The Shoal Report

[83b]

I’ll preface this by admitting that my commute route and stickler-for-the-rules behavior provide perfect conditions for getting shoaled frequently. There are tons of lights along my route down the East Capitol St and Penn Ave lanes. And I stop at every red behind the designated stop line.

But the incidences of shoaling are starting to drive me insane. Today I was shoaled 10 times out of 13 possible interactions (i.e., only three times did someone stop behind me at a light–the same woman in each instance). That seems to be pretty representative for a late morning commute, but I’m going to start keeping track. It’s particularly irritating when the person is (a) someone you just passed and now have to wait to safely pass again, (b) a crap biker who does the awkward hop-shuffle start to get going, (c) someone who is obviously slow but was going to try to run the light and couldn’t find a gap in traffic, or (d) trying to maintain momentum and so tries to shoot past you right as the light changes. Having spelled it out, I realize just how irritating I find shoaling in all it’s infinite colors and variations.

My ire is particularly high today because I almost put (or maybe did put) someone into the barrier poles in the Penn Ave median. Three people in a tight line tried to shoot around me as the light at 14th had just changed to green. I’d already started going–but was still building speed–and things got crowded. The third guy in the line made contact with my bars and I leaned into him hard. He didn’t go down, but I did hear skidding as he stopped just short of (or went into?) the barriers. Enraged, I’m ashamed to admit, I immediately passed the other two shoalers in the intersection and exchanged nasty words about their behavior before speeding off to the 15th street hill. A total failure to channel Dirt’s zen on my part, which thankfully doesn’t happen often.

This latest incident riled me up/shook me enough that I’m thinking about ignoring the stop lines from now on and pulling up as far as possible so that people can’t pull that cute little maneuver. But I really hate obstructing the crosswalks in any way, especially on the Hill. Any other good strategies or options people employ?

Courtesy of the BikeSnob
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Topic

[Xarici]

I also stop at all lights behind the stop bar on E. Cap and Penn and am constantly being shoaled. The worst are the people that do it multiple times on one stretch. I even had a guy on a CaBi last week shoal me (without calling) three times despite having thanked me for calling my first pass. I know the route and the timing of the lights so I know when I need to push, slow down, so it really bugs me that people are self-important/rude/unaware enough to jump ahead of me only to get stuck at the next light they can’t ‘safely’ jump. I just try to be patient and ding/call every time so they get the memo, but doesn’t always work though sometimes it will. I have tried telling them it makes us look bad, doesn’t usually work but I did get one positive reaction once. I have also audibly apologized to the pedestrians the other biker cut off. I would also be interested in others’ experiences, especially constructive ones.

[KLizotte]

I must be the only person in DC that actually stops and waits at all the lights on the 15th St cycletrack. All the other cyclists seem to do an Idaho stop. Fortunately I’m never in a hurry on a bike so I just let them pass. To 83(b): in the long term, you’re better off stopping behind the line, taking a deep breath, and trying to educate when possible. Hopefully the others will eventually catch on.

A week or so ago I did apologize to some tourist peds by the tidal basin when a dickhead cyclist blew by them dangerously close. Slow down dude!

Overall though, PA Ave in particular, I’m simply thankful I made it to my destination with all of my fingers and toes intact. Everything else is just gravy.

[nikki_d]

I ALWAYS get shoaled and 95% of the time the people are slower than me which pisses me the f%$# off. I don’t know if it is pure rudeness or just everyone decides the middle-aged fat woman on the bike has to be slow. On top of that, I have had a really high number of people passing me on the right when I have been stopped at red lights and stop signs this week.

This week I started to completely lose it on people and rudely calling them out on their behavior. Most people just ignore me, except the woman who objected to my language. I told her only when she could give me a good reason why she passed me on the right as I started from a red light would I even engage her on the topic of my language choices. Of course, she couldn’t.

I don’t know what to do any more. I have tried to be polite. I have tried to have productive conversations with people. It has all gone no where. I know my reactions this week were not productive in the least. It has gotten to the point where riding my bike is becoming a chore because no one thinks any of the rules apply to them so it makes things dangerous and unpleasant. I think I just need to hibernate for the summer until the cold weather chases a majority of these fair weather cyclists away and I can enjoy relatively peaceful roads again. Modeling the bicycle behavior I would like to see from others is not working.

[nikki_d]

@KLizotte 56557 wrote:

I must be the only person in DC that actually stops and waits at all the lights on the 15th St cycletrack.

We must never have been out there at the same time. I always do.

[DCLiz]

@nikki_d 56561 wrote:

We must never have been out there at the same time. I always do.

Me too! Except for the red lights between PA Ave and the White House which say “PEDS FOR STOP,” where I don’t stop unless there are pedestrians, which I think is correct.

