[baiskeli]

@lordofthemark 210612 wrote:

The new law passed in Virginia requires drivers to change lanes to pass bikes if they cannot give 3 feet otherwise (and on a standard width lane, they cannot, even if cyclists go single file to the right). They have the right to cross a double yellow line when passing a human powered device such as a bicycle.

This is the law in Virginia.

And yes, I don’t expect drivers to be good at estimating distance. That is why I usually take the center of the lane, and why riding two abreast is good.

New question – Virginia law still requires a single rider to stay to the right unless necessary for, say turning left, or when it is unsafe not to take the lane. That would still apply, I think. Only riding with a buddy next to you gives you the right to take the lane at any time. Do you think I’m reading this right?

[baiskeli]

@SarahBee 208615 wrote:

Wow- totally uncalled for by the cyclist. I’ll admit that sometimes when I am huffing and puffing up the Custis hills in my granniest gear, I’ve been known to utter a few swear words quietly under my breath as someone on an e-bike cruises past me without a hint of breathing hard or drop of sweat. This, however, stems entirely from my envy. Civility on the trail should be mandatory.

I will never forget the strange feeling of climbing a somewhat steep hill and being passed by a jogger.

[baiskeli]

@consularrider 207838 wrote:

When did they post a speed limit on the Custis?

Sorry, I should have explained. The speed limit (20 mph) that applies to e-bikes, not to the trail.

[baiskeli]

@dbb 202388 wrote:

I was particularly impressed that the Post used snot rocket correctly in the sentence “There’s such a thing as a “snot rocket,” which — well, look it up.” Kudos to Angela Haupt, the journalist, who probably consulted the AP (About Phlegm) style guide.

Likely the first use of the term in the Post in, well, all time.

I bet it has appeared in the Sports section a few times in stories about football.

[baiskeli]

@Emm 202332 wrote:

From Facebook’s MVT Trail Users Group:

Just a head up that some…very special…person posted on Nextdoor in my area that they will be open carrying a firearm on the MVT this Saturday at 10:00 for a gun rights protest walk that starts near the Dyke Marsh, South of Alexandria just near Belle Haven (around mile 4 or 5 I think). He is trying to enlist other…special people…to walk with him.
It’s perfectly legal in VA and on National Park land.
Just a heads up, in case you run across them!

A few other posters responded that they knew of this specific individual, and he was known to be very confrontational. So please, regardless of your political views on this, stay safe and don’t confront.

Hmm. If it’s legal, what’s he protesting?

[baiskeli]

You picked the wrong guy today.

Me passing a pedestrian on a sidewalk.

Pedestrian: (politely moves over, but then tells me) “Bikes aren’t allowed on sidewalks.”

Me: “Yes, they are. I’ve been riding a bike for many years and I know the law.”

Pedestrian: “No they aren’t.”

Me (having waited for this moment for years): “I carry a copy of the relevant laws with me, would you like me to read it to you?”

Pedestrian: “No bikes on sidewalks.”

Me (pulls out handy sheet of paper, reads relevant state law with citation)

Pedestrian (can’t bear to admit he’s wrong): “Nope.”

Me (rides away into the sunset)

[baiskeli]

Isn’t the thread title the summary?

[baiskeli]

@phog 195793 wrote:

Yikes! I had to look up what the ulna is… “long bone found in the forearm that stretches from the elbow to the smallest finger”. Hope it’s OK!

I was going to make a joke, but I don’t think this is an appropriate time to be humerus.

[baiskeli]

@secstate 195040 wrote:

Just to continue with my annoyance with this sort of journalism, if we assume this is based on four full years of data, that’s 1460 days. So, about 8 trips a day, split over three roads.

How many individual women riders are we talking about in this dataset? If it’s a small number, then a shift in behavior for any reason by even a few riders will translate into big effects over time in the dataset. It’s really hard to attribute that to infrastructure change as opposed to some idiosyncratic factor affecting those individual riders’ habits. If it’s a larger number, then we just have to hope that women Strava users in Queens are somehow representative of the overall behavior of women cyclists.

Sorry to harp on this, but these sorts of issues of basic transparency are really common in data journalism.

It’s not the journalist’s fault.

[baiskeli]

@cvcalhoun 194844 wrote:

But the wording was… odd.

How about “degloving?” That’s pretty good wording, doncha think?

[baiskeli]

They’re finally catching up with me. From my post in 2012:

“Minneapolis has some of the same street trends DC has. There are pedicabs. There are food trucks. There are bike lanes and trails. There is a CaBi-style bike share system.

What they have that we don’t are bike lanes with separate lanes for pedestrians, which seems to work really well.”

http://bikearlingtonforum.com/archive/index.php/t-2670.html

[baiskeli]

@Steve O 193530 wrote:

Congrats! The grand champion of imaginary hypotheticals!

Yes, exactly. Also known as reductio ad absurdum.

https://www.iep.utm.edu/reductio/

[baiskeli]

@Steve O 193506 wrote:

You then took up valuable thread space with imaginary hypotheticals that were unrelated to our point.

If that’s a problem, then most of the threads here qualify. It’s just a discussion where people come to understanding what the other means. Anyway, here’s a great opportunity to end it.

[baiskeli]

@Steve O 193506 wrote:

If I were to run into someone walking on the trail who was hard to see, I would consider it my fault, just like if I were to run into a deer standing on the trail (although they do have those cool reflective eyeballs), or a fallen tree limb lying across the trail. If I cannot see far enough ahead to avoid these kinds of things, I am riding too fast. My fault.

I’d say it depends on where they are, if they are moving, what direction they are moving relative to you, etc. Just as a bike is required to have reflectors, etc. to have a reasonably minimum level of visibility. If someone goes out on a moonless night dressed in a black body-suit and runs back and forth across the trail in front of cyclists, I’m not going to hold the cyclists responsible if they are hit.

A person riding a bike at night without a light, however, is riding illegally, and I feel comfortable complaining about those types of ninjas.

I thought a ninja was a pedestrian in all black with no reflectors, etc. But why treat a cyclist with not light differently simply because the law requires them to have a light? Wouldn’t the same principle apply?

[baiskeli]

@jrenaut 193501 wrote:

I don’t object to cyclists being visible. I encourage lots of lights and reflective gear. What I object to is specific gear requirements to interact with special gear we’ll put in cars so that drivers can say “well, my Cyclist Censor didn’t see you, so it’s not my fault I ran you over”.

Yeah, I completely agree on that.

[Author]

Posts