5 ms·

I mean, at the end of the day, it's just yet another symptom of how entitled these people feel to...well, anything. The message is: "These are MY roads. How da

I mean, at the end of the day, it's just yet another symptom of how entitled these people feel to...well, anything. The message is: "These are MY roads. How dare a cyclist force me to slow down for 10 seconds? I'm IMPORTANT! Don't you understand how valuable my time is, and how critical it is that I arrive at my destination without delay? Roads for me, but not for thee." They act with the urgency of an ER doctor en route to saving lives. While going grocery shopping. I suspect that people who hate cyclists may also hate other groups of people who are not like them, and may be politically aligned with a party that fosters and embraces fear-based tribalism. Just speculation, probably wrong...

mytailorisrich 4y ago
This applies in all directions: as a cyclist I see car drivers who behave badly, as a car driver I see cyclists who behave badly, as a pedestrian I see cyclists and car drivers who behave badly. I definitely see many cyclists who behave badly and who think that both road and pavement belong to them while the law does not apply to them... especially as a pedestrian (perhaps there's an aspect of relative 'power' at play). But an important point, I think, is that the cycling infrastructure in the UK is wholly inadequate, which certainly does not help cordial relations.
- rantallion 4y ago
  > as a car driver I see cyclists behave badly > is that the cycling infrastructure in the UK is wholy inadequate I recently had a cyclist clumsily drift into the outside lane of a 40mph carriageway at around 10mph with one hand on the handlebar. A few metres to the side of the carriageway? An incredible stretch of smooth, fast, dedicated cycle path, separated from the road by a wide grass verge. While he's one of the worst examples I've seen in a while, and not representative of all cyclists, he's proof that even the best infrastructure in the world won't stop some people acting like they own the roads and putting themselves in harm's way in the process.
  - seadan83 4y ago
    This lack of understanding and emphathy goes a long way. - Perhaps the cycle way had issues that made it un-navigable. Maybe it got tacked, had a load of glass, perhaps it was not smooth. You don't really know how bad some off-road areas are until you are 2 feet away (then you notice, oh yeah, this is rooted to crap, or there are other issues). - Maybe the cyclist needed to make a turn that was coming up? - Maybe the cyclist had joined the road way not long ago and was going to hop over - Maybe the road way was just safe enough rather than go on a path that significantly reduces speed of travel. A 20% reduction in speed, every day, two ways, over distance - adds up. It's not quite enough for something to be "safe", needs to be functional as well. If you make a commute be an hour when it could be 20 minutes instead, that infrastructure is not "perfect" (that is a real example, some infrastructure I've seen wants you to ride on super crowded side-walks where you can do at best 3mph for 2 miles. On the road that goes by in about 5 minutes, can sustain 25mph on it and 2 miles is done in no time; and this is just one two mile stretch of a 6 mile distance). > he's proof that even the best infrastructure It turns out what looks like "the best infrastructure", is really often a sad joke when you try to ride in it. Protected lanes sound nice, but turning left (in the US) out of one is a nightmare and is super dangerous because nobody can see you or is expecting for you to cross lanes. This again goes back to perspective. Those protected lanes might seem lovely, but in practice can be totally useless. The far edge of the road might look ideal, but if you look at it you'll see it's uneven, full of debris, has grates, and places where the road crumbles away and is not even there. You won't notice these at all traveling faster than 20mph (let alone at 50mph) and from 20 feet away.
