Lane splitting

[jnva]

M street westbound through Gtown in the afternoon can be strange. I have ridden completely by myself on the road all the way to key bridge, but most of the time it’s total gridlock.

Thanks for the responses everyone, I am going to try some of the alternate routes.

[GuyContinental]

@consularrider 30574 wrote:

I’m a little confused about which intersection you mean. Both Washington Blvd and 10th St have left turn lanes onto Clarendon/Wilson, but Fairfax Blvd is 50 feet of one way westbound when it intersects with Wilson by Northside Social. With the left turn backups at each of the first two intersections, unless I can see absolutely no west bound traffic on 10th, I have started to opt to bear right on 10th from Fairfax, staying in the right lane. Then I will line up in the right hand lane on Wilson at the traffic island and go through on Wilson’s signal taking the right hand lane for the short block until I get to the bike lane on Clarendon after the Washington Blvd intersection.

My bad- the first left is onto Kirkwood from Fairfax but until I just looked at a map I thought that Kirkwood started at Washington Blvd. I live in Lyon Village so I take a left onto Kirkwood, a right onto Washington and then a quick left onto 13th st. and then into the neighborhood. It’s almost exactly the same length as heading down Custis to Lee but requires less effort EB (in the morning I go down to Lee). In winter darkness Lee to Highland is safer (but barely) so I generally stick to the trail as long as I can.

[Dickie]

@Dirt 30569 wrote:

IF I ride up the right side (which I also don’t do often) I do so at a very slow speed so that I can react quickly if I need to. Lots of times I wait in line with the cars.

Couldn’t agree more. Although it sucks to sit in traffic, I just don’t feel safe passing streams of cars on the right. I feel much safer (and visible) sitting and waiting with everyone else. I also think it encourages motorists to accept cyclists as vehicles.

[vvill]

@eminva 30575 wrote:

I’ve used several options over the years but my preferred route at the moment is 17th Street south to G Street, west on G Street to Virginia Avenue and then TR Bridge. I only discovered this route because construction was blocking my normal route out of the alley behind our building, and the detour put me out on Connecticut. Like all other westbound routes it has its downsides, but it is a lot better than M Street.Liz

Similar to what I do as well, except I come south on 21st before going onto G St. For a while I was going I St. to Foggy Bottom metro and New Hampshire to Virginia. The great thing about going south if you forget to turn onto G St. it’s only a couple straight miles to Hains Pt.

@Dirt 30577 wrote:

ride back through Georgetown and cross key bridge. It was seriously ugly. I hung out in line and just waited my turn for things. It took for ever.

Sine then I’ve either hopped up to N street (or even further north), down to riding under Whitehurst Freeway or stayed east, headed past the Kennedy Center and across Roosevelt Bridge. The latter is part of my daily route for the most part. I either head up through Rosslyn, or south past National Airport and up 4-mile run and W&OD.

Same. First time I tried M St going home it was chaos, and I’ve never bothered with that way since.

Which way do you go when you go from under the Whitehurst to Key Bridge? Seems like there is no easy connection there.

[mstone]

@Dickie 30609 wrote:

Couldn’t agree more. Although it sucks to sit in traffic, I just don’t feel safe passing streams of cars on the right. I feel much safer (and visible) sitting and waiting with everyone else. I also think it encourages motorists to accept cyclists as vehicles.

You don’t actually get any bonus points for sitting unnecessarily. The cars are perfectly willing to pass in-lane (which they wouldn’t do for another car) so why shouldn’t we be equally willing to pass them in-lane? I know it’s a lot of burden for them to have to put one hand on the wheel and look up from texting to pass a bike, but they’ll get over it.

[jnva]

This is why I prefer going down the middle of L street. This happened to me this morning – double whammy Maryland driver and a BMW!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF8qLbIwBPY&feature=youtube_gdata_player

[DismalScientist]

At least he/she signaled… Unlike the Pennsylvania driver on Clarendon that did the same thing to me today.

[dasgeh]

I don’t know if I’ve just been away too long, or if this thread is just super confusing. I’ve always understood that there are two different issues: (1) where bikes ride when cars and bikes are both moving (“riding”) and (2) where bikes ride when cars are stopped and bikes are moving (“filtering”). My understanding is that, in DC (not sure about in VA), filtering is legal on either the right or the left. In other words, when cars are stopped, a bike may pass on the right or left, and doesn’t need a full lane. Of course, there are thousands of unique situations, each with its own answer as to whether filtering is a good idea at all, and whether left or right is better. On my commute, I end up filtering at lights when I know I’ll have time to get to the light (and sit in/by the crosswalk, where good city planners would have put a bike box). I usually filter between the right most lane (which usually has buses stopped in it) and the middle lane. I ride along in the right-most lane that goes where I need to, and take the lane as best I can.

