Missed connection

[Steve O]

Me: Northbound Lynn Street on top of the Rosslyn tunnel–taking the whole left lane (left turn only) as usual to prevent left hooking. (I usually ride up onto the sidewalk/Custis at Lee Hwy so the bikeometer counts me.)

You #1: Car in next lane over (straight only) with right turn signal on trying to move to the right but not really moving at all.

You #2: Car behind car#1 choosing not to wait behind and so going around car #1 to the left. Except that’s where I am. Oh, and no turn signal to indicate this sudden movement. Also no glancing over your shoulder to make sure no one is in that lane.

Me: Screaming at you to pay attention and veering to the far left of the lane to avoid being smooshed. Thankfully car #2 didn’t get all the way left before noting my presence.

Me: Wishing I had stopped and channeled my inner Dirt to have a friendly conversation with said driver, but instead just rode on with slightly elevated heart rate.

[mstone]

Me: guy taking the family out on the MVT this weekend on another warm and pleasant day

You: the Potomac

Oh my god, the smell.

Me: the frazzled guy trying to teach multiple children the rules of polite use of the trails. (Keep to the right! Stay in your lane! Signal! Not so close!)

You: kitted up people on road bikes passing between the trying-to-be-good kids and the oncoming baby strollers on the other side

[Dickie]

@mstone 93953 wrote:

Me: the frazzled guy trying to teach multiple children the rules of polite use of the trails. (Keep to the right! Stay in your lane! Signal! Not so close!)

You: kitted up people on road bikes passing between the trying-to-be-good kids and the oncoming baby strollers on the other side

It sucks that these weekend bozos wear the same outfit I do but have half the sense and none of the manners. Wish I had seen you, I would have been the kitted guy encouraging your kids and complimenting their skills. Awesome that you were out there on the weekend, it’s seeing families riding together that makes the MVT tolerable.

[Supermau]

Are those the so called ” pathletes”. The most risky passers of them all from my experience…a lot of them anyway.

[pfunkallstar]

@Supermau 93962 wrote:

Are those the so called ” pathletes”. The most risky passers of them all from my experience…a lot of them anyway.

Yes and don’t forget the supremely annoying, but incredibly rare, “penpathletes,” i.e. that guy who does interval sprints up and down the hill by the I-66 overpass on the Custis, randomly stopping and doing push-ups at the top of the hill in the middle of the trail. I have only seen this on one occasion – had to savor it.

[mstone]

@Supermau 93962 wrote:

Are those the so called ” pathletes”. The most risky passers of them all from my experience…a lot of them anyway.

Yes. At some point, you need to man up and find a road.

Note: I don’t mean to be gender exclusive: I think a disproportionate number of the risky passers yesterday were women (that is, more than the percentage of women overall). But “man up” is a much catchier phrase than “person up”.

[Raymo853]

Me: Goofball who did not pay attention to the orientation of my new headlight.
You: Guy coming the other way on the 14th street bridge who dramatically shielded your eyes.

Sorry, I corrected the orientation right afterwards.

[DismalScientist]

@Dickie 93954 wrote:

It sucks that these weekend bozos wear the same outfit I do but have half the sense and none of the manners.

There’s hope for you yet. Now, just change the outfit.:rolleyes:

[cyclingfool]

@mstone 93953 wrote:

Me: guy taking the family out on the MVT this weekend on another warm and pleasant day

You: the Potomac

Oh my god, the smell.

The smell this morning was something to be reckoned with. I didn’t really encounter the Potomac until the 14th St Bridge today b/c I went through the Pentagon reservation on Boundary Channel and then through pas the LBJ Memorial, so I can’t speak to how localized my experience was. But once I did come to the bridge, it smelt horrible. It seemed worse as I got closer to the DC side and smelled of rotting fish, so I assumed it was the seafood market, but maybe it was the whole river.

[Supermau]

@Raymo853 93969 wrote:

Me: Goofball who did not pay attention to the orientation of my new headlight.
You: Guy coming the other way on the 14th street bridge who dramatically shielded your eyes.

Sorry, I corrected the orientation right afterwards.

