffic regulations, and both the New York and London studies mentioned cyclists injured while in violation of the law. Unless one is to assume that these three studies were all erroneous it may be useful to make a study of who actually is responsible for cyclists being injured as if the majority of the injuries/deaths are associated with the cyclists breaking the law a more forceful enforcement of traffic laws relative to cyclists malfeasance might well be the real answer. Oh, I'm familiar with the data you mention. I was just talking about the motorists who come up and blare the horn out of pure rudeness. IME, they're extremely unlikely to cause a crash. They just want to show dominance, and inform us that in their screwball opinion, we have no right to the road. I can only assume that you live in an area with a lot of very rude people. I can honestly say that it happens so rarely here that I even can't remember the last time it happened to me. Of, course I don't ride in a manner to impede others :-) -- Cheers, John B. |
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