RMoudatir

When I started cycling I was naive about safety, I never had a helmet or lights till couple of months after seriously cycling. I never really had fear of vehicles running me over during the first year. I never had any problems with careless drivers and trusted every driver that passed by me.

In the last year or two though, I've been encountering a lot of careless drivers, I lost track of how many times if I wasn't so cautious that it wouldn't have ended so well. I started finding so many stories about people being in accidents and the scary statistics of how many cyclists are killed in my city annually, it's scary how the other day there was a hit and run on a cyclist a few blocks away from me.

Last year October 2018, I was almost ran over by one of those box trucks. I was in a position where I had to ride on the edge of a lane while there were cars blocking the shoulder, I turned my head to look behind and see a speeding truck directly behind me not slowing down or getting out of the way, I started pedaling like at 120 rpm and saw a small space between two parked cars and immediately jumped into there before it got to me.

Last August I was almost ran over crossing an intersection, the road I was on had stop signs but the perpendicular road didn't. I had a bunch of cars waiting behind me and felt pressured to not wait any longer since there were so many cars passing by every second, when I saw there were no cars to my left after a group of cars passed by, as I crossed the cars that passed by were blocking the view of the other side and I see this car going 40 mph to my right side headed towards me, I stop pedaling and froze as I stared at it but the car braked very hard and slowed down enough that I got away. This was on me though and I should have paid more attention.

I could type all day if I wanted to for all the dozens of incidents I had encountered in the last year. Cars charging out of the driveways into the street at 20 mph, impatient/blind drivers making a left turn on an intersection as I'm in the middle of crossing, cars that pass by me giving me less than a foot of space. Heck even today on my way to school as a pedestrian I crossed a street with the cross walk sign on and there was a van on the last lane of the street not slowing down to make a right turn, I anticipated it without even seeing as there was a blind spot from a car blocking the view and I stopped before I was in the van's way, would have been ran over at that point.

I live by Los Angeles and I try to ride the river paths whenever possible but when on certain parts of the city, you have no choice but to ride on those streets. I find it very stressful to ride in Industrial zones with semi trucks passing by me at 40-50 mph with some streets having no shoulders or sidewalks.

I know this sounded like a rant or just complaining but I just wish my city was a bit more cycling friendly. Some drivers here don't even deserve to be driving. My trust with riding around motorists is almost zero. Phil Gaimon even posted a video of how crazy some drivers can be. Maybe I just need to harden up and not think too much of it, I honestly don't know anymore.