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Getting Cautious

09.25.2011 by Ray Niekamp // 8 Comments

The comment by Blackpearl in the last post triggered some resonant thoughts in my mind. He’s concerned that road riding is losing its attraction for him, because it’s just becoming too dangerous. I’m not there yet, but I do think I’m getting more cautious out on the road than I used to be.

In Blackpearl’s case, it was a near miss at some distance from home that upset him. He started wondering about what could have happened if the incident had been more serious. I guess a lot of us have that kind of reaction. I know that after my first major fall it took me about a year before I rode with my previous verve. On the club ride last week, the group turned off on a side street, then waited a long time for a stoplight to change before we could turn onto a major arterial. I mentioned to the ride leader that if we had gone on a few blocks more to a busier street, the wait at the light would have been much shorter.

“Yeah, but that’s where I had my crash,” he said.

A pickup truck’s mirror had clipped his helmet when turning too close, and he went down. His injuries were severe enough for an ambulance trip to the emergency room.

“I’d prefer not to ride there again,” he added.

I haven’t crashed in almost two years (knock wood), and I do like to bomb downhills with the kind of élan I had when I was a new biker. But in some situations I find myself backing off because of sudden timidity, too. Just a week ago I was way out in the country and faced a long downhill. The speed climbed to 37 mph. Problem was, the road was really torn up. The surface was uneven, with wide cracks parallel to my direction of travel, and spots of gravel or small potholes. Oncoming traffic kept me from getting out in the middle of the road where the surface was a little bit smoother. It was an exhilarating hill, but I was glad to put it behind me.

Another route I like out in a different area has a nice straight downhill that I always look forward to, but the last two times I’ve ridden it I found myself braking once I get to 34 mph. It also has an uneven surface, and I’m a lot less comfortable on it than I would expect, considering that I have never seen a car on that road.

One popular route north of the city features long rolling hills. It’s easy to get into the high 30s going down, but the crosswind that usually affects this route bothers the heck out of me. On a group ride two months ago, I watched the person I was chatting with zoom ahead of me on the downhill, while I feathered the brakes to guard against the (imagined) feeling I had that the wind would blow me off the road and over a steeper drop at the side.

I mentioned to my friend David that I’ve gotten more cautious in certain situations.

“That’s not caution, that’s wisdom,” he said. David is 61 and has been biking for over 20 years. But he said even he is backing off when faced with some stretches he doesn’t care for. At the same time, he recently took me a different way to get to the Veloway than usual. We rode in the left lane of a 45 mph highway (where the traffic is often moving well over 50) for about a half mile before being able to make our left turn. For him, it was a normal ride. Myself, I don’t care if I never go that way again — too nerve-wracking.

On today’s group ride, I was heading back on a four-lane divided road with no shoulder. I rode “as far to the right as practicable.” Usually, cars will take the left lane to pass, but not today. They whizzed by pretty close — well closer than the three feet we cyclists like to see. It would have been easy to get off onto a residential side street, but this was new biking territory for me, and I wasn’t sure I’d be able to navigate side streets out to the next turn. I held my ground. Most cyclists who confess to timidity say it’s because of situations like this one, where the cars come too close. The only advice I can give is to ride with at least one other person. The bigger the group, the more cars will have to give way. They won’t like it, but they’ll do it.

Ultimately, the decision about when to ride aggressively and when to back off lies with the individual cyclist. As the instructor in my Road I course said three years ago, “If it makes you uncomfortable, don’t do it.” There are things I won’t do.

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Categories // Safety Tags // bad roads, traffic

When Sharrows Don’t Work

09.04.2011 by Ray Niekamp // 5 Comments

I’ve run across several streets with “sharrow” markings lately. Sharrows are generally a great idea. They signify the sharing of traffic lanes between bikes and cars, and thereby let cars know that bikes may be around, may be taking the lane, and that it’s all right to do so. However, one recently added sharrow in Austin isn’t working.

Here’s a good example of a proper sharrow. It occupies the right lane, leaving the left lane open for motorized traffic. But bikes and cars can share the sharrow lane.

Sharrows are great in theory, and in many cases, like the picture above, they work. But recently the city of Austin added a sharrow to a right turn lane — and that causes problems that shouldn’t happen. Here’s the situation — intersection of Escarpment Blvd. and Slaughter Lane. (Slaughter is the left-right lane in this picture.) Escarpment is a divided road, two lanes in each direction. The northbound (right) lanes widen to four lanes just before a stoplighted intersection. I travel this route at least three times a week. My way continues north past the intersection.

This Google Earth view was taken before the sharrows were added. In the picture, you can see there are no markings before the right turn lane. The through lanes and left turn lane are marked with arrows.

So here’s how I used to negotiate it: Approaching the right turn lane, I would signal my intention to move left, and take the through lane. That way, any cars behind me that wanted to go right would (theoretically) have to slow down and turn right behind me.

Cars have a tendency to pass bikes and then turn in front of them. That either forces the bike to slam on its brakes, or hug to curb to avoid the car. But that also put the bike in a right turn lane, where he might not want to be.

