February 2015 Trail Conditions

[hozn]

Rain only ’til midday according to weather.com, windy afternoon should dry things up for Tues AM. Fingers crossed; I am not keen to remount studded tires.

[PotomacCyclist]

Weather Underground is showing a 94-100% chance of rain from now (10-11 pm) through 7 pm Monday evening, with temperatures around 35F at that time. The temps will fall below freezing by 10 pm Monday and stay there until midday Tue. Hopefully the warmer Mon. afternoon and the strong winds will prevent ice buildup, but commuters should be prepared for some problem spots Tue. morning.

[hozn]

Ah, weather underground; that is the problem. In my experience, anyway, weather.com is the most correct weather service for hourly precipitation models. I wish it weren’t so, because I hate the ads on their Android app, but after spending a while with all the alternatives, I keep coming back because their projections are the most likely to be correct.

Anyway, the ride in was really pleasant, just misty. There’s a bit of slush still on the trail between Gallows, Cedar and in Reston, but I would expect the trails to be completely clean by the afternoon.

[vern]

The wooden bridges on the WOD were all clear this morning except for a tiny bit of slush serving as a center stripe on the eastbound Citizens bridge. Hopefully they dry before the freeze hits later on today.

[dasgeh]

@PotomacCyclist 107231 wrote:

Weather Underground is showing a 94-100% chance of rain from now (10-11 pm) through 7 pm Monday evening, with temperatures around 35F at that time. The temps will fall below freezing by 10 pm Monday and stay there until midday Tue. Hopefully the warmer Mon. afternoon and the strong winds will prevent ice buildup, but commuters should be prepared for some problem spots Tue. morning.

I’m worried about temps dropping tonight earlier than currently predicted, because the predictions I’ve seen show warmer temps this morning than we’ve had… Anyway, be careful out there. Remember that roads (in particular car lanes) are a bit warmer than trails, and the weight of cars will melt ice, especially when temps are around freezing.

[cyclingfool]

weather.GOV FTW!

[hozn]

@cyclingfool 107247 wrote:

weather.GOV FTW!

To be honest, I’ve never used the NOAA weather on the phone. I’ll give it a try and see if it is as good as (or better than?) weather.com. I’ve used their website, which is almost worse than weather.com in terms of user-friendliness, but at least it’s not littered with ads. But the hourly forecast graphs are very nice. When I was trying to use their API to find weather data for the freezingsaddles scoreboard, I ended up giving up; the registered [small] weather stations were pretty useless at recording observations, apparently.

[rcannon100]

@cyclingfool 107247 wrote:

weather.GOV FTW!

This is what I use. I find it to be excellent. Their local weather forecast graphs can give you a weather prediction for the minute of your commute. And then I use WeatherUnderground’s radar map for weather right now.

[IMG]http://forecast.weather.gov/meteograms/Plotter.php?lat=38.8845&lon=-77.0939&wfo=LWX&zcode=VAZ054&gset=20&gdiff=3&unit=0&tinfo=EY5&ahour=0&pcmd=11011111111110000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000&lg=en&indu=1!1!1!&dd=&bw=&hrspan=48&pqpfhr=6&psnwhr=6[/IMG]

[PotomacCyclist]

Weather Underground is currently owned by The Weather Channel. I think all of the major weather sites include National Weather Service data, but WU includes data from 80,000 local monitoring stations. I used to look at weather.com but not recently, so I can’t say which is more accurate. Both sites change their forecasts frequently. The WU forecast for today has been changing every time I check, but I remember the same thing happening when I used to look at weather.com.

