Riding in Traffic



Freehub

New Member
Jun 15, 2007
98
0
0
Anybody out there ever get so disgusted with the dangers of riding on public roads, that you thought about not doing it anymore?
Like maybe going to dedicated bike paths, not that there's anything wrong with them. Well, I probably will not stop riding on public roads but it is stressfull, sometimes.
 
To tell the truth I often feel safer in traffic than on the local MUP (multi use path) the numerous intersections are way more dangerous and the crowded trail offers up a lot of obstacles - joggers, kids, adults who ride dangerously, dogs, etc. so that you have to ride pretty slow. I probably know of more bad accidents that have happened on that trail - the kind that result in broken bones, than I know people who've tangled with cars. If it were only for bikes and wider it might be safer - but there's still the intersections - one that our local trail crosses has been designated most dangerous intersection in the city and I've personally had some close calls there - cars turning left across the trail when its green for trail users.
 
I hate city driving with a passion. So I load my bike into the van and go up north to ride on roads where theres barley any cars
 
When I moved from the rural northern countryside to urban Florida in 1990 I persisted in riding my bike for about two years. Then one day as cars were buzzing by me and a red light loomed up ahead I had a revelation - I hated this! I put the bike away and went back to running.

A couple of years later I moved a few miles south of town that, with some ingenuity, afforded me about twenty miles of reasonable cycling. I quit running and got the bike back out.
 
Eden said:
To tell the truth I often feel safer in traffic than on the local MUP (multi use path) the numerous intersections are way more dangerous and the crowded trail offers up a lot of obstacles - joggers, kids, adults who ride dangerously, dogs, etc. so that you have to ride pretty slow. I probably know of more bad accidents that have happened on that trail - the kind that result in broken bones, than I know people who've tangled with cars. If it were only for bikes and wider it might be safer - but there's still the intersections - one that our local trail crosses has been designated most dangerous intersection in the city and I've personally had some close calls there - cars turning left across the trail when its green for trail users.
Good points. I hate the GDDmd rollerbladers. Here in Cincinati though, we're lucky to have a 70 + mile tarmac "rail-trail". On the crossroads: What? can't u slow down and look both ways? Although there was this cyclist, here, a couple of yrs. ago who didn't yield and broad-sided a pick-up. He died.
But with the length of the Little Miami Scenic Trail, even the most elite cyclists have enough room to get away from the slow moving humans.
Ken.
 
Cyclists are traffic.

Well, so are pedestrians but I find that bikes mix better with vehicles on a road designed for vehicles than with pedestrians on a path designed for pedestrians.

Dedicated cycle-paths seem to be desgned to meet the requirements of pedestrians, and are used by them as footpaths. Also, cyclists who don't ride on the real road don't know how to cope with other cyclists when they meet them, invariably they try to pass on the wrong side for instance.
 
I tend to ride a mix. The Little Miami Trail is a good trail as long as you ride away from the popular staging areas or ride on the weekdays.

Freehub- if you don't mind driving a little, the Simon Kenton Trail, between Urbana and Springfield is a great rail trail with little use, pedestrian or bike. It is kind of new though and not well known yet.
 
Freehub said:
On the crossroads: What? can't u slow down and look both ways? Although there was this cyclist, here, a couple of yrs. ago who didn't yield and broad-sided a pick-up. He died.

Much of this trail is very much in the city - there are a lot of crossings, and many of them are more complicated that simple cross streets - many of them have impaired sight lines too for trail users and for cars. Even so, most of the accidents do not occur because someone came out in front of a car coming straight across the trail, but because someone turns across the trail from a parallel street - its like getting right hooked on the road, but even harder to predict and you can't avoid it like you can out on the street by getting out into the middle of the lane at intersections. That bad intersection is a 4 way street intersection with the trail crossing just south. Cars turning, while the trail/sidewalk (the trail comes together with a sidewalk here as well) users have the walk signal often do not look - the intersection is not dangerous only for cyclists, but for pedestrians as well. The problem could be solved by having no right on red and a dedicated crossing time- making all the cars stop, but I doubt that will happen.
 
kdelong said:
I tend to ride a mix. The Little Miami Trail is a good trail as long as you ride away from the popular staging areas or ride on the weekdays.


Hi KD. It's good to here from someone who lives around here.
Ken.
 
Freehub said:
Hi KD. It's good to here from someone who lives around here.
Ken.
It's good to hear from someone else named Ken too. I ride all over. I registered on this site when I was working over in Athens for a couple of months then moved hack over here. Never updated my profile, too busy(lazy) to bother.
 
:cool: Hit the country roads, away from the city....explore new horizons, meet up with new challenges....or better yet, move out away from the big city like we did---my only problem is deciding which direction from the small town to ride when I take off !!!:D
 
bicycleman1956 said:
:cool: Hit the country roads, away from the city....explore new horizons, meet up with new challenges....or better yet, move out away from the big city like we did---my only problem is deciding which direction from the small town to ride when I take off !!!:D
Your lucky, thats the kind of place I hope to move to. The only thing I worry about on country roads, is people tend to speed cause theres not too many cops, I hope one doesn't paste me when I'm riding......
 
I ride to and from work most Days so I'm used to Traffic, so weekends it's nice to hit the Bike Paths as long as they're not too over populated with Families with Kids...they can be just as hazardous sometimes
:mad:
 
I ride primarily for transportation (I can't afford a car), and leisure comes second -- as a result I find myself riding in traffic on a daily basis.

Luckily, Corvallis has a gold rating from the League of American Bicyclists as a bike-friendly community. The traffic isn't too heavy and most lights have a sensor in the bike lane. There's also at least five bike shops within a few blocks of each other downtown.

If I lived in a big city, I'd probably hate trafic cycling -- though my Dad used to cycle to work daily between West Salem and downtown.
 
TheBugGuy said:
I ride primarily for transportation (I can't afford a car), and leisure comes second -- as a result I find myself riding in traffic on a daily basis.

Luckily, Corvallis has a gold rating from the League of American Bicyclists as a bike-friendly community. The traffic isn't too heavy and most lights have a sensor in the bike lane. There's also at least five bike shops within a few blocks of each other downtown.

If I lived in a big city, I'd probably hate trafic cycling -- though my Dad used to cycle to work daily between West Salem and downtown.
I can deal with the traffic, I never gave it a second thought. It's the damn bugs that I keep Swallowing that pisses me off. I swallowed something yesterday, not sure what it was, but it was the biggest thing that flew down my throat so far..
mad.gif