Notice to All Bicyclists

[praxis1966]

The next one of you bags of dicks that comes bombing down the sidewalk and wants to give me a dirty look or talk shit because I don't get out of your way is getting served... End of. You have been warned.

[Tablo]

Will keep that in mind. :crying:

[Kuppo Shakur]

Make sure you shout "PEDESTRIAN POWER!!!", before you beat them with their own bikes.

[praxis1966]

Will keep that in mind. :crying:

Hey, man, all I'm saying is cyclists know as well as I do that they don't have any business on the sidewalk... So why is it that three days ago some asshole came down the sidewalk at close to 30 mph (he was coming down this big ass hill) that after he had to swerve to avoid me he slammed on his brakes to stare me down? And why was it that just tonight some lady called me a jerk because she almost fell off her bike trying to avoid me on the sidewalk? I'm on foot, so naturally I'm where I'm supposed to be. If I went walking down the middle of the street, I'd deserve to get hit. Same should hold true for cyclists on the sidewalk...


Make sure you shout "PEDESTRIAN POWER!!!", before you beat them with their own bikes.

I hadn't thought of that, but will do... :lol:

[Tablo]

Well, I generally ride on sidewalks when I am able to since people driving cars get pissed at me being on the road. I don't get mad at people if they are in my way, I just ride around. What we need are more bike-lanes.

[praxis1966]

Well, I generally ride on sidewalks when I am able to since people driving cars get pissed at me being on the road. I don't get mad at people if they are in my way, I just ride around. What we need are more bike-lanes.

I agree completely about the bike lane issue, but the fact is riding on the sidewalk is dangerous and illegal. I shouldn't have to be on the lookout for cyclists if I'm where I'm supposed to be and they aren't.

[Summerspeaker]

Motorists regularly tell me to bike on the sidewalk. I ignore them and only do it under unusual circumstances. I've been hit by cars under both options, so I wouldn't describe either as strictly safe. Stupid death machines. :(

[Fawkes]

You would get a ticket so fast if you rode a bike on the sidewalks here, not to mention you'd bust your ass within about 8 seconds because of the amount of swerving necessary.

I love you for using the term "getting served", by the way.

[Ele'ill]

The next one of you bags of dicks that comes bombing down the sidewalk and wants to give me a dirty look or talk shit because I don't get out of your way is getting served... End of. You have been warned.

Objects in motion tend to stay in motion.

[praxis1966]

Motorists regularly tell me to bike on the sidewalk. I ignore them and only do it under unusual circumstances. I've been hit by cars under both options, so I wouldn't describe either as strictly safe. Stupid death machines. :(

See, I get that and sympathize, I really do... You know, after almost getting run over by a Ford F-350 Superduty whilst living in Austin and all... Frankly, though, I think if riding a bike is really that dangerous in your area you should consider doing what I do: Either public transit or walking, which is still honest according to Against Me!, lol... Anyway, I think it's worth mentioning that I don't have a problem with bikes on the sidewalk as long as you're being courteous and conscientious. But after almost getting run over twice in the same week by people who had the nerve to get pissed off at me (a pedestrian on the sidewalk) for not getting out of their way, the attitude is starting to get to me.


You would get a ticket so fast if you rode a bike on the sidewalks here, not to mention you'd bust your ass within about 8 seconds because of the amount of swerving necessary.

Which is part of the problem here. The Bay Area is so full of liberal pretension that people worship cyclists like some sort of Green God or something... It's to the point where the cyclists here feel and act like they own every bit of turf on the planet; I've seen them cut off moving cars in traffic, ride between lanes in moving traffic, they never signal before turning, blow red lights and now they think they're entitled to the sidewalk as well... And the pigs never do anything about it. Nevermind that I was in downtown Berkeley (which is within a couple blocks of Cal University and has a ton of restaurants, bars, movie theatres and shops) last night (on a Saturday night) less than a block from the only downtown train station so there was literally hundreds of pedestrians on the sidewalk. Certainly not a good idea to be riding a bike there.


I love you for using the term "getting served", by the way.

:laugh: De nada.


Objects in motion tend to stay in motion until you clothesline them.

Fixed.

