Do Cylists irritate Motorists & Vice Versa?

[CorsairMac]

It's my belief that cyclists that irritate motorists are dealing with motorists who have issues anyway and are just looking for someone/thing to take it out on. As a rule, my daily commutes on a busy street are filled with motorists who go out of their way to watch out for me - sometimes to the detriment of the other drivers! LOL Most of my close calls have come from inattentive drivers. But it could be that I live in a biker-friendly city.

[Geonz]

A lot has to do with what s/he's calling "Defensive Riding," in my opinion... sometimes what is best is counterintuitive.
HOwever, a *lot* has to do with local culture, and just how crowded the roads are.
Around here, there isn't too much traffic, *and* the locals are accustomed to things like tractors. Slowing down for a bit doesn't bother most people. HOwever, if I"m goign down one of our busier streets, I'm much more likely to get hollered at, and people *have* been hit and had things thrown at them.

In many communities, cyclists are a minority - and that brings baggage. It's human nature that when one group has inherent power over another, they tend to rationalize that that group shouldn't have any rights anyway, and will make up a rationale for it. Since most people they talk to are in their majority, they tend to get it supported. SO, there are groups of A Certain Type who sort of don't understand that a: most riders also have cars so they *do* pay taxes, b: cars are the creatures that cause the damage that we have to pay those taxes to repair; the bikes don't cost the road crews those dollars. They just cause the "eternal" seconds of inconvenience to the all-powerful driver... and usually the link between "road taxes" isn't direct anyway. Do you have "road taxes" on your tax form? No.

Here, I'm surprised that a generally very supportive community is horredously unreflected in the road plans... we have some bike paths but they tend to do things like go right *through* bus stops, or are in the middle of the road (despite people jumping up and down at meetings when they planned the things!?) or have to cross busy streets suddenly or just END wham! (Change may be in the wind... but this *is* Illinois and the politics ... argh...) So I tend to just take the roads... where almost all drivers treat me with respect.

"Riding Defensively" - what does that mean? Riding too defensively sometimes means being invisible and that's worse than being "out there." HOwever, so much depends on the local culture.