6 ms·

My main problem with cyclists as both a pedestrian and in a vehicle comes from them seemingly arbitrarily deciding when they're a vehicle and when they're a ped

My main problem with cyclists as both a pedestrian and in a vehicle comes from them seemingly arbitrarily deciding when they're a vehicle and when they're a pedestrian. They'll blow through stop signs and red lights, then yell at you for being in their way, they'll illegally turn in front of your vehicle, then yell at you for not giving them the right of way, they swerve through traffic changing lanes without signaling then again, will get angry with you when you have to slam on your brakes to avoid killing them, they'll go back and forth between the sidewalk and street without paying attention to pedestrians or cars and yelling at anyone that gets in their way. My experience has been, they wish to be treated like pedestrians, as in, have the right of way whenever they want, whether it's with a vehicle or an actual pedestrian, until they decide they're actually a vehicle. For me, when i'm on a bike, i'm a vehicle. I obey traffic laws, yield to cars much of the time, because they will crush me and give pedestrians the right of way at intersections. Cyclists that don't do these things piss me off. ETA: This may have come across like I was targetting all cyclists. I meant, the ones that do things like this are the ones I have a problem with. There's plenty of cyclists I see more often that don't do things like this. I have no problem with them I don't judge them as a group. I dislike in general when people do dangerous things on the road. Whatever vehicles they're in or not in. These just so happen to be the shitty things i've experienced cyclists doing that bug me.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
natestemen 8y ago
there are cases when you should treat a cyclist like a pedestrian and others where you should treat them like a car. i don't think any driving teachers are doing a good job at teaching this, but as soon as you get on a bike you realize how silly it is to make a full stop at a stop sign, both from a safety point of view as well as a physics point of view.
- peterlk 8y ago
  Nope. You follow traffic laws. If you're in the lane at a stop sign, you stop. If you're on the sidewalk, you can behave as a pedestrian. Stop can mean different things in different places, so rolling through might be fine in some places.
  - btrettel 8y ago
    > Nope. You follow traffic laws. If you're in the lane at a stop sign, you stop. If you're on the sidewalk, you can behave as a pedestrian. My experience is that drivers tend to have a much worse understanding of the law as it relates to cycling than I as a cyclist do. I've been told by drivers to ride on the sidewalk where riding on the sidewalk was illegal. (Regardless, riding on the sidewalk is bad practice because it's actually more dangerous than riding on the road and not nice for pedestrians.) I've been told by drivers to get in the bike lane when I was in the sharrow lane on an official city bike route. They want me to ride in parking, which is actually illegal as far as I know, though not enforced. Sorry, I won't be swerving in and out of traffic so that you can get to the stop light 10 seconds ahead of me and then still have to wait 30 more seconds for the light to change. Add on top of that the debris in a "lane" that's not intended for travel and thus not often cleaned; I won't get a flat tire to save you a couple seconds. Some drivers seem to get annoyed that cyclists "run red lights" at a few intersections near where I live, when there are signs that say "cyclists may use pedestrian signal" and I have never seen a cyclist go through red there without the pedestrian signal. For "infractions" like these I've had drivers do close "punishment passes". Now, there are bozo cyclists out there, but as someone who is particularly knowledgeable about the law as it applies to cyclists like me, I know that drivers frequently believe cyclists are breaking the law when they are not.
    - btrettel 8y ago
      Thinking about it, it might actually have been legal to ride on the sidewalk at the time I had in mind when writing above. But still, riding on the sidewalk is bad practice.
  - IshKebab 8y ago
    Traffic laws and infrastructure have never really be designed to consider the fact that cyclists exist though, so it's not surprising that cyclists don't follow the law to the letter.
- ratling 8y ago
  What does a cyclist do when they hit a redlight? Nothing.
Afton 8y ago
As a cyclist, I get to decide if I'm a pedestrian or a vehicle. I can pop on/off my bike at will. I can ride on the road, then ride up a ramp onto the sidewalk for 4 blocks, then back onto the road. Different rules and expectations hold depending on where I am, but I don't understand this criticism. At least where I live (Seattle), riding on the sidewalk is perfectly legal. I don't always signal, because bicycles have this major flaw that your breaking/steering tools work best when you have both hands on the handlebars. So if something hinky is happening ahead, I may need my hands to slow down instead of signalling. I try not to yell angrily when people do dangerous things around me but I do often need to yell loudly, maybe repeatedly, in order to stop a car that doesn't understand that my bike is front of them, and they can't proceed without killing me. But you should understand that the stakes are much higher for me a cyclist than for the driver of a car. They might hit me and that would suck for them. I might die or need months of physical therapy. So be patient with cyclists who appear to have unleashed random anger at you (you-the-driver), they are under more stress from the interaction. Also, the lawless cyclist trope, while often true, is often a case of the lawlessness you are unfamiliar with. I bike-commute most days, and EVERY SINGLE DAY I see cars: speed, run red lights, yield-instead-of-stop at stop signs, turn without signalling, wander into the bike lane, park or stop in the bike lane, drive without lights (at night), or with one light out. Also, it may not be illegal (but sometimes is!), but when I'm in a 'sharrow' lane, I will often get aggressively passed by people who can't be bothered to look 200 ft ahead to the red light, or who pass over a double-yellow in order to get ahead of me, then turn left/right 5 seconds later. But because we're all used to those kinds of infractions (and because they are partially 'our' infractions as drivers) we don't notice them. Because there are so few cyclists, and they aren't 'our' infractions, it's easier to notice their driving transgressions. Anyway, super long rant. Not claiming all cyclists are angels, but as someone who is literally making it easier for the cars on the road BY NOT DRIVING TO WORK, I wish I got a little respect instead of the barely tolerated contempt I get a lot of. yada yada yada, plenty of good drivers out there as well.