Also, I’m so damn slow, I’m the one that turns to you at the stop lights and asks you to go around me. Most people do, but this morning someone who looked quite a bit faster than me was happy to ride (very slowly) along behind me. I think because he was turning pretty soon after the intersection we met at; northbound 15th at K.

Actually, on my little stretch of 15th, between PA & M in the AM and L & PA in the evening, I would say 99% of cyclists stop and wait at the lights. Maybe that’s because it’s a congested area of downtown, and it’s just not safe to go through the reds there.

[83b]

@DCLiz 56572 wrote:

Except for the red lights between PA Ave and the White House which say “PEDS FOR STOP,” where I don’t stop unless there are pedestrians, which I think is correct.

That’s also how I treat those, though I try to do more actual “stopping” for pedestrians than I see many folks doing. If we’re wrong, then there’s a major need to revise the signage along that stretch.

To everyone else, as an irate stickler for the rules, I’m glad to be in such good company!

[Justin Antos]

@83(b) 56518 wrote:

It’s particularly irritating when the person is (a) someone you just passed and now have to wait to safely pass again,

This really is pretty irritating, mostly on East Capitol in the morning. The worst is when they do it repeatedly until you get to the Capitol. My strategy? Sip coffee, sigh, soft-pedal until I can pass again, and try to find zen. And at the next red, act wide

The problem usually goes away around Daylight Savings Time.

[Vicegrip]

I now take the path that there is nothing I can do to change human behavior in general but I can change how I think.

For shoalers I see if I can make a “personalized” haiku as I catch up. I win when I am chuckling or have a wry grinn as I un shoal.

[83b]

@Vicegrip 56600 wrote:

For shoalers I see if I can make a “personalized” haiku as I catch up. I win when I am chuckling or have a wry grinn as I un shoal.

This game is awesome! It’s fortunate that “____ ____ on CaBi” works out to five syllables. Have you considered doing 15mph readings to share your genius with the source of your inspiration?

[Terpfan]

@nikki_d 56560 wrote:

I ALWAYS get shoaled and 95% of the time the people are slower than me which pisses me the f%$# off.

This is my precise gripe. I don’t mind if someone shoals me and speeds up, but when I have to leap frog them is when I get pretty annoyed.

On 15th St cycletrack for me, there isn’t a ton of shoaling, but mainly because I’m going the opposite way of most folks. One place I will run the light is at K. Well, not really run it, but go into it yellow. If you’re going southbound from L and you hightail it at the green then you hit K at a yellow. The red on 15th and K is actually a green with a left turn arrow for folks heading north on 15th, which aside from Metro buses, is basically no one in rush hour. Plus you don’t have cars turning right in front of you onto K doing it this way and they do not care that you have the right away at the green. Oddly enough, I think it’s safer to get it yellow or tenth of a second red there then it is during the green.

[Rogburt]

I had read this before and thought it apropos, forgive me if its been referenced before….

http://bikesnobnyc.blogspot.com/2009/10/indignity-of-commuting-by-bicycle.html

[Terpfan]

Not much shoaling on the way in this moring save the usual 15th St folks on the wrong side and refusing to move back over as if suddenly it was a one-way cycletrack, but going home yesterday some idiot shoaled me on the cycletrack heading south. No surprise I leapfrogged him. He shoaled again. And then we get to the fun rising barracade things at the White House where he goes through so slowly I thought he was going to fall over. That was the last point he shoaled me too as it’s mostly straight away from there. Still funny to watch people shoal who are slower, then find out their slower, and then do it again–such a selfish attitude.

[nikki_d]

@Terpfan 57451 wrote:

Still funny to watch people shoal who are slower, then find out their slower, and then do it again–such a selfish attitude.

I had one of those on Penn yesterday morning. She was riding a bikeshare and went in the opposite lane to pass me at a light, then cut in much too close on the other side of the intersection, when I wasn’t working hard since I knew there was no way to make the next one. Of course, when that light turned green I gave her a very sharp “passing” as I passed her. She stayed behind me for one light before she decided at every subsequent red light she needed to move in front of me after waiting behind me, get a jump on the green, and then be in my way again.Finally got rid of her on the 15th street turn, which I would have missed on that green had I hung behind her when she shoaled me again at 14th.

I just really don’t understand it.

[83b]

Repeatedly shoaled by someone in full Artemis team kit this AM. Vicegrip’s haiku game remains awesome, but this tested my new-found patience.

[birddog]

This entire week has been a shoal-a-thon. Bikes and cars both think they’ll win the race against me by zooming past at a stop light or passing only to immediately turn right. I just had to get this off my chest. It’s so stupid and dangerous and impossible to defend against. What will make these shoalers stop?

[Author]

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