luke_emit

The Santa Barbara Bicycle Coalition recently made a rather definitive statement at a city council meeting on Tuesday night, and the local papers have already published a couple bike-bashing articles.

Feel free to read one of them here and leave your "constructive" feedback - https://www.thedailysound.com/Ginaperry/021209gina

A few choice quotes:
- "my emotions when I have to change lanes during rush hour to avoid hitting a bicyclist who is taking up half of my lane."
- "Persons who ride bicycles on heavily traveled roadways impede intended traffic flow, cause congestion, and are a danger to themselves and others."
- "Instead, the City should require bicyclists riding within city limits to travel alternate routes during heavy traffic hours and/or avoid heavily traveled roadways altogether unless absolutely necessary."
- "It’s a win-win and it won’t cost a dime."

genec

The writer is a clueless SUV driving soccer mom (at least according to her "confessions") who hasn't a clue about the laws that govern the streets on which she supposedly "pilots" her SUV.

Typical.

San Rensho 

My god Santa Barbara is so civilized! If that article had appeared here in Miami, all of the letters would have read something like "we should run over all cyclists and then dance on their graves" with lots of f-bombs thrown in.

genec

The thing is Santa Barbra and Goleta to the north, are quite nice places to bike... compared to much of the rest of California.

Spanky-G-Master

I had to leave some "constructive" feedback for her. She's the typical self absorbed motorist who's schedule to so demanding that a ten second delay is worth changing laws or perhaps worth running someone down...

GodsBassist

The feedback to that article is AWESOME! I hope she reads it, as well as other people who feel the same way that she does.

luke_emit

I know! I'm amazed at how civilized it stayed. Most of these comments are well thought out and make a good point. Usually the internet allows people to be huge *******s without consequence.

kuan

I thank her for changing lanes.

Rober

I posted these comments on that editorial:

Gina -

I live in Salt Lake City and commute on a bike most days, a 20-mile round trip. Considering recent events, you probably would not consider Salt Lake City to be among the most enlightened places in the country, but I have never heard anything close to the arrogant, illogical, and simplistic arguments in the on-going car/bike debates as you have advanced here.

Salt Lake City has determined that it will be one of the most bike-friendly cities in the country. It has written into law and policy the idea that bikes are a viable, sustainable, and healthy form of transportation and recreation. The City has put its money where its mouth is, and created hundreds of miles of bike lanes and paths and actively supports the advocacy efforts of many private bicycle groups and clubs. It sponsors bike races for charity and provides accommodations for bikes on public transit and near public buildings, parks, and schools/colleges.

Frankly, the ideas and impressions you have expressed here would be regarded as regressed in our town. I am still surprised that someone from Santa Barbara would have ideas like yours. I always thought Santa Barbara was a more forward-thinking place. But wait - maybe you aren't from Santa Barbara?

Rober
Salt Lake City

SeattleShaun

After reading all of the excellent comments correcting this clown's me first ignorance, I would officially like to move to Santa Barbara...

Oh wait, that's surrounded by California, right? ;-)

Dchiefransom

Until that REALLY big earthquake.

Daily Commute

Wow. This is an example of the benefits of free speech. The author made her point, and comment after comment demolished her "logic." Nice work Santa Barbara. If these comments are any indication, you are a truly cyclist-friendly city.

Edit: Here's my favorite comment:
Priceless.

genec

I think my favorite comment was about the driver of the 30,000 pound dump truck that had to change lanes to avoid the 8000 pound SUV.

Cyclaholic

She's getting absolutely hammered in the comments.

Not one single comment in support of the article, not one!

unterhausen

I think I've seen the reluctance to change lanes first hand. I was driving on a 4 lane, low traffic road. A 30000 lb dump truck was stopped in front of a business. I changed lanes, the 8000 lb SUV behind me didn't.

chrys9989

Why do people have a problem with changing lanes? I don't get it, when I'm driving, I change lanes often. Not everyone wants to drive at the same speed I do, fine, it's not hard to go around someone, especially a bike.

genec

I think the biggest issue with changing lanes is that if everyone is driving too fast, it can be difficult. But if everyone is driving at or under the speed limit, then there is room and time to negotiate.