[Q]

Bicycle paths ftw!
http://www.vvnafdelingbrielle.nl/old/images/Extra%20fietspad%20thv%20Leonardusschool.jpg

[Rusty Shackleford]

Go to UC davis.

http://www.bikingbis.com/_photos/UCDavis.sized.jpg

[Red Commissar]

Brazilian Praxis rages

UgA6Uo1n17w

[psgchisolm]

If I ever ride a bike again I'd stay on the street, at least until a car comes by then i'd hop up on the sidewalk until it passes. Unless I feel like being Dave Mirra and doing a double backflip over you.;)

[Triple A]

I remeber giving one guy the finger after he honked me for stopping the bike in traffic light.
Sweet memories...:thumbup1:

[Pirate Utopian]

I fucking hate riding a bike. Thankfully I'm mostly using the bus or tram these days. Fuck bikes.

[Triple A]

I fucking hate riding a bike. Thankfully I'm mostly using the bus or tram these days. Fuck bikes.


The buses are slow and always full of people that stink.
At least in my city.


And they stop at every 200m

[Pirate Utopian]

Not where I live. Busses can be crowded in the morning. But it's still better than riding a bike. I'd rather ride in the back of a dumptruck ride than a bike every morning.

[eyedrop]

Do you randomly walk back and forth in the sidewalk without looking, or block the entire thing with friends since they almost run you over all the time?

Biking on the sidewalks are allowed here, but pedestrians walk in a single file, or twos, when they're a group. Biking on the road also has it's problems in that it slows the whole traffic down until there's a suitable place to pass the cyclist.

Public transports generally suck for short distances, cars make you go fat and your credit card hungry and walking is way to slow. Bikes own during the summer months.

[praxis1966]

Do you randomly walk back and forth in the sidewalk without looking, or block the entire thing with friends since they almost run you over all the time?

In the two instances I was referencing I wasn't... In one I was coming out of a theatre and heading toward my girlfriend's car which was parked on the street. In the other, I was standing motionless finishing a cig before I went inside my apartment building. In both cases I was walking by myself.

In the first case, I'm not entirely sure where the woman came from; probably the next block up since we were relatively near the corner, but the sidewalk was damned crowded so it's hard to know. In the second case, the guy was coming down a big ass hill. About 20 feet from me was a driveway flanked on either side by parked cars into which he swerved to get onto the sidewalk. I assume he didn't see me because of the cars, but it makes me question why exactly he wasn't getting on the brakes as a precaution given that he knew he couldn't see what was on the sidewalk.

In any event, I don't think it really matters what the fuck I was doing on the sidewalk considering what those two were doing on the sidewalk is illegal here and everybody knows it. They've no right to cop an attitude. Anyway, whether or not I was being inconsiderate is immaterial in my view given both these people were someplace they weren't supposed to be.

To put it another way, let's say I'm a pedestrian and I'm crossing the street mid-block. Now I know what I'm doing (jaywalking) is illegal and people don't expect me to be there, so I'm going to be extra cautious when I do it and I know I've only myself to blame if something goes wrong.

[bailey_187]

whens bikes ride on the rode but dont think they have to stop for red lights like cars, wtf

im trying to cross the fucking road, i see a green man in the light, its my turn

[eyedrop]

Praxis: Maybe we have a more considerate breed of cyclists here as I've never had any problems with it.

[praxis1966]

Praxis: Maybe we have a more considerate breed of cyclists here as I've never had any problems with it.

That's probably true. There is this yuppie, liberal attitude of superiority that cyclists here have since a lot of them ride bikes as some sort of effort to "help the environment"... Here, riding a bike is as much a political statement as it is a mode of transportation. It seems like they feel owed some sort of special consideration for it.

[Agnapostate]

We have an ugly set of options. Riding in the middle of the street gets us honked at and barely missed at the least and hit at the worst. Riding next to the curb gets us hitting shitloads of debris and rubble. Riding on the sidewalk sometimes brings us into conflict with pedestrians, and sometimes with opposing cyclists riding in the opposite direction. Personally, I've had near misses, but the only time I've been hit on a bike is riding on the sidewalk. I was crossing a driveway and a Hyundai turned right into me.

[praxis1966]

See, that's the thing... I've actually considered buying a bike (I don't own one nor do I own a car) as a cheap mode of transportation, but the more cyclists I talk to the more I become convinced that cycling in major metropolitan areas is more risk than reward. That's mainly why I still either hoof it or take the bus/train.

[Agnapostate]

See, that's the thing... I've actually considered buying a bike (I don't own one nor do I own a car) as a cheap mode of transportation, but the more cyclists I talk to the more I become convinced that cycling in major metropolitan areas is more risk than reward. That's mainly why I still either hoof it or take the bus/train.