I’ve had to fine tune my own 700 lumens after blinding a couple folks, don’t feel bad.

[mikoglaces]

@mstone 93953 wrote:

Me: guy taking the family out on the MVT this weekend on another warm and pleasant day

Me: the frazzled guy trying to teach multiple children the rules of polite use of the trails. (Keep to the right! Stay in your lane! Signal! Not so close!)

You: kitted up people on road bikes passing between the trying-to-be-good kids and the oncoming baby strollers on the other side

When I first started riding local MUPs, I thought kids didn’t belong there. I was wrong. Kids have never ever caused me any problem. Lots of kitted up guys have.

[PotomacCyclist]

@cyclingfool 93971 wrote:

The smell this morning was something to be reckoned with. I didn’t really encounter the Potomac until the 14th St Bridge today b/c I went through the Pentagon reservation on Boundary Channel and then through pas the LBJ Memorial, so I can’t speak to how localized my experience was. But once I did come to the bridge, it smelt horrible. It seemed worse as I got closer to the DC side and smelled of rotting fish, so I assumed it was the seafood market, but maybe it was the whole river.

When there are heavy rains, the water from the storm sewers mixes in with the sanitary sewers and the overflow gets dumped out into the Potomac River. That is, untreated sewage starts flooding into the river. That’s what the smell is.

Any city with older sewer systems has the same problem. This is why you should avoid flooded paths and roads after heavy rain. (Well, also the fact that you could get washed away if there’s a strong current.)

D.C. is working on the problem, with a billion dollar+ project to construct massive tunnels under SW and SE D.C. Those large tunnels will act as reservoirs for storm water and help to prevent the water from mixing with sanitary sewers. The tunnels won’t solve the problem completely, but it should cut down on the number of times that untreated sewage floods into the Potomac. I’ll have to find the article later on, but I think I remember reading that right now, we average more than 100 days a year when untreated sewage floods into the river because of rain. Or something like that. (Maybe someone here has the stats on hand.) Once the tunnels are complete, the number of days of sewage overflow should drop to 30 or so a year. Still not ideal, but much better than the current situation.

However, I believe it’s supposed to take a least a few more years before the first of the tunnels is completed. So if it rains again this week, expect to experience more of those aromatic smells near the water.

[PotomacCyclist]

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/07/140703-combined-sewer-overflow-washington-storm-water-tunnel/

‘The new excavations correct a problem that dates from the 19th century, when the city was fitted with a “combined sewer overflow” system. A combined system means storm water and sewage are channeled into the same pipes. About 750 communities around the country still use this system, notes Ray.

On dry days, the pipes are big enough to move that combined flow to local water treatment plants. But if the city gets more than a quarter inch of rain at one time, the system is overwhelmed, and engineers have to divert the entire flow—sewage and all—directly into the local rivers.

Washington has been diverting three billion gallons of raw sewage into the rivers on an annual basis, says Ray. The Anacostia takes the brunt of that flow, which is especially bad for its water quality because impurities tend to linger in slower and shallower rivers.’

[cyclingfool]

@PotomacCyclist 93978 wrote:

When there are heavy rains, the water from the storm sewers mixes in with the sanitary sewers and the overflow gets dumped out into the Potomac River. That is, untreated sewage starts flooding into the river. That’s what the smell is.

Any city with older sewer systems has the same problem. This is why you should avoid flooded paths and roads after heavy rain. (Well, also the fact that you could get washed away if there’s a strong current.)

I knew about combined sewage overflow issues in DC and the and the infra projects to address it, but didn’t put it together in my head about the smell and the rains over the weekend. Probably would have thought of something more generalized like the sewage issue had I ridden along the river more this morning and/or remembered about the heavy rain events over the weekend.

[PotomacCyclist]

I was more aware of it because the Saturday downpour led to the cancellation of the swim at the triathlon this weekend. Plus there were specific announcements, relayed on the triathlon social media sites, about the sewage outflow on Saturday. Even down to the exact minute. I think they said it occurred at 10:41 pm on Saturday, although I’m pretty sure the sewage overflow continued for more than 60 seconds.

[Author]

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