6 ms·

Bicyclists seem, to me, to be a very certain and peculiar breed of obsessives.

by bmitc 4y ago

system2 4y ago
- Sentino 4y ago
  Srsly? How often are they a problem? Also it's legal and expected
  - zdragnar 4y ago
    It depends on the local culture. You've gotta be pretty dedicated to ride a bike in the metro near me on some streets, because the layout isn't very friendly to bikers. Those that do seem to rarely obey traffic laws- the number of near-miss incidents alone caused by bicyclists who run red lights or weave in and out of lanes, up onto sidewalks, then back down into traffic is too damn high, to borrow a meme. The city would be a whole lot better off somewhere in the middle- more room for dedicated biking, and more enforcement of safe behavior. It's not just the roads either, unfortunately. There's a shared walking and bicycling path that runs around a lake in the city. It's fairly popular, but I've never been more than twice because I find walking there is unpleasant. You can only get nearly clipped by bikers flying past, not staying in their lane, just so many times.
    - egypturnash 4y ago
      To be quite honest, it is very useful for cyclists to behave this way when they have to constantly fight traffic because it makes drivers give them a wider berth. You don't know what that bike's about to do, so you stay the fuck away instead of blazing by too close. On the other hand, people who can't bother to get a bell for their bike and zoom past pedestrians are dickheads.
      - michaelmrose 4y ago
        Honestly no bike belongs mixing with pedestrians any more than any other vehicle bell or no bell. A pedestrian is meandering along at 1-3MPH a bike is comparatively racing at 10-20. Even at only 10MPH you are closing on a slow walker by at least 13 feet per second. If they notice you 60 feet behind they have less than 5 seconds to react. If they don't notice you and you don't maneuver you'll hit them. If you maneuver and they also try to get out of the way you might still hit them. I've had multiple bikes zip by with very little space where a slight step to the side would have let to disaster. Honestly anyone caught biking on the sidewalk ought to have their equipment impounded and sold.
        NegativeLatency 4y ago
        Biking on the sidewalk is legal in most places. Not saying those people weren’t being dumb but I’d much rather that that getting hit by a car
        michaelmrose 4y ago
        It's legal in only half the country and its stupid everywhere. "The overall crash rate for cyclists was 0.29 per 1000 cycled kilometres and 6.1 per 1000 cycled hours. The crash rate for cyclists riding on pedestrian paths was 26.4 per 1000 h, which was considerably greater than other road environments. For example, the risk was 8.8 on shared pedestrian and bicycle paths, 5.8 on cycle lanes and 4.7 on roads." https://etrr.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s12544-021-00497-z https://etrr.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s12544-021-00... I understand it may be preferable from the cyclists perspective to injure a pedestrian rather than risk getting hit by a car but your unilaterally risking them to procure a benefit for your self. Morally you are fucking them. Furthermore some are more vulnerable to serious or permanent injury than others and they don't have an option not to be on a sidewalk especially in the city. If you have access to a car and are cycling for your health or to achieve a warm fuzzy for saving the earth and hypothetical and mostly fictional people while actually risking, injuring, or killing existing people because actually biking on the street is too dangerous you should probably bike on the street like an adult or turn the key in your car.
    - Sentino 4y ago
      On one side it's expected from a biker to drive straight etc. And then it's expected to drive around plenty of obstacles on the bike lane. But yes we should rebuild cities to accommodate bikes first and then see if cars still have space.
- _dain_ 4y ago
  "car roads"? there is no such thing, aside from motorways, on which cyclists are banned by law.
  - egypturnash 4y ago
    There are definitely roads where bikes are allowed, maybe even with a designated lane, that are not safe ones to cycle on.
    - Moru 4y ago
      But in no case is it the bikers fault. If the road is allowed for bicycles, the cars have to take care not to run them over. Most roads are perfectly safe for bicycles, it's the cars that isn't safe for them. Best is to plan a city so you can bicycle wherever you need to, this leads to less cars in the city which is good for you that need your car to get home.
SoftTalker 4y ago
You find them in any sport. Weightlifting is another one that's easy to see. Go to any gym for a few weeks, you will pretty quickly identify a handful of people who seem to live there.
freetime2 4y ago
Being a low-impact endurance sport means that cycling is conducive to really large training volumes relative to other sports. I recall reading that pro cyclists will spend 30+ hours a week on the bike. Triathletes are even more crazy, though.
- asdff 4y ago
  Honestly after a week or two riding a bike you will get to that point. You crank out 30 miles in two hours and you will go "well that felt like a jog lets do another 30 miles right now"
  - doliveira 4y ago
    Try a year or two, and even that is quite a stretch. I don't think you quite realize how uncommon your level of fitness is
    - asdff 4y ago
      Just try it out biking and see how far you get before you feel absolutely cooked, you'd be surprised at how much mileage you just covered. Charity bike rides usually have the lowest mileage at like 15-20 miles or so and you can do that in any shape, they advertise that distance route as such, then they might have a 50 mile one that does take some training and will probably leave you cooked, then the more serious ones.
      - doliveira 4y ago
        I used to cycle to work (about 3 miles away from my place) and after 6 months I still felt absolutely cooked after the uphill trip back, and the inclination wasn't even that accentuated. So unless you live in a cold and flat-as-a-pancake area there's really no way to classify 15 miles as easy for anyone but seriously fit people. Even then, it's not something a non-athlete (amateur or otherwise) can just pick up in two weeks.
  - freetime2 4y ago