I hate Gtown on a bike. I use TR bridge to intersection of doom to the Custis. It would be awesome if they built a connection from the CCT/Water St (under the Whitehurst) to the West side of the Key Bridge…

[jabberwocky]

@jnva 30639 wrote:

This is why I prefer going down the middle of L street. This happened to me this morning – double whammy Maryland driver and a BMW!

Dirt would disapprove, but people who do that to me get a new cleat-shaped-dent in the rear quarter panel of their fancy beemer.

[eminva]

@jnva 30639 wrote:

This is why I prefer going down the middle of L street. This happened to me this morning – double whammy Maryland driver and a BMW!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF8qLbIwBPY&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Yep, that’s pretty much SOP on L street and your solution of taking the middle lane is correct.

Liz

[GuyContinental]

@jnva 30639 wrote:

This is why I prefer going down the middle of L street. This happened to me this morning – double whammy Maryland driver and a BMW!

It almost seems cute going that slowly- out here in Loudoun there are 2 downhill right turn lanes on my commute where folks do that to me where I’m going 30 and they are going 60. Usually they have to accelerate more than they thought to blast to past me and then slam on their brakes halfway into the right lane to make their turn. I usually get forced into traffic (that’s also moving at ~50-60)… big ol’ pucker factor. Might have to get a camera just for show and tell.

[Terpfan]

@jnva 30639 wrote:

This is why I prefer going down the middle of L street. This happened to me this morning – double whammy Maryland driver and a BMW!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF8qLbIwBPY&feature=youtube_gdata_player

By DC law I think that’s actually correct to be in the right side of the middle lane because the right lane has no functioning traffic flow due to parking, thereby the middle lane becomes the lane of commute. Besides, you run the risk of dooring if you’re in the right side.

I don’t ride L regularly, but I do infrequently. I have encountered that problem once there. Then again, I encounter it a few times a week on the 15th St cycletrack and I figure those turning must know the cycletrack is there and just don’t care.

[Dirt]

@jabberwocky 30654 wrote:

Dirt would disapprove, but people who do that to me get a new cleat-shaped-dent in the rear quarter panel of their fancy beemer.

For all the WWDD talk, I am far from perfect.

I’m not proud of it, but I confess to having figured out that my cargo bike is capable of removing a side mirror off of Chrysler 300M kinda like a bottle opener removes a bottle cap. Made a cool noise when it came off… cooler when it dangled from the wiring and left scratches in the door paint as it swung. It didn’t happen on purpose on my part… but I didn’t exactly shed a tear for the car or driver.

There are plenty more stories where that came from. I’ve been fortunate that few of them ended in me sustaining injuries.

The bottom line is this.. Lots of incidents like this have taught me a thing or two about stuff like this. As a result, I don’t split lanes. I rarely go up the right side of stopped cars. I’ll go some pretty good lengths to find some mellow roads to ride on or at least busy ones where I flow with traffic.

As I’ve said elsewhere… I’ve also got into the habit of reporting EVERY aggressive driving incident I encounter. I report them even when I don’t think anyone is going to do anything about them. I try to be as objective, fair and informative as possible and not get emotional about it. I get pictures and license plates if I can.

I work pretty darn hard not to put myself in a position where bad stuff happens. Nowhere I’m going is so important that it can’t see me getting there 5 minutes later.

I know this post went a lot of places… not all of them on-topic. Just kinda felt like it needed to be said.

[Dirt]

@jnva 30639 wrote:

This is why I prefer going down the middle of L street. This happened to me this morning – double whammy Maryland driver and a BMW!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF8qLbIwBPY&feature=youtube_gdata_player

The dreaded right hook… I see that on Pennsylvania Avenue almost every morning.

[Tim Kelley]

@jnva 30639 wrote:

This is why I prefer going down the middle of L street. This happened to me this morning – double whammy Maryland driver and a BMW!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF8qLbIwBPY&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Just curious about your setup–is that an electric bike? At :07 it sounds like you can hear a motor winding up. And what are using to record the video? The vertical positioning makes me think iphone.

[Author]

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