- grawprog 8y ago
  > As a cyclist, I get to decide if I'm a pedestrian or a vehicle. I can pop on/off my bike at will Keywords there being, on or off the bike. Off the bike, walking beside it sure, you're a pedestrian, on your bike, riding a vehicle. >I don't always signal, because bicycles have this major flaw that your breaking/steering tools work best when you have both hands on the handlebars. I don't always signal because cars have this flaw where you need your hands on the steering wheel and you have to take it off to flick the signal switch. There are lights you can get to signal on bikes, if you're not comfortable signalling using your hands, maybe invest in one of those. It's just dangerous to turn in traffic without signalling. That shit causes accidents. I don't know the laws there, but here if a cyclist causes an accident because they turned without signalling, they're considered responsible the same as a car would be. Cops will also ticket you. >Also, the lawless cyclist trope, while often true, is often a case of the lawlessness you are unfamiliar with. I dunno about the trope, I was speaking from personal experience. Honestly, I get pissed at drivers and pedestrians that do dangerous shit by breaking traffic rules. >as someone who is literally making it easier for the cars on the road BY NOT DRIVING TO WORK, I wish I got a little respect instead of the barely tolerated contempt I get a lot of. You're not a superhero by riding a bike. You're not making it easier, you're adding one type of obstacle for everyone to look out for. One that's small, fast and fragile and behaves unpredictably. Maybe instead of demanding respect from everyone, use situational awareness and understand people are probably pissed at you, because they're worried about killing you. Acting like you can just ride anywhere, anytime with impunity makes the act of not killing you more difficult.
scarejunba 8y ago
Haha, the concept that any road user follows the rules even 30% of the time is an illusion. People act like this in SF all the time. "I never run the stop signs. I always follow the road rules. Drivers stop at stop signs, why can't cyclists?". Haha, total bullshit. Until Stanley Roberts did that piece where he showed that people routinely run stop signs, everyone did this high horse motorist crap. Turns out everyone lies to themselves. Switching lanes in intersections, not yielding to peds, not stopping at Stop signs. But fortunately we all judge ourselves by intentions and others by their actions.
kurtisc 8y ago
When someone's in a car and they see someone else in a car blow through a red light, they say something along the lines of 'that person's an idiot'. When they someone on a bike do it, they say 'cyclists are idiots'. If I count how many laws people in cars break when I drive home tonight - speeding, illegal parking, etc. - I'll run out of fingers and toes. Ultimately the worst thing someone on a bike can do to me in a car is cause me a delay. The worst thing I can do to them is kill them. So I give them the benefit of the doubt.
- d6e 8y ago
  Reminds me of this https://www.xkcd.com/385/ https://www.xkcd.com/385/ I suppose sweeping generalizations like that are a matter of who is in your out-group and who is in your in-group.
  - pytyper2 8y ago
    Worked with a guy like that once, In his review I wrote he was a great inductive reasoner.
- maceurt 8y ago
  There are a lot less cyclers than drivers, and cyclists are more likely to run redlights or stops signs than drivers.
  - cpt1138 8y ago
    Do have any data to back up that claim? I assume the "California stop" is not isolated to California.
  - tonyedgecombe 8y ago
    That is wrong: https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/01/03/study-cyclists-dont-break-traffic-laws-any-more-than-drivers-do/ https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/01/03/study-cyclists-dont-b...
    - 8y ago
cmurf 8y ago
When I drive, I treat cyclists like pedestrians, and I don't care what rules they violate, they cannot hurt me. Ever. Whereas if I make a mistake, they're maimed or dead. That disproportionality is what flaws every "both sides are bad" type argument. I bike about as many miles as I drive, and there are about the same percentage of bad actor cyclists as automobile drivers. But only a car driver has any chance of killing a cyclist, not the other way around. Once I was riding bike just like a car, and a car driver tried to run me off the road on purpose. I pulled up beside him at a stop light, baby in a car seat behind him, and said driving like that will get someone killed. His screaming reply "fucking good, you should all fucking die, fucking get off the fucking road, the fucking road is for cars, you should be only on the fucking bike lane". And threw in a few more fucks. This was in Denver, on a 30mph two lane street. Meanwhile my lizard brain is thinking, I'd like to take off my helmet and bash this guys face in, over and over and over again. I'm day dreaming of committing a violent assault, because it's clear to me his action of putting me in mortal danger was intentional, and that is a betrayal of civility, and a major loss of trust. For a little bit I really thought he wanted me dead and he had the power to do it. And the statistics show decent chance he'd have gotten away with vehicular homicide. And he's teaching all of this psychosis to the kid in the backseat. There is the concept in aviation that higher category aircraft must yield right of way to lower category aircraft. e.g. an airplane must yield right of way to a glider. That should apply between heavy vehicles like cars, and light vehicles like bicycles. And bicycles should yield to pedestrians. The problem is man state laws either don't recognize bicycles as vehicles, and those that do equate them and it's just not tenable quite a lot of the time. It's far less safe for a cyclist to come to a complete stop at a stop sign and dismount, than for them to do a hesitation waltz. So when you talk about what pisses you off when your life isn't even in danger? That's psychotic to me. It's so completely control freak irrational that you get angry over people who don't follow rules intended for automobiles? It's just nonsense.
