January 30, 2009

Brake for Bikes

I'll be the first to admit, I hate bike riders on the road. Anytime I see those two-wheeled contraptions while driving in my car, nothing but venom and the occasional "Chuck Norris your a**" reference comes out.

And let me rephrase that, most of the time, bicyclists are not a nuisance, when they're on the sidewalk or not cruising down a main lane on Division St. It's the guys who think they have just as much right to buzz around like motorized vehicles. Problem is, they don't exactly move as fast as vehicles, nor do they signal as efficiently as vehicles.

In fact, my main concern is not so much that I'll be stuck behind a bike, but rather the rider's insistence to weave back and forth in traffic like they own the place and otherwise create a very dangerous situation. You know for the most part where cars are going thanks to blinkers, you don't know what bike riders are going to do.

Now fellow blogger Jake Rehm is a bloody bike rider, but he understands how traffic goes and really how bikers shouldn't be out in the middle of it.

Here's a story by the Spokesman, on how Spokane wants to make more biking trails through the city and residential areas, which i think is great, but just putting a bike lane on residential streets is only going to make limited driving space (if you live on the South Hill, you know what I'm talking about) even more a commodity.

The main focus seems to be safety on that project though, and that's a good thing as some bike riders don't seem to be so focused on safety.

1 comment:

  1. Clearly cyclists aren't concerned about safety if they are trying to share the road with autos.

    2004 (latest stats I could find) showed a decrease in auto deaths over the previous year in the US. Only 42,000 people were killed that year in car crashes.

    Cyclists are crazy for sharing the road with cars. About 15,000 people were murdered in America that year. I would much rather walk through the meanest neighborhood in Spokane than share the road with a car. I'd have 1/3 the chance of being killed!

    I'd rather join the army and fight in Iraq than share the road with cars. I'd have 1/10th the chance of being killed (that's about 4200 for the whole war, not just one year).

    About 13 "September 11ths" happen on our roads each year.

    Shame on cyclists for trying to be healthy and energy independent. Can't they see that our fat ass SUVs are too big to share the road with?

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