road rules.

[BikingNurse]

Can someone please explain how/why people on a good bike with all the "gear" even their brain bucked is on correctly still insist on giving us a bad name by ignoring the rules of the road?! I see many "cyclists" in my town who use the road but refuse to obey traffic signs and the like. This is why drivers don't like cyclists. Truthfully, it really irritates me!!

[Owlie]

There are a lot of commuter cyclists here who do stupid things--don't obey traffic lights or stop signs, ride against traffic, no lights or switch randomly between the road and sidewalk.

The spandex-clad crowd (what there is of it) is actually pretty good about following "the rules", but not always good about wearing helmets...

[7rider]

Can someone please explain how/why people on a good bike with all the "gear" even their brain bucked is on correctly still insist on giving us a bad name by ignoring the rules of the road?! I see many "cyclists" in my town who use the road but refuse to obey traffic signs and the like. This is why drivers don't like cyclists. Truthfully, it really irritates me!!

I'll let you know as soon as someone can tell me why a motorist - with all the "gear" - fully functioning brakes, lights, and a steering wheel, and presumably a brain in their head controlling all of it - can insist on ignoring the rules of the road - speeding, blowing through stop signs, failing to yield the right of way, failing to signal a turn. The list goes on.

You see.....a bicycle is controlled by a human (what they're wearing or not wearing is irrelevant). Just as a motor vehicle is controlled by a human. Humans will do whatever they think they can get away with - whether it's safe, legal, or otherwise. A human on a bicycle is more rare than a human in a motor vehicle. Therefore, what the human on the bike does is more obvious and therefore more visible. The frequency with which a motor vehicle operator ignores the rules of the road is just as high - if not moreso - but by virtue of their numbers and mass, it is easier for them to ignore their own transgressions and lay blame at the "other".

[OakLeaf]

Good answer! <applause>

[marni]

as they keep saying in the movie Shakespeare in Love "It's a mystery."

marni

[PamNY]

BikingNurse, I get frustrated with bad cyclists, too. And I really, really, really don't see what the behavior of auto drivers has to do with it.

When a cyclist ran down a 73-year-old women in Central Park, the road was closed to cars. When cyclists grumble at me for stopping to let pedestrians cross the bike path (required by law in a crosswalk), there are no cars present.

When a cyclist bumped me while I was photographing a bird nest last week, there were no cars around. It was just plain, no-excuses rude biking. Nothing to do with cars.

[zoom-zoom]

I had TWO cyclists nearly take me out, today (both in the same group of riders). I used the public MUP for a few miles to avoid a busy and risky stretch of road (the path in this area is generally pretty quiet, though not in great shape for riding a road bike), but I think I would have been safer on the road with the cars.

They were riding 2 across...no problem, but when another cyclist (me) approaches from the opposite direction wouldn't it seem appropriate to go single-file to let the other cyclist pass? So I squeezed past while they refused to give me an inch (and they actually glared at me...WTF?!). Then the next pair in the group was a woman and a guy. The woman looked right at me...the guy was looking at the ground immediately in front of his bike--did not see me (and the woman didn't in any way alert him to my presence). As we got closer I yelled "heads up, heads up, heads up!" He nearly lost control of his bike and crashed with the woman as he darted over to avoid colliding with me.

Flippin' morons. These idiots make the rest of us look bad. They were all on road bikes, so one would assume that they have some knowledge of proper riding etiquette. My dad (not a cyclist) has had it with the touron (tourist moron) cyclists in their area. They ride on the wrong side of the road, weave all over, won't go single-file when they obstruct traffic, run stops, don't watch for cars, and just generally put everyone on the road at risk. THESE "cyclists" are the ones who stand-out to non-cyclists and cause so much ire to be directed towards those of us who are following rules appropriately.

[OakLeaf]

What 7r was trying to say, and what I agreed with, is that it doesn't have anything to do with cars OR bikes.

It has to do with PEOPLE.

I see just as many rude and oblivious pedestrians ... we all have.

Nothing to do with cycling or cyclists.

[Owlie]

I get that. The problem is, nobody ever says "drivers don't follow the rules" or "pedestrians don't pay attention." It's often "cyclists don't follow the rules, so they shouldn't be on the road and if I hit one, I shouldn't have to face the consequences."

We don't have the protection pedestrians have, nor do we have the strength of numbers or (in many, if not most) places to constitute a political force. A few bad apples...

[Crankin]

I agree that people, generally, are rude.
But, what I think the op was trying to describe is that bad feeling I get when I see another cyclist do something rude, illegal, etc. Because I am a member of that group, it makes me feel like I am going to be judged or compared to the cyclist who is being rude. While i do get mad other drivers, it's not the same feeling; I think it has to do with being a member of a "minority" group, that others always are not so keen on. The best thing I can compare it to is the way I feel when another Jewish person is accused of a crime or something immoral. It's like his/her actions speak for the whole group.
Perhaps not everyone who rides gets this "feeling," when observing other cyclists behaving badly, but I know that my DH and several of my riding friends do

[Owlie]

I agree that people, generally, are rude.
But, what I think the op was trying to describe is that bad feeling I get when I see another cyclist do something rude, illegal, etc. Because I am a member of that group, it makes me feel like I am going to be judged or compared to the cyclist who is being rude. While i do get mad other drivers, it's not the same feeling; I think it has to do with being a member of a "minority" group, that others always are not so keen on

This is exactly what I was trying to say.

[zoom-zoom]

This is exactly what I was trying to say.

And it's exactly why I get riled-up when I see it. Partly because it paints us all in a bad light, but what got me yesterday is that one would think that cyclists would look out for other cyclists--I know I do. Apparently not everyone on a road bike got that memo.

[PamNY]

I get annoyed at the road bike/spandex people because they are dangerous. Period. They go way too fast in crowded conditions, they veer waaaay into my lane on curves and I'm frightened they will hit me.

During the Nautica Triathlon recently, I was nearly in tears. Some of these people were terrifying. I know they weren't familiar with New York, but if you can't understand new conditions, stay home. I saw one biker ride directly at a child on a skateboard. For some reason, he was the one who went down but he YELLED AT THE CHILD.

I don't feel like part of a minority group, I don't think other bikers make me look bad (only I can do that). I certainly don't think there's a shortage of complaints about pedestrians or car drivers. I don't think people are generally rude; I see way more good than bad.

I took the OP's post to mean she was frustrated and wanted to let off steam.

[Crankin]

I don't see too many other road cyclists blatantly ignoring the laws the way I see commuters do when I go to the city. When my son started commuting last year he called me up after his first week and asked if it was OK to do the stuff the other riders were doing, i.e. running reds and being just generally crazy. I told him no, it's not OK, you will still get there! He now likes to "race" these people, showing them that he can keep up, even with obeying the law.
Occasionally I see, mostly riders who are alone, running reds out where I live, but there just aren't that many lights. The large club rides that come through here generally obey the stopping stuff, because the police are watching, but at times, they don't ride single file when they should be.

[Eden]

What 7r was trying to say, and what I agreed with, is that it doesn't have anything to do with cars OR bikes.

It has to do with PEOPLE.

I see just as many rude and oblivious pedestrians ... we all have.

Nothing to do with cycling or cyclists.

+++1

And it certainly has nothing to do with spandex.....

People like to generalize about those who look different from themselves and ignore those who seem to similar. Why else would it be perfectly fine to perform a California stop in a car (I *rarely, rarely* ever see a car come to a full and actual stop behind a stop sign here) and then turn around are totally rail about the cyclist who did the same thing?