- mft 8y ago
  Are people really voting this down? I'd love to read why...
- Pharmakon 8y ago
  So when you talk about what pisses you off when your life isn't even in danger? That's psychotic to me. It's so completely control freak irrational that you get angry over people who don't follow rules intended for automobiles? It's just nonsense. I have a few responses to this and your broader point. First of all, and to be more blunt and less charitable, I don’t choose to put my life at the massively increased risk of injury and death of riding a bike vs. a car. Saying that we should be most concerned with those who are in the most danger ignores their conscious choice in making a dangerous choice in the first place. Now on its own this would be a ludicrously callous point, but it leads to my next one... Cyclists on busy roads put not only their own lives at risk, but the lives and wellbeing of others as well. As a pedestrian cyclists and scooterpricks blasting past are the danger, and as a driver having to veer into oncoming traffic to avoid them is dangerous. The tendency of cyclists I’ve encountered to blow red lights and stop signs presents the danger of a car accident as one vehicle swerves or slams on brakes to avoid them. Finally I don’t want to hurt or kill someone and if I did I’d be devastated. The fact that plowing into a cyclists while in a car is likely to leave me relatively unscathed physically doesn’t imply a lack of harm. Careless and selfish behavior predicated on a kind of nonexistent moral high-ground is the core of why it is so popular to utterly despise cyclists. We’ve all had to deal with the attitude of superiority and belief that cyclists are somehow saving us from ourselves. Of course people have a bad reaction to moralizing, proselytizing people who think the rules of the road don’t apply to them. Choosing to ride a 10lb metal frame with just a helmet in motor vehicle traffic is manifestly unsafe, it was unsafe when you decided to do it and unsafe now. Shrugging and telling everyone else to take the responsibility for your safety onboard because you wouldn’t is obnoxious. It is especially difficult to accept when one has the perspective that despite the hype from a minority, cycling is not going to save us from ourselves.
sevensor 8y ago
As a cyclist, I face a street crossing that's dangerous if I behave as a vehicle. So I ride a block out of my way, dismount, and use a protected pedestrian crossing, as a pedestrian pushing a bicycle. On the other side, I re-mount and I'm a vehicle again. I avoid the same crossing when I'm on foot, even though it has a sign that says, "state law: stop for pedestrians in crosswalk." I have never seen a vehicle stop for a pedestrian in that crosswalk, even police. People who cross there either spend a long time waiting for a lull in traffic, or they dash frantically across hoping not to be hit by drivers who think the pedestrians are irresponsible for crossing there.
- btrettel 8y ago
  > I avoid the same crossing when I'm on foot, even though it has a sign that says, "state law: stop for pedestrians in crosswalk." I have never seen a vehicle stop for a pedestrian in that crosswalk, even police. I take the existence of such signs as strong evidence that the intersection is dangerous. They seem to be added to cover the asses of the city/state/etc., not because they are effective.
  - sevensor 8y ago
    What's worse is, this is a crosswalk that people from the residential neighborhood on the far side of the street use if they want to walk their children to either of two preschools on the near side. They have to dodge oncoming traffic while carrying their toddlers across. That or drive, which, due to the configuration of the streets and the roundabout route they have to take, isn't any faster than walking.
mindslight 8y ago
It almost sounds like you're dealing with more than one person. There are plenty of moronic cyclists. I've come across several riding in the middle of the wrong side of the road around a blind corner! But putting them all in a group, judged by its worst members, is simply a step on a path to dehumanizing them. In general, drivers suck too. Try walking next to a road with puddles and witness the sheer number that think it's appropriate to continue at their entitled speed and spray road water all over you. That's basic assault with damages, but for driving it's just business as usual. Ultimately, people in general are just fucking morons that don't pay attention or predict how their actions will affect others. But if you latch onto that as justification for your own antiempathetic behavior, you're just contributing to the problem.
bhandziuk 8y ago
> They'll blow through stop signs and red lights, then yell at you for being in their way, they'll illegally turn in front of your vehicle, then yell at you for not giving them the right of way, they swerve through traffic changing lanes without signaling then again This was confusing because I thought you were talking about cars.
ubu7737 8y ago
I drive and cycle, and somehow I just do not find cyclists irritating. When are they ever inconveniencing me? It simply does not happen. How can a cyclist possibly ruin my commute, no matter how he rides? It is inconceivable to me that your delay at intersections is a reasonable complaint to make.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