Now, the city has made the right turn lane a sharrow. Here’s what it looks like:

The SUV is making a right turn. Note from his position in the lane that he entered the lane late — probably to make sure he got by the crazy biker taking a picture, even though my bike was off the road and on the grass. If a bike had been in the sharrow, the SUV would have cut him off. A couple of weeks ago, I saw that very thing happen to a lady on her bike. A car entering the right turn lane ahead of her forced her into the curb, and she wound up making a turn she didn’t want to make. The driver should have let her get past the turn, and dropped in behind her to make his turn.

So the problem would seem to be one of education. I’m not sure how many drivers know what sharrows even are. Heck, I’m not sure how many bikers know what sharrows even are — the lady in my example didn’t seem to. Two signs at the entrance to the right turn lane indicate that cars must yield to bikes. Yeah, that’s going to happen.

When the lane was re-striped two months ago, and the sharrow symbol added, my initial reaction was, “Cool! This will be easier to get through.” It took me about a week to rethink that. Now, I do the same thing I used to do. I take the lane before the right turn lane starts, sharrow be damned. When I’m in the lane, cars have to slow for me. When I’m in the sharrow, they think they can get around me.

I applaud the city for trying to make travel easier and safer for cyclists. But I’m afraid this time, they achieved just the opposite.

 

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Categories // Safety Tags // bike lanes, sharrow

Being Visible

07.28.2011 by Ray Niekamp // 8 Comments

I’ve been riding along some pretty busy roads lately. Most of the time, they have shoulders. Sometimes, they don’t. And shoulders and bike lanes usually end at intersections. So being seen is something I’m always aware of.

It seems whenever I hear of a collision between a car and a bike, the driver often says something like, “I didn’t see you!” Now, that’s generally because the driver was not looking for a cyclist. They were looking for motorized traffic, so didn’t expect to see cyclists.

So I decided early on that I would try to wear clothing that is visible.

Different colors show up differently. Below is a shot from the start of a group ride I attended about a year and a half ago. (It’s kinda nice to see evidence of cooler weather — I’m sure it will be back, eventually!)

Anyway, some colors jump right out. Hi-vis green, for one. On this overcast day, the screaming color makes the cyclists wearing it stand out from the crowd. Another good choice is bright yellow, also obvious in the picture.

Less of a standout — white and black. Again, the overcast sky has an effect. White might work on a day like this, but not as well when the sun is low in the sky. Blue is a popular color. It’s one of my personal favorites, and I have three jerseys that feature blue as a dominant or prominent color. But I don’t think blue is a great choice for visibility. Note the cyclist in blue top and black shorts in the right third of the picture. Not exactly a stand out.

Red and orange show up well. I was following a group several weekends ago, and all were wearing different shades of those. My wife was in her salmon pink and orange jersey, and was riding with a woman in a red flower print top. I could see them clearly well before I could determine who they were.

So I’m at a loss to figure out why black seems to be such a popular jersey color these days. Cyclists in black seem to me to blend in with their surroundings.

In addition to being less of a standout, it strikes me that black jerseys absorb too much heat. I own a jersey with black shoulders and a blue body. I wear it often, but during this hot sunny summer weather we’re having, it is not my first choice. I pick it when my other jerseys are in the wash. Both the Sky and Leopard-Trek teams in the Tour de France wore jerseys that were predominantly black. Ugh. I can’t imagine going more than 100 miles for days on end in the summer, in black.

A lot of cyclists prefer to go the understated way, though. They don’t like to dress in high visibility colors. Why? Often, it’s because they’re engaged in cycling for reasons other than sport. Commuters, for example, would like to wear their work clothes on their bikes. Touring cyclists might want to stop and visit attractions or shops on their routes, and darker clothing makes them less conspicuous in a crowd of non-bikers. Some might think the bright colored cycling jerseys themselves are dorky looking.

Other cyclists argue that color is not important — it’s how you cycle that matters. Make yourself prominent on the road. Take the lane when necessary. Make eye contact with drivers. Just because you’re wearing high-visibility clothing doesn’t mean drivers will see you.

See Me Wear jersey

As in most issues, there can be extremes. A line of cycling gear called See Me Wear is available that — well, see for yourself:

There’s even talk of requiring high-visibility colors when cycling. New Zealand is going through a debate along those lines right now. Proponents say anything that makes cyclists more visible is a good thing. Cycling advocates argue that making mandatory a type of clothing that some might see as “dorky” would discourage some people from riding — and could lull others into a false sense of security.

You wouldn’t find me wearing one of these warning chevron jerseys. But at the same time, I’m not going to take anything for granted. I’ll do what I can to ride safely, and to make myself known to drivers. But I’ll also do it in my red or yellow jerseys, and my hi-vis green jacket. And as I add to my cycling wardrobe, I’ll favor brighter, not duller, colors.

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Categories // Accessories, Equipment, Safety Tags // jersey

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