The main problem for me with weather.com was the obnoxious ads. I tried running ad blockers, but I think that breaks the site, or they incorporate the ads so it’s not easy to block them. Even then, I wouldn’t get bothered because I know websites depend on ad revenue to operate. But weather.com has an awful ad service. I think it’s the Taboola article referral service. For several months, I kept seeing links and photos for conspiracy websites and articles, like “Billionaire declares that U.S. economy about to enter worst depression in history” and alarmist junk like that. I think weather.com disables many of their weather charts and graphs if you don’t allow Taboola to run. After being warned of “the greatest depression in history” week after week, I had to find a new weather site. So far, we haven’t had a total economic collapse in the past couple years, so I’m thinking that the Taboola articles may not be too accurate.

[cyclingfool]

I like the NOAA Weather app I have on my Android a lot. The graph’s a little harder to read on it than on a full size computer monitor, but the app I use now has a tabular representation of the same date as a view option, so that’s helpful. I do agree that the site can seem a little clunky for some things, but for straight up forecast down to the hour, including wind speed, etc., I find it hands down to be my favorite, and I help pay for it already, so I might as well take full advantage of it… and avoid annoying ads. Plus now that I use it all the time, I know how to navigate the page pretty easily, even if it might not be 100% user-friendly or intuitive all the time. In this case, familiarity breeds ease of use, not contempt.

[hozn]

@PotomacCyclist 107253 wrote:

Weather Underground is currently owned by The Weather Channel. I think all of the major weather sites include National Weather Service data, but WU includes data from 80,000 local monitoring stations. I used to look at weather.com but not recently, so I can’t say which is more accurate. Both sites change their forecasts frequently. The WU forecast for today has been changing every time I check, but I remember the same thing happening when I used to look at weather.com.

The main problem for me with weather.com was the obnoxious ads. I tried running ad blockers, but I think that breaks the site, or they incorporate the ads so it’s not easy to block them. Even then, I wouldn’t get bothered because I know websites depend on ad revenue to operate. But weather.com has an awful ad service. I think it’s the Taboola article referral service. For several months, I kept seeing links and photos for conspiracy websites and articles, like “Billionaire declares that U.S. economy about to enter worst depression in history” and alarmist junk like that. I think weather.com disables many of their weather charts and graphs if you don’t allow Taboola to run. After being warned of “the greatest depression in history” week after week, I had to find a new weather site. So far, we haven’t had a total economic collapse in the past couple years, so I’m thinking that the Taboola articles may not be too accurate.

Yeah, I tuned adblocker to remove all that crap. But I agree, it’s gross. I’d love to find a reliable alternative. FWIW, Weather.com has had consistent hourly forecasts since yesterday in terms of precipitation. They revised their hourly temps last night to show it dropping faster (31F by 4pm instead of originally expected 35F). That looks to be significantly colder than the weather.gov forecasts (~37F, looks similar to original model from weather.com), so we’ll see who wins today. WU looks consistent with weather.com forecast now as far as I can tell.

[bobco85]

Warning to anyone wanting to use the Williamsburg Blvd bike lane in Arlington near Sycamore St: http://www.arlnow.com/2015/02/02/water-main-break-creates-sinkhole-on-williamsburg-blvd/

[TwoWheelsDC]

@bobco85 107264 wrote:

Warning to anyone wanting to use the Williamsburg Blvd bike lane in Arlington near Sycamore St: http://www.arlnow.com/2015/02/02/water-main-break-creates-sinkhole-on-williamsburg-blvd/

Thankfully, not many cyclist go through that particular section of the circle, where you turn left from northbound Sycamore to west/southbound Williamsburg. Most cyclists go up Sycamore and continue on to northbound Williamsburg, Powhatan, or Little Falls. You also can just go around the circle to make that turn from Sycamore to Williamsbug, so it shouldn’t be particularly disruptive for cyclists or drivers.

[vern]

Currently winds at Dulles are 30 mph out of the NW with gusts to 39. I’m not thinking that I really want to ride straight into that on my 21 mile commute home.

[mikoglaces]

@vern 107273 wrote:

I’m not thinking that I really want to ride straight into that on my 21 mile commute home.

Serpentine.

[Author]

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