natestemen 8y ago

there are cases when you should treat a cyclist like a pedestrian and others where you should treat them like a car. i don't think any driving teachers are doing a good job at teaching this, but as soon as you get on a bike you realize how silly it is to make a full stop at a stop sign, both from a safety point of view as well as a physics point of view.

peterlk 8y ago
Nope. You follow traffic laws. If you're in the lane at a stop sign, you stop. If you're on the sidewalk, you can behave as a pedestrian. Stop can mean different things in different places, so rolling through might be fine in some places.
- btrettel 8y ago
  > Nope. You follow traffic laws. If you're in the lane at a stop sign, you stop. If you're on the sidewalk, you can behave as a pedestrian. My experience is that drivers tend to have a much worse understanding of the law as it relates to cycling than I as a cyclist do. I've been told by drivers to ride on the sidewalk where riding on the sidewalk was illegal. (Regardless, riding on the sidewalk is bad practice because it's actually more dangerous than riding on the road and not nice for pedestrians.) I've been told by drivers to get in the bike lane when I was in the sharrow lane on an official city bike route. They want me to ride in parking, which is actually illegal as far as I know, though not enforced. Sorry, I won't be swerving in and out of traffic so that you can get to the stop light 10 seconds ahead of me and then still have to wait 30 more seconds for the light to change. Add on top of that the debris in a "lane" that's not intended for travel and thus not often cleaned; I won't get a flat tire to save you a couple seconds. Some drivers seem to get annoyed that cyclists "run red lights" at a few intersections near where I live, when there are signs that say "cyclists may use pedestrian signal" and I have never seen a cyclist go through red there without the pedestrian signal. For "infractions" like these I've had drivers do close "punishment passes". Now, there are bozo cyclists out there, but as someone who is particularly knowledgeable about the law as it applies to cyclists like me, I know that drivers frequently believe cyclists are breaking the law when they are not.
  - btrettel 8y ago
    Thinking about it, it might actually have been legal to ride on the sidewalk at the time I had in mind when writing above. But still, riding on the sidewalk is bad practice.
- IshKebab 8y ago
  Traffic laws and infrastructure have never really be designed to consider the fact that cyclists exist though, so it's not surprising that cyclists don't follow the law to the letter.
ratling 8y ago
What does a cyclist do when they hit a redlight? Nothing.