For the most part, I avoid surface streets. The three major rivers near me (the San Gabriel River, the Rio Hondo River, and the Los Angeles River) all have bike paths. Often I won't go on north-south streets because I can ride up or down one of those paths. If there were easily accessible bike paths that ran east-west, I'd stay off the road the vast majority of the time. Going down paths with no motor traffic already cuts down on time tremendously.

[eyedrop]

That's probably true. There is this yuppie, liberal attitude of superiority that cyclists here have since a lot of them ride bikes as some sort of effort to "help the environment"... Here, riding a bike is as much a political statement as it is a mode of transportation. It seems like they feel owed some sort of special consideration for it.

Cyclists here usually fall under 3 categories; small kids under 16, random people using it as a practical vehicle, and men, in full condom equipment,their middle aged crisis.

[bailey_187]

just get an oyster card ffs

[bricolage]

just get an oyster card ffs
I save twenty odd quid a week cycling to work instead of getting the bus. Plus I don't have to wait around at the bus stop, don't have to hang around in traffic, don't have to stand up all the way and it all gets done much quicker. I'd recommend getting a bike to anyone who lives in London.

[eyedrop]

just get an oyster card ffs

Try living with only buses which goes only every half hour at best and never later than 11. Add in that they have a wiggle room of 15 minutes for when they will actually pass the bus stop, so you have to account for atleast an hour travel time if there is some place you absolutely need to be at a certain time, for what would be a 20 minute bike ride.

[Quail]

In Sheffield, I get the bus or walk because I live within walking distance of most places I need to go, and the buses are regular enough for me to just walk up to the stop and one will come. When I go back to my parents' house, the buses are rubbish and you have to plan your day/evening around what time the buses run, so I can really see the benefit of a bike there.

[Magón]

I was in Chinatown one day in SF, and as always, it's busy and crowded as fuck on those streets, but as this young kid, probably in his mid-teens, came riding around this corner minding his own business, some old Chinese woman threw what I thought at first was a baseball, at him. But then I realized it was some sort of onion looking thing? I don't know why she threw it at him, but damn she had good aim. The kid kept riding, but some people gave him a weird look as he held the side of his head where she'd hit him.

I kinda laughed.

[Hoplite]

Bikes and the people that ride them need to make up their minds; they are bikes or they are people, they cannot be both.

People that ride bikes will, on the one hand, give me dirty looks for passing them when they're going 12 on a road marked 40. Then they decide to blow through a red light and/or stop sign without looking, stopping, signaling, or even slowing down then look at me like I'm some heinous dick for having to slam on my brakes to avoid wrapping them around my goddamn drive shaft.

[Ele'ill]

This isn't some subcategory of humans from a science fiction novel- it sounds pretty much in line with how people can be where ever they are and whatever they are using as a vehicle- it also sounds like there are a lot of questionable perceptions regarding these absurdly brief social interactions.

[Hoplite]

This isn't some subcategory of humans from a science fiction novel- it sounds pretty much in line with how people can be where ever they are and whatever they are using as a vehicle- it also sounds like there are a lot of questionable perceptions regarding these absurdly brief social interactions.
Making a fist with one hand while thrusting the middle finger straight into the air is a good indication that the person you're interacting with is displeased with you.

[Ele'ill]

Making a fist with one hand while thrusting the middle finger straight into the air is a good indication that the person you're interacting with is displeased with you.

So if I do that sometimes while driving a car does that mean I'm one of these bicyclist?

[Hoplite]

So if I do that sometimes while driving a car does that mean I'm one of these bicyclist?
No, you'd just be a really angry driver.

Not quite as bad as a biker who thinks seven pounds of aluminum grants him immortality.

[Ele'ill]

No, you'd just be a really angry driver.

Not quite as bad as a biker who thinks seven pounds of aluminum grants him immortality.

I think the main difference here- just to start out- is that when a car clips another car there's usually some anger, maybe not, but there's insurance and such and you know all of that but when a bicyclist gets clipped by a car they're you know, dead. (so they have a little bit more of a reason to be protective of themselves and their immediate space)

[Hoplite]

I think the main difference here- just to start out- is that when a car clips another car there's usually some anger, maybe not, but there's insurance and such and you know all of that but when a bicyclist gets clipped by a car they're you know, dead. (so they have a little bit more of a reason to be protective of themselves and their immediate space)
Except they arent, in my experience.

