Bicycles/sharing the road

Well. Since you've ridden so many thousands of miles on that bicycle, you are probably familiar with this piece of road: US Hwy 101 between Yachats and Florence, OR that goes past the Sea Lion Caves. I used to live in Waldport. I can not count the number of times I've come around some of those 25 and 30mph, uphill corners to find people on bicycles in the middle of the travel lane and flat refusing to move the *#%& over because of they are "exercising their right to travel." I have been flipped off, yelled at and called filthy names by some of these people because they do not want to share the road. It did not matter that I was in an ambulance responding code three to a bicyclist struck by a car when the struck cyclist was in the middle of the opposing lane of traffic....most likely flipping off, swearing at and name-calling a car who was trying to get by slower traffic....i.e....a bicyclist.

Possession of a bicycle does not give you dominion over the nation's roadways. The last sentence in the quote above tells the whole story of how you feel. The man you quoted is a former police officer who responded to crashes caused by just the sort of thing I described above. I responded to it too...as a medical provider.

Regardless of how you feel about your "right to travel" there are roads that should be off limits to bicycles. Period. Because I kind of got tired of scraping up grease spots peppered with pieces of bicycle helmets off the road with a flat-nose shovel and a fire hose.

Get it?

 

Perhaps educating other cyclists (I refuse to call you a "biker") may be a more productive goal than calling people names on a trucker's forum.
Ciao.

 

In some of the towns around my community, there are traffic signs prohibiting bikes on some roads because there has been too many accidents (not condemning bikes or motorists), just stating regulations some areas have adopted.

 

Man, There's been a lot of knuckleheads on bicycles taking up the lane i'm traveling on, on a two lane road even after giving em the train horn they still won't move out the way. So here I am slamming on my brakes because theres oncoming traffic. Really starting to piss me off........

 

Cyclist in my area is starting to work my nerves. They generally ride the service road on a hwy that between my town and the next town over which is cool. These services roads are hardly used and long. Well here lately they have started taking a side road which is busy with oilfield traffic. I don't see why the change in roads but this side road doesn't leave a lot of room for errors. Heck, the four wheelers and big trucks are always running into each other on this road. I'm a mountain bike rider my self and I wouldn't be caught riding on this road.

 

I remember seeing a policeman stopping a few bycyclists for impeding traffic flow not too long ago...

 

Speaking as a cyclist and having my CDL, but not actively driving, please keep in mind that people in a motor vehicle have a couple hundred horse power or more at their disposal. When I go out for a bike ride, I start out with a MAXIMUM of ONE horse power and, depending on the conditions of the ride, finish near zero, if not in the negative numbers.

I agree with smellybacon that truckers do a far better job of sharing the road than 4-wheelers.

Here's to the day that I will actually be driving 18 wheels with 2 wheels in the sleeper!

 

Cyclists need to keep that in mind as well.

 

Which is the main reason that people who are on bicycles need to choose which roads they ride on. Common sense should tell people that riding a bicycle on a high speed highway that is a narrow two lane with no shoulders, just is not very bright.

I'm not talking about what the law says. I'm talking about survival.

The truckers actually do have more to lose than the four wheelers do.

Hope you get the job you are looking for!