Afton 8y ago

As a cyclist, I get to decide if I'm a pedestrian or a vehicle. I can pop on/off my bike at will. I can ride on the road, then ride up a ramp onto the sidewalk for 4 blocks, then back onto the road. Different rules and expectations hold depending on where I am, but I don't understand this criticism. At least where I live (Seattle), riding on the sidewalk is perfectly legal. I don't always signal, because bicycles have this major flaw that your breaking/steering tools work best when you have both hands on the handlebars. So if something hinky is happening ahead, I may need my hands to slow down instead of signalling. I try not to yell angrily when people do dangerous things around me but I do often need to yell loudly, maybe repeatedly, in order to stop a car that doesn't understand that my bike is front of them, and they can't proceed without killing me. But you should understand that the stakes are much higher for me a cyclist than for the driver of a car. They might hit me and that would suck for them. I might die or need months of physical therapy. So be patient with cyclists who appear to have unleashed random anger at you (you-the-driver), they are under more stress from the interaction. Also, the lawless cyclist trope, while often true, is often a case of the lawlessness you are unfamiliar with. I bike-commute most days, and EVERY SINGLE DAY I see cars: speed, run red lights, yield-instead-of-stop at stop signs, turn without signalling, wander into the bike lane, park or stop in the bike lane, drive without lights (at night), or with one light out. Also, it may not be illegal (but sometimes is!), but when I'm in a 'sharrow' lane, I will often get aggressively passed by people who can't be bothered to look 200 ft ahead to the red light, or who pass over a double-yellow in order to get ahead of me, then turn left/right 5 seconds later. But because we're all used to those kinds of infractions (and because they are partially 'our' infractions as drivers) we don't notice them. Because there are so few cyclists, and they aren't 'our' infractions, it's easier to notice their driving transgressions. Anyway, super long rant. Not claiming all cyclists are angels, but as someone who is literally making it easier for the cars on the road BY NOT DRIVING TO WORK, I wish I got a little respect instead of the barely tolerated contempt I get a lot of. yada yada yada, plenty of good drivers out there as well.

grawprog 8y ago
> As a cyclist, I get to decide if I'm a pedestrian or a vehicle. I can pop on/off my bike at will Keywords there being, on or off the bike. Off the bike, walking beside it sure, you're a pedestrian, on your bike, riding a vehicle. >I don't always signal, because bicycles have this major flaw that your breaking/steering tools work best when you have both hands on the handlebars. I don't always signal because cars have this flaw where you need your hands on the steering wheel and you have to take it off to flick the signal switch. There are lights you can get to signal on bikes, if you're not comfortable signalling using your hands, maybe invest in one of those. It's just dangerous to turn in traffic without signalling. That shit causes accidents. I don't know the laws there, but here if a cyclist causes an accident because they turned without signalling, they're considered responsible the same as a car would be. Cops will also ticket you. >Also, the lawless cyclist trope, while often true, is often a case of the lawlessness you are unfamiliar with. I dunno about the trope, I was speaking from personal experience. Honestly, I get pissed at drivers and pedestrians that do dangerous shit by breaking traffic rules. >as someone who is literally making it easier for the cars on the road BY NOT DRIVING TO WORK, I wish I got a little respect instead of the barely tolerated contempt I get a lot of. You're not a superhero by riding a bike. You're not making it easier, you're adding one type of obstacle for everyone to look out for. One that's small, fast and fragile and behaves unpredictably. Maybe instead of demanding respect from everyone, use situational awareness and understand people are probably pissed at you, because they're worried about killing you. Acting like you can just ride anywhere, anytime with impunity makes the act of not killing you more difficult.