    - rantallion 4y ago
      That's lots of hypotheticals. I've used the cycle path in question myself many times. It's one of the best I've seen, and part of a great network around my city. The road he chose to use instead is one of the busiest routes into the city centre, and frequently sees accidents, many of which are fatal. It's certainly not a road I'd choose to cycle on myself.
      - seadan83 4y ago
- ssizn 4y ago
  Any infrastructure that doesn’t make cyclists fall into a giant meat grinder is wholly inadequate.
- random314 4y ago
  I welcome cyclists, but experienced my first cyclist rage incident a couple of days ago. I was driving to take a right turn into Mathilda Ave, Sunnyvale at its widest point from a small inner 25 mph road. Naturally, I came to a stop before the six lane right turn. And then checked left for incoming traffic. I saw a cyclist about 20 yards away on the left staring daggers at me and throwing up his arms in anger! Not exactly sure what he was angry about, as my car was stopped well outside Mathilda ave. However, definitely better than being chased by a car for a whole minute because I merged from one freeway to another at the speed limit, so the person who was driving at twice the speed limit in the merge lane had to slow down.
- blacksmith_tb 4y ago
  I think there's a bit of selective vision at work for motorists particularly - many, many times when a passing acquaintance discovers I commute by bike I hear "I saw a cyclist fly right through a red light etc." I then agree that there are some reckless cyclists out there - and how many bad drivers do they see in a day, a week, a year? I'd say it's precisely because there are so few cyclists that whatever we do stands out - but it's no surprise apparently that drivers blow through stop signs, fail to signal etc.
trgn 4y ago
> it's just yet another symptom of how entitled these people feel to...well, anything It is and it isn't. There is something particularly ugly that happens when you put a person in a car. A driver, when walking down the sidewalk, would never spit on a slower walker in front of them. Cars (the actual physical things, the technology) amplify harmless human traits into fullblown sociopathy. Being distracted, impatient, inattentive, a slight sense of grandiosity ... in a car, these, sometimes even endearing, human failings become murderous, violent, degrading. The anger drivers express towards cyclists is not innate, it is not a kind of anger that finds expression elsewhere. That anger is specifically the result of _driving in an enclosed metal battering ram_. That kind of sociopathy only arises _in a car_. The real ugly part here is the car itself. Cars are dehumanizing technology because they create an incredible power imbalance. Once that power is frustrated, because of a cyclist for example, the driver will lash out. When men are reminded of their impotence, they turn rageful. Thousands of years of literature and history are evidence. It takes a complete paradigm shift, a whole new set of community values, to counterbalance this. America (and apparently UK) has not been building these. Other countries have. It will take decades.
- bobbylarrybobby 4y ago
  Relevant: https://mobile.twitter.com/BrentToderian/status/1563738717487251457 https://mobile.twitter.com/BrentToderian/status/156373871748...
  - trgn 4y ago
    oh waw, this is great, thank you for sharing!
  - bryanlarsen 4y ago
    In the same vein: https://theoatmeal.com/pl/minor_differences/cutting_off https://theoatmeal.com/pl/minor_differences/cutting_off
mrwh 4y ago
I got sworn at recently for walking over a crosswalk at a normal place. The driver (blue Tesla) seemed to think that anything other than trotting across was a dire insult to him. I bet he's awful to cyclists.
- frumper 4y ago
  I bet they are also awful to cars.