In fact, bicyclists are, in my experience, some of the most fucking reckless people on the planet when it comes to being on the road. They expect to be given special treatment and then refuse to follow even the most basic rules of the road.

[Ele'ill]

Except they arent, in my experience.
In fact, bicyclists are, in my experience, some of the most fucking reckless people on the planet when it comes to being on the road.

http://rightofway.org/research/cyclists.pdf


http://www.bikeradar.com/news/article/drivers-at-fault-in-majority-of-cycling-accidents-28489






They expect to be given special treatment

Such as?

[praxis1966]

This isn't some subcategory of humans from a science fiction novel- it sounds pretty much in line with how people can be where ever they are and whatever they are using as a vehicle- it also sounds like there are a lot of questionable perceptions regarding these absurdly brief social interactions.

You may be right in this regard, especially in light of the studies you cited. However, those studies only account for bicycle - automobile interactions. Not to mention that in the second study, you have to account for the observer effect. There's no way of knowing with absolute certainty whether or not the cyclists with the helmet cams changed their behavior because they knew their actions were being recorded. Further, I know for a fact that there's a ton of lifestylists out here, people who think that going vegan makes them an anarchist by default. Riding a bike instead of driving is just another extension of that. EG There's at least one Berkeley city supervisor (aka a city councilperson or selectman, depending on where you live) who rides for that reason and liberals tend to eat that shit up with a spoon. The first two things they mention as evidence of how cool he is have to do with his bike and vegetarian diet in that order, not his support or criticism of this or that issue.

Anyway, all of this is really kind of beside the point as you won't get any arguments out of me concerning people who drive cars doing idiotic shit. I don't mean to sound sanctimonious either as I've seen plenty of pedestrians doing plenty of equally idiotic things (running into traffic mid-block without looking, crossing the street against the signal, etc). My only point was that, after two close brushes with bicyclists speeding down the sidewalk followed by them giving me shit when they were the ones doing something obviously illegal, something needed to be done. Hell, like I said in an earlier post, I don't even particularly care if cyclists do use the sidewalk as long as they're conscientious and courteous... But they shouldn't expect me to get out of their way and definitely don't talk shit when I don't when I'm on the sidewalk.

For what it's worth, I didn't mean to suggest that cyclists were some sort of special case or something. No matter who we're talking about, be it pedestrians, cyclists or motorists, people are gonna do reckless shit because that's what people do. For instance, this guy: http://windsor.towns.pressdemocrat.com/2011/03/news/windsor-teen-survives-leap-from-golden-gate-bridge/

[Agnapostate]

Cyclists here usually fall under 3 categories; small kids under 16, random people using it as a practical vehicle, and men, in full condom equipment,their middle aged crisis.

That's what I see too: kids, commuters, and hobbyists. The hobbyists are usually pretty intense and in excellent shape out here, so there are a lot of geared-up men on racing bikes blowing past me with my backpack and regular clothes on my mountain bike.

[Agnapostate]

Another little occupational hazard: My back tire fucked up yesterday and I was trying to fix it (unsuccessfully, because of a broken part that I need to get replaced), and was outside of this gated community in the city of Carson. I'd been dropping some paperwork off at Cal State Dominguez Hills, where I'm trying to transfer. This is by Central [South Central] Avenue, on the outskirts of the city of Compton, but in an affluent area, not what the media depicts.

A Sheriff's deputy pulled up to me, acting like I was doing something wrong, accused me of being on meth because he said that my pupils were dilated, patted me down, and stuck me in the back of his squad car while he ran my name through his computer and said that he was going to run drug tests on me. I had pipes with resin in my bag and could have at least gotten an infraction and ticket, and I think I could have gotten a misdemeanor transportation charge. I didn't have any ID in my pockets, and he said he was about to search my bag, because I was acting "nervous" about it, i.e. I hadn't consented to his request to search it. For whatever reason, I randomly happened to be carrying my late dad's business card in my pocket, which stated his position as president of the county Marshals' association.

He sees it, and asks who it was, so I told him. "Your dad's a marshal?" "He was..." "Shit." He lets me go, partly because of that and maybe partly because I know some legal things, reminding him that he needed reasonable suspicion that I committed a crime to detain me. I got lucky when I shouldn't have, but I would not put it past one of the Jet Set calling in and complaining that some common rabble was next to their little kingdom. Be careful out there.