scarejunba 8y ago

Haha, the concept that any road user follows the rules even 30% of the time is an illusion. People act like this in SF all the time. "I never run the stop signs. I always follow the road rules. Drivers stop at stop signs, why can't cyclists?". Haha, total bullshit. Until Stanley Roberts did that piece where he showed that people routinely run stop signs, everyone did this high horse motorist crap. Turns out everyone lies to themselves. Switching lanes in intersections, not yielding to peds, not stopping at Stop signs. But fortunately we all judge ourselves by intentions and others by their actions.

kurtisc 8y ago

When someone's in a car and they see someone else in a car blow through a red light, they say something along the lines of 'that person's an idiot'. When they someone on a bike do it, they say 'cyclists are idiots'. If I count how many laws people in cars break when I drive home tonight - speeding, illegal parking, etc. - I'll run out of fingers and toes. Ultimately the worst thing someone on a bike can do to me in a car is cause me a delay. The worst thing I can do to them is kill them. So I give them the benefit of the doubt.

d6e 8y ago
Reminds me of this https://www.xkcd.com/385/ https://www.xkcd.com/385/ I suppose sweeping generalizations like that are a matter of who is in your out-group and who is in your in-group.
- pytyper2 8y ago
  Worked with a guy like that once, In his review I wrote he was a great inductive reasoner.
maceurt 8y ago
There are a lot less cyclers than drivers, and cyclists are more likely to run redlights or stops signs than drivers.
- cpt1138 8y ago
  Do have any data to back up that claim? I assume the "California stop" is not isolated to California.
- tonyedgecombe 8y ago
  That is wrong: https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/01/03/study-cyclists-dont-break-traffic-laws-any-more-than-drivers-do/ https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/01/03/study-cyclists-dont-b...
  - 8y ago

cmurf 8y ago

When I drive, I treat cyclists like pedestrians, and I don't care what rules they violate, they cannot hurt me. Ever. Whereas if I make a mistake, they're maimed or dead. That disproportionality is what flaws every "both sides are bad" type argument. I bike about as many miles as I drive, and there are about the same percentage of bad actor cyclists as automobile drivers. But only a car driver has any chance of killing a cyclist, not the other way around. Once I was riding bike just like a car, and a car driver tried to run me off the road on purpose. I pulled up beside him at a stop light, baby in a car seat behind him, and said driving like that will get someone killed. His screaming reply "fucking good, you should all fucking die, fucking get off the fucking road, the fucking road is for cars, you should be only on the fucking bike lane". And threw in a few more fucks. This was in Denver, on a 30mph two lane street. Meanwhile my lizard brain is thinking, I'd like to take off my helmet and bash this guys face in, over and over and over again. I'm day dreaming of committing a violent assault, because it's clear to me his action of putting me in mortal danger was intentional, and that is a betrayal of civility, and a major loss of trust. For a little bit I really thought he wanted me dead and he had the power to do it. And the statistics show decent chance he'd have gotten away with vehicular homicide. And he's teaching all of this psychosis to the kid in the backseat. There is the concept in aviation that higher category aircraft must yield right of way to lower category aircraft. e.g. an airplane must yield right of way to a glider. That should apply between heavy vehicles like cars, and light vehicles like bicycles. And bicycles should yield to pedestrians. The problem is man state laws either don't recognize bicycles as vehicles, and those that do equate them and it's just not tenable quite a lot of the time. It's far less safe for a cyclist to come to a complete stop at a stop sign and dismount, than for them to do a hesitation waltz. So when you talk about what pisses you off when your life isn't even in danger? That's psychotic to me. It's so completely control freak irrational that you get angry over people who don't follow rules intended for automobiles? It's just nonsense.