mytailorisrich 4y ago

This applies in all directions: as a cyclist I see car drivers who behave badly, as a car driver I see cyclists who behave badly, as a pedestrian I see cyclists and car drivers who behave badly. I definitely see many cyclists who behave badly and who think that both road and pavement belong to them while the law does not apply to them... especially as a pedestrian (perhaps there's an aspect of relative 'power' at play). But an important point, I think, is that the cycling infrastructure in the UK is wholly inadequate, which certainly does not help cordial relations.

rantallion 4y ago
> as a car driver I see cyclists behave badly > is that the cycling infrastructure in the UK is wholy inadequate I recently had a cyclist clumsily drift into the outside lane of a 40mph carriageway at around 10mph with one hand on the handlebar. A few metres to the side of the carriageway? An incredible stretch of smooth, fast, dedicated cycle path, separated from the road by a wide grass verge. While he's one of the worst examples I've seen in a while, and not representative of all cyclists, he's proof that even the best infrastructure in the world won't stop some people acting like they own the roads and putting themselves in harm's way in the process.
- seadan83 4y ago
  This lack of understanding and emphathy goes a long way. - Perhaps the cycle way had issues that made it un-navigable. Maybe it got tacked, had a load of glass, perhaps it was not smooth. You don't really know how bad some off-road areas are until you are 2 feet away (then you notice, oh yeah, this is rooted to crap, or there are other issues). - Maybe the cyclist needed to make a turn that was coming up? - Maybe the cyclist had joined the road way not long ago and was going to hop over - Maybe the road way was just safe enough rather than go on a path that significantly reduces speed of travel. A 20% reduction in speed, every day, two ways, over distance - adds up. It's not quite enough for something to be "safe", needs to be functional as well. If you make a commute be an hour when it could be 20 minutes instead, that infrastructure is not "perfect" (that is a real example, some infrastructure I've seen wants you to ride on super crowded side-walks where you can do at best 3mph for 2 miles. On the road that goes by in about 5 minutes, can sustain 25mph on it and 2 miles is done in no time; and this is just one two mile stretch of a 6 mile distance). > he's proof that even the best infrastructure It turns out what looks like "the best infrastructure", is really often a sad joke when you try to ride in it. Protected lanes sound nice, but turning left (in the US) out of one is a nightmare and is super dangerous because nobody can see you or is expecting for you to cross lanes. This again goes back to perspective. Those protected lanes might seem lovely, but in practice can be totally useless. The far edge of the road might look ideal, but if you look at it you'll see it's uneven, full of debris, has grates, and places where the road crumbles away and is not even there. You won't notice these at all traveling faster than 20mph (let alone at 50mph) and from 20 feet away.
  - rantallion 4y ago
    That's lots of hypotheticals. I've used the cycle path in question myself many times. It's one of the best I've seen, and part of a great network around my city. The road he chose to use instead is one of the busiest routes into the city centre, and frequently sees accidents, many of which are fatal. It's certainly not a road I'd choose to cycle on myself.
    - seadan83 4y ago
ssizn 4y ago
Any infrastructure that doesn’t make cyclists fall into a giant meat grinder is wholly inadequate.
random314 4y ago
I welcome cyclists, but experienced my first cyclist rage incident a couple of days ago. I was driving to take a right turn into Mathilda Ave, Sunnyvale at its widest point from a small inner 25 mph road. Naturally, I came to a stop before the six lane right turn. And then checked left for incoming traffic. I saw a cyclist about 20 yards away on the left staring daggers at me and throwing up his arms in anger! Not exactly sure what he was angry about, as my car was stopped well outside Mathilda ave. However, definitely better than being chased by a car for a whole minute because I merged from one freeway to another at the speed limit, so the person who was driving at twice the speed limit in the merge lane had to slow down.
blacksmith_tb 4y ago
I think there's a bit of selective vision at work for motorists particularly - many, many times when a passing acquaintance discovers I commute by bike I hear "I saw a cyclist fly right through a red light etc." I then agree that there are some reckless cyclists out there - and how many bad drivers do they see in a day, a week, a year? I'd say it's precisely because there are so few cyclists that whatever we do stands out - but it's no surprise apparently that drivers blow through stop signs, fail to signal etc.

trgn 4y ago

> it's just yet another symptom of how entitled these people feel to...well, anything It is and it isn't. There is something particularly ugly that happens when you put a person in a car. A driver, when walking down the sidewalk, would never spit on a slower walker in front of them. Cars (the actual physical things, the technology) amplify harmless human traits into fullblown sociopathy. Being distracted, impatient, inattentive, a slight sense of grandiosity ... in a car, these, sometimes even endearing, human failings become murderous, violent, degrading. The anger drivers express towards cyclists is not innate, it is not a kind of anger that finds expression elsewhere. That anger is specifically the result of _driving in an enclosed metal battering ram_. That kind of sociopathy only arises _in a car_. The real ugly part here is the car itself. Cars are dehumanizing technology because they create an incredible power imbalance. Once that power is frustrated, because of a cyclist for example, the driver will lash out. When men are reminded of their impotence, they turn rageful. Thousands of years of literature and history are evidence. It takes a complete paradigm shift, a whole new set of community values, to counterbalance this. America (and apparently UK) has not been building these. Other countries have. It will take decades.

bobbylarrybobby 4y ago
Relevant: https://mobile.twitter.com/BrentToderian/status/1563738717487251457 https://mobile.twitter.com/BrentToderian/status/156373871748...
- trgn 4y ago
  oh waw, this is great, thank you for sharing!
- bryanlarsen 4y ago
  In the same vein: https://theoatmeal.com/pl/minor_differences/cutting_off https://theoatmeal.com/pl/minor_differences/cutting_off

mrwh 4y ago

I got sworn at recently for walking over a crosswalk at a normal place. The driver (blue Tesla) seemed to think that anything other than trotting across was a dire insult to him. I bet he's awful to cyclists.

frumper 4y ago
I bet they are also awful to cars.