genec

Well, they call them "farm roads," but yeah...


OK this has a shoulder...


But not all of them do have shoulders... just narrow "goat trails..." to "share" with others, doing 70MPH... hey, there's a hill up ahead, wonder if some cyclist is taking the lane beyond that rise? Oh, slow to 60.

urbanknight

That's the funny thing about drivers. If the conditions are such that they wouldn't be able to see a cyclist in time, then the conditions are such that they wouldn't be able to see debris on the road, a small tractor, a large animal, etc. They're simply insisting on driving faster than is safe and blaming the other's existence for not being able to.

genec

Tend to agree... but in the cases you mentioned, there is likely to be damage to the driver and or vehicle too... tractors and cows tend to a lot bigger than cyclists... and sadly, in most car/bike collisions, it is the cyclist that incurs most of the damage, not the car.

And yeah, way too many drivers adhere to the "I must drive the speed limit" mode of driving, vice the "I should drive for the conditions" mode. We see this too often in the annual "multi-vehicle collision in the snowstorm" report.

JoeyBike

I wonder if a cyclist is taking the lane over that hill just as the rising/setting sun blasts me in the face as I near the crest? And a motor home/log truck coming at me in the opposing lane forcing me far right. And BTW, I'm driving 75-80 mph like everybody else.

What could go wrong?

urbanknight

True, it doesn't matter if you're "dead right".

Out here, it's "I must drive 10 over the speed limit", and very few people even seem to be aware of what our state calls the "basic speed law"... at least until they are placed at fault for an accident involving nobody else while saying "But I was going the speed limit (in a downpour at night with the street lamps out)"

urbanknight

I always love the "but everyone else does it" mentality when someone is complaining about getting a speeding ticket.

And for anyone who cares to know, not everyone does it. There are plenty of people (like me) who haven't gotten a ticket for a reason.

I had someone honk at me blaming the sun for his inability to see me. He suggested I not ride in that direction near sunset (I was commuting, so not sure what he thought the solution would be) and I suggested he get sunglasses or pull off and park until he could see where he was going because I could see just fine.

JoeyBike

First note: Where I live no one gives/gets speeding tickets unless a robot catches you speeding through a school zone. It is literally a free-for-all wild-wild-west situation. Always has been, it's cultural. That said, I USUALLY drive right on the speed limit, even in 20 mph zones. However, since there is zero enforcement there are times on the freeway where driving right on the speed limit is a pretty serious hazard. So if I feel like traffic is doing 80 in a 60, I kick it up to 70. What makes high speed driving safer is EVERYBODY driving the exact same speed, no passing. I can't control the rest of the world, only me. So I do what I feel is the safest at the moment, not what some mindless sign reads. Facts on the ground baby. And I've never had a moving violation. I'm 63yo been driving since 15.

So you corrected ONE motorist, assuming he obeyed your suggestion. But guess what? There are millions of motorists out there, many, many of which have filthy windshields, imperfect eyesight, no/cheap sunglasses, and drive in challenging conditions i.e., rising and setting sun. Guess what else? Not even ONE OF THEM is going to wait for the sun angle to change before continuing on.

I don't know where you live, or if Nirvana is inside your head alone, but you better adjust to facts on the ground, how other people act behind the wheel, or you certainly run up the odds of becoming just one more BikeForums obituary in A&S. Adapting to the REAL WORLD that I cannot control is how I got to be old.

urbanknight

It really does sound like the wild west, and I'm glad I don't live there. I'm guessing the reason you feel 60 is unsafe is because the inconsiderate people behind you would swerve around you with one hand on the horn and one hand holding a choice finger up without letting off the gas pedal for a moment. They most likely could slow down if they wanted to, but as you said with no enforcement some of them are going to choose anarchy. As long as you own up to anything that you do to yourself or any other person, I guess that's settled.

Oh, I'm sure I didn't change his mind one bit. Just pointing out the hypocrisy that he thinks I shouldn't be on the road because HE can't see.

I'm not quite as old as you, but I have been riding hundreds of thousands of miles on all sorts of public roads and highways since I was 12 without incident, and being AFRAID of the real world isn't how I did it. Being as visible as possible and riding as predictably as possible has definitely helped. Can I be perfectly safe? No, but I'd rather die living than live dying. Plus, the cameras on my bike will likely provide enough evidence for my wife to collect insurance money long enough to survive until she finds my replacement.

FYI I live in Los Angeles. My biggest concerns are phones while driving and drunk driving, and that can kill a cyclist at 30 mph as well as 80 mph. While road rage is abundant, drivers still generally try to avoid killing us.

JoeyBike

I've cycled across the USA five times completely self contained. So like you, I've seen every type of road and biked them all. Lived to tell about it. And I can tell you about a few REALLY close calls where motorists nearly died avoiding me. And times when I was inches from being disintegrated by passing traffic. Thankfully nobody got hurt but I can tell you from experience, there are many roads out there that are barely safe for the most talented motorist much less adding a bike to the situation. I used every trick in the book for being visible and out of harms way, but there are those times when my presence made a sketchy situation worse for everyone including me.

I'm not advising anyone to live under their bed. Just realize that cycling on certain roads, under certain conditions, with road users of dubious skills, is NOT safe. It's frikkin' dangerous at times. So if there's a close call, or I get clobbered, I won't be crying about it. I swam with sharks. I survived. But there was a LOT of luck involved too. Looking at all the obituaries here, many are not as lucky.

urbanknight

Oh, almost every male I've talked to is lucky to have lived past 25 based on the dumb things we have done! But I think we're looking at things from different perspectives. Very few roads are "barely safe" unless drivers are not driving properly for the conditions. If you remember that there is a middle (nowadays left) pedal in the footwell and that getting there a little later is better than never at all, roads can be quite safe.

But yeah, I get it. There are certainly roads I avoid for various reasons, but that's no guarantee. My commute includes a road where a student of mine and his sister were killed by a drunk driver... while riding in the back of their parents' car. I consider it one of the safest roads for bicycles in the San Fernando Valley, and the local club uses it in many of their routes. Nevertheless, whatever my chances are of being a statistic on that road, they're greater on all of the alternatives. Just depressing going by their shrine every day.

JoeyBike

Yep. That sucks.