Bicyclists seem, to me, to be a very certain and peculiar breed of obsessives.

by bmitc 4y ago

Bicyclists seem, to me, to be a very certain and peculiar breed of obsessives.

system2 4y ago

Sentino 4y ago
Srsly? How often are they a problem? Also it's legal and expected
- zdragnar 4y ago
  It depends on the local culture. You've gotta be pretty dedicated to ride a bike in the metro near me on some streets, because the layout isn't very friendly to bikers. Those that do seem to rarely obey traffic laws- the number of near-miss incidents alone caused by bicyclists who run red lights or weave in and out of lanes, up onto sidewalks, then back down into traffic is too damn high, to borrow a meme. The city would be a whole lot better off somewhere in the middle- more room for dedicated biking, and more enforcement of safe behavior. It's not just the roads either, unfortunately. There's a shared walking and bicycling path that runs around a lake in the city. It's fairly popular, but I've never been more than twice because I find walking there is unpleasant. You can only get nearly clipped by bikers flying past, not staying in their lane, just so many times.
  - egypturnash 4y ago
    To be quite honest, it is very useful for cyclists to behave this way when they have to constantly fight traffic because it makes drivers give them a wider berth. You don't know what that bike's about to do, so you stay the fuck away instead of blazing by too close. On the other hand, people who can't bother to get a bell for their bike and zoom past pedestrians are dickheads.
    - michaelmrose 4y ago
      Honestly no bike belongs mixing with pedestrians any more than any other vehicle bell or no bell. A pedestrian is meandering along at 1-3MPH a bike is comparatively racing at 10-20. Even at only 10MPH you are closing on a slow walker by at least 13 feet per second. If they notice you 60 feet behind they have less than 5 seconds to react. If they don't notice you and you don't maneuver you'll hit them. If you maneuver and they also try to get out of the way you might still hit them. I've had multiple bikes zip by with very little space where a slight step to the side would have let to disaster. Honestly anyone caught biking on the sidewalk ought to have their equipment impounded and sold.
      - NegativeLatency 4y ago
        Biking on the sidewalk is legal in most places. Not saying those people weren’t being dumb but I’d much rather that that getting hit by a car
        michaelmrose 4y ago
        It's legal in only half the country and its stupid everywhere. "The overall crash rate for cyclists was 0.29 per 1000 cycled kilometres and 6.1 per 1000 cycled hours. The crash rate for cyclists riding on pedestrian paths was 26.4 per 1000 h, which was considerably greater than other road environments. For example, the risk was 8.8 on shared pedestrian and bicycle paths, 5.8 on cycle lanes and 4.7 on roads." https://etrr.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s12544-021-00497-z https://etrr.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s12544-021-00... I understand it may be preferable from the cyclists perspective to injure a pedestrian rather than risk getting hit by a car but your unilaterally risking them to procure a benefit for your self. Morally you are fucking them. Furthermore some are more vulnerable to serious or permanent injury than others and they don't have an option not to be on a sidewalk especially in the city. If you have access to a car and are cycling for your health or to achieve a warm fuzzy for saving the earth and hypothetical and mostly fictional people while actually risking, injuring, or killing existing people because actually biking on the street is too dangerous you should probably bike on the street like an adult or turn the key in your car.
  - Sentino 4y ago
    On one side it's expected from a biker to drive straight etc. And then it's expected to drive around plenty of obstacles on the bike lane. But yes we should rebuild cities to accommodate bikes first and then see if cars still have space.
_dain_ 4y ago
"car roads"? there is no such thing, aside from motorways, on which cyclists are banned by law.
- egypturnash 4y ago
  There are definitely roads where bikes are allowed, maybe even with a designated lane, that are not safe ones to cycle on.
  - Moru 4y ago
    But in no case is it the bikers fault. If the road is allowed for bicycles, the cars have to take care not to run them over. Most roads are perfectly safe for bicycles, it's the cars that isn't safe for them. Best is to plan a city so you can bicycle wherever you need to, this leads to less cars in the city which is good for you that need your car to get home.

SoftTalker 4y ago

You find them in any sport. Weightlifting is another one that's easy to see. Go to any gym for a few weeks, you will pretty quickly identify a handful of people who seem to live there.

freetime2 4y ago

Being a low-impact endurance sport means that cycling is conducive to really large training volumes relative to other sports. I recall reading that pro cyclists will spend 30+ hours a week on the bike. Triathletes are even more crazy, though.

asdff 4y ago
Honestly after a week or two riding a bike you will get to that point. You crank out 30 miles in two hours and you will go "well that felt like a jog lets do another 30 miles right now"
- doliveira 4y ago
  Try a year or two, and even that is quite a stretch. I don't think you quite realize how uncommon your level of fitness is
  - asdff 4y ago
    Just try it out biking and see how far you get before you feel absolutely cooked, you'd be surprised at how much mileage you just covered. Charity bike rides usually have the lowest mileage at like 15-20 miles or so and you can do that in any shape, they advertise that distance route as such, then they might have a 50 mile one that does take some training and will probably leave you cooked, then the more serious ones.
    - doliveira 4y ago
      I used to cycle to work (about 3 miles away from my place) and after 6 months I still felt absolutely cooked after the uphill trip back, and the inclination wasn't even that accentuated. So unless you live in a cold and flat-as-a-pancake area there's really no way to classify 15 miles as easy for anyone but seriously fit people. Even then, it's not something a non-athlete (amateur or otherwise) can just pick up in two weeks.
- freetime2 4y ago