Unfortunately speeding tends to push up the speed limits (due to the 85 percent rule) and the result is hurried, harried drivers that feel that any little thing is contributing to overall congestion, without realizing it is their own actions that are the problem.

Feldman

A little expression of class bias here--when I lived in California (less so in the Northwest) I found the wealthiest areas, and SB ain't no poverty pocket, to be the homes of the most inconsiderate, rushed, arrogant drivers anywhere. I grew up in a couple of less affluent LA neighborhoods and noticed from my earliest rides that the scariest stuff happened in Bev. Hills, on Mulholland Drive, Palos Verdes Estates, etc. What was that Cathy Bates line from "Fried Green Tomatoes"; something like "I don't give a damn, I'm older and I've got more insurance!"

noisebeam

You are right it is quite easy even in fast paced fairly dense traffic. I've observed thousands of drivers of all types and sizes of vehicles who can do it with no issue. The drivers who end up having issue are the those who can't clearly recognize ahead of time that merge will be required or the few who think they shouldn't have to merge and expect and even sometimes intimidate the slower driver to move out of the way for them, even if there is no physical place to do so. These drivers then self create the need for a difficult merge, as instead of merging early and easily when they are at the general speed of adjacent lane traffic and with plenty of forward space to use for speed/position adjustment to make the merge, they slow down to well below the speed of the adjacent lane and also eliminate any forward space buffer to use to accelerate into a gap in the adjacent lane. They have then gotten themselves stuck and focus their mental energy (usually negative) on the slower vehicle ahead of them instead of getting themselves out of the situation by backing off and giving room to safely merge.

Cyclists can also help avoid much of this issue by making it clear to faster rear approaching drivers that there is and there will be no room for them to pass without merging (if that is the situation.) The sooner the rear approaching driver realizes this the sooner they can plan a merge which will end up being easier for them and have a trickle back effect to the drivers following them.

Al

unterhausen

I don't really get it either, but you bring up a good point. It really stresses some people out to change lanes. It takes a certain amount of effort to frequently check your mirrors.

con

I thought her piece was hysterical; the following is some of the cleverest anti bike logic I have heard in a long time.

"Consider the following: A Chevrolet Suburban (a mid-sized vehicle if you consider the size and weight of trucks and buses traversing city roadways) weighs about eight thousand pounds. Conservatively speaking, so does an African elephant. The average bicycle weighs between 20 and 40 pounds - the size of your average toddler.

An adult who allowed a toddler to play with an elephant would be considered unreasonable (on a good day) by most community standards. "

Trail Runner

I must say I was quite (pleasantly) surprised to read all the comments in response to that article. Normally I would expect a large portion of the responses(at least 50-60%) to be agreeing with her.

Bob N.

I thought the "Typical Republican" response title was interesting. Do Republicans not ride bikes? No Democrat road-ragers out there? Nothing like a painting with a REALLY wide brush.

I can understand how some drivers are amazed at the roads some bicyclists "choose" to ride down. Can anyone honestly say they've never seen someone riding and thought "Wow! I'd never ride down that street!" I do agree that sometimes there is no choice, but face it, some cyclists can be stubborn.

I don't think the problem of drivers seeing cyclists break the law and not realize/admit they're doing the same thing when they drive wil ever be resolved.

you may now flame away...

genec

Not a flame, but just reality... if there is no other way to get from A to B... then is it a matter of a "stubborn cyclist" or simply poorly designed streets? This gets right to the heart of our automotive centric infrastructure. Flat out, there really is no reason that streets "you'd never ride down" should ever exist.

mackerel

Very very true