mft 8y ago
Are people really voting this down? I'd love to read why...
Pharmakon 8y ago
So when you talk about what pisses you off when your life isn't even in danger? That's psychotic to me. It's so completely control freak irrational that you get angry over people who don't follow rules intended for automobiles? It's just nonsense. I have a few responses to this and your broader point. First of all, and to be more blunt and less charitable, I don’t choose to put my life at the massively increased risk of injury and death of riding a bike vs. a car. Saying that we should be most concerned with those who are in the most danger ignores their conscious choice in making a dangerous choice in the first place. Now on its own this would be a ludicrously callous point, but it leads to my next one... Cyclists on busy roads put not only their own lives at risk, but the lives and wellbeing of others as well. As a pedestrian cyclists and scooterpricks blasting past are the danger, and as a driver having to veer into oncoming traffic to avoid them is dangerous. The tendency of cyclists I’ve encountered to blow red lights and stop signs presents the danger of a car accident as one vehicle swerves or slams on brakes to avoid them. Finally I don’t want to hurt or kill someone and if I did I’d be devastated. The fact that plowing into a cyclists while in a car is likely to leave me relatively unscathed physically doesn’t imply a lack of harm. Careless and selfish behavior predicated on a kind of nonexistent moral high-ground is the core of why it is so popular to utterly despise cyclists. We’ve all had to deal with the attitude of superiority and belief that cyclists are somehow saving us from ourselves. Of course people have a bad reaction to moralizing, proselytizing people who think the rules of the road don’t apply to them. Choosing to ride a 10lb metal frame with just a helmet in motor vehicle traffic is manifestly unsafe, it was unsafe when you decided to do it and unsafe now. Shrugging and telling everyone else to take the responsibility for your safety onboard because you wouldn’t is obnoxious. It is especially difficult to accept when one has the perspective that despite the hype from a minority, cycling is not going to save us from ourselves.

sevensor 8y ago

As a cyclist, I face a street crossing that's dangerous if I behave as a vehicle. So I ride a block out of my way, dismount, and use a protected pedestrian crossing, as a pedestrian pushing a bicycle. On the other side, I re-mount and I'm a vehicle again. I avoid the same crossing when I'm on foot, even though it has a sign that says, "state law: stop for pedestrians in crosswalk." I have never seen a vehicle stop for a pedestrian in that crosswalk, even police. People who cross there either spend a long time waiting for a lull in traffic, or they dash frantically across hoping not to be hit by drivers who think the pedestrians are irresponsible for crossing there.

btrettel 8y ago
> I avoid the same crossing when I'm on foot, even though it has a sign that says, "state law: stop for pedestrians in crosswalk." I have never seen a vehicle stop for a pedestrian in that crosswalk, even police. I take the existence of such signs as strong evidence that the intersection is dangerous. They seem to be added to cover the asses of the city/state/etc., not because they are effective.
- sevensor 8y ago
  What's worse is, this is a crosswalk that people from the residential neighborhood on the far side of the street use if they want to walk their children to either of two preschools on the near side. They have to dodge oncoming traffic while carrying their toddlers across. That or drive, which, due to the configuration of the streets and the roundabout route they have to take, isn't any faster than walking.

mindslight 8y ago

It almost sounds like you're dealing with more than one person. There are plenty of moronic cyclists. I've come across several riding in the middle of the wrong side of the road around a blind corner! But putting them all in a group, judged by its worst members, is simply a step on a path to dehumanizing them. In general, drivers suck too. Try walking next to a road with puddles and witness the sheer number that think it's appropriate to continue at their entitled speed and spray road water all over you. That's basic assault with damages, but for driving it's just business as usual. Ultimately, people in general are just fucking morons that don't pay attention or predict how their actions will affect others. But if you latch onto that as justification for your own antiempathetic behavior, you're just contributing to the problem.

bhandziuk 8y ago

> They'll blow through stop signs and red lights, then yell at you for being in their way, they'll illegally turn in front of your vehicle, then yell at you for not giving them the right of way, they swerve through traffic changing lanes without signaling then again This was confusing because I thought you were talking about cars.

ubu7737 8y ago

I drive and cycle, and somehow I just do not find cyclists irritating. When are they ever inconveniencing me? It simply does not happen. How can a cyclist possibly ruin my commute, no matter how he rides? It is inconceivable to me that your delay at intersections is a reasonable complaint to make.