The Ride of Silence still echos, and the rest of the Feed

I actually have a Saturday to myself for a change, which is good. I have some catching up to do with other members of the household that can only be done on a Saturday. This has been a rough week for me, physically. I did more than my normal week’s worth of mileage in one day on Wednesday between riding to the BPAC meeting in Arlington and the Ride of Silence, plus I had my normal running around town miles all this week, and because I have been doing all kinds of early activities at church on Saturdays I haven’t had my weekly therapy session on my legs for about 3 weeks. Let me tell you I could definitely feel that when I did my therapy this morning, as all those muscles that keep my knees from flopping over sideways and the kneecap centered over the joint now that the ligaments are trashed were complaining loudly about the abuse and lack of treatment. Since my wreck I have managed to scale back to once a week of rubbing on the muscles from every day, but that is as far as I can reduce it and still have knees that work. I was very close to having to quit riding this week because of missing the 2 sessions earlier, I was nowhere full power on my rides Thursday and Friday.

Nothing echoes like silence, and that goes double for the Ride of Silence. Silent ride speaks out for cyclists and Chris Treadway: Richmond observes Ride of Silence for killed, injured bicyclists Also Ride of Silence remembers bicyclists killed on roadways The Ride is working, but most people have craniums as dense as neutronium and it’s taking a long time to get through their thick skulls that bikes have an equal right to the road as motor vehicles, and that it is the responsibility of the driver of the faster, heavier, and more deadly vehicle to pass bicycles and pedestrians with due care so as not to cause injury or death.

Two non-fatal wrecks in San Diego CA. CYCLISTS INJURED IN CRASHES IN SAN CARLOS AND SCRIPPS RANCH The one wreck where the cyclist was travelling at a high rate of speed on a sidewalk could be avoided by slowing down on sidewalks. The other wreck is a little harder as it requires drivers to not turn on top of cyclists, but intersection protocol applies.

And in the OC of SoCal, a cyclist dodges a wreck with another vehicle but still crashes. Cyclist Injured After Avoiding Car Not much about this one, as the cyclist didn’t actually hit the car or vice-versa. The cyclist was obviously following one of the two protocols for avoiding wrecks, but without further information I can’t tell you which one.

Still in SoCal, a cyclist is killed by a SUV driver in a hit-and-run. 71-year-old cyclist killed in Canoga Park hit-and-run Not much here except the cyclist was hit while riding in the crosswalk. At this point it is unknown if the driver ran a red light or was making a left or right turn when he (?) hit the cyclist.

In the most deadliest state in the US to walk or ride a bike a cyclist is startled into crashing by the wreck immediately behind him. Authorities: Startled cyclist injured after two-car collision The wreck was caused by an inattentive driver running into a driver that had slowed for the cyclist, and the proximity of the wreck caused the cyclist to wreck. It was like, “Ahhh! I’m about to get hit!” >crash<. The cyclist in this case was pushing 70 YO so a little over-reacting and a crash is permitted. If he had been riding long in FL he was probably more than a little shell-shocked.

A gruesome wreck of a cyclist in NJ. Bike rider critically injured after being hit, dragged by taxi in Jersey City The really puzzling thing is why the driver left the scene, as he was driving a highly identifiable vehicle and witnesses got a good description of him, so why not stay? The consequences of staying are much less than the consequences of getting caught for hit-and-run. The wreck appears to be a hit-from-behind with little chance on the cyclist’s part to avoid it, but a minor one had the driver remained at the scene.

Another report on the cyclist that fell in front of a truck in OR. Bicycle rider killed by truck on Highway 211 near Molalla, same stretch as March bike fatality For those of you that didn’t read yesterday’s post, this was a salmon rider that crashed on bad pavement on the shoulder just as the truck passed. This wreck might have happened no matter which way the cyclist was going, and the direction was not a factor in this wreck, but you should still ride with traffic, not facing it.

Another report on the SWCC/SWSS wreck of a cyclist and a politician in AZ. Mesa councilman in collision that killed bicyclist As I posted yesterday, I don’t believe one word of this aside from the fact that the politician hit a cyclist.

In the Emerald Isle we cyclists are perceived as “smug”. We smug cyclists just bring out the worst in drivers It’s hard not to be “smug” when car drivers blaze past you only to be caught by a red light and you pass them in the bike lane, which means you are making the same average speed as the fossil fool.

Infrastructure! in LA CA. Cyclists Appeal To L.A. City Council To Make Streets Safer For Riders More than 50 years of building infrastructure for nothing but motor vehicles leaves SoCal in a fiscal hole. Whatchagonnado?

Houston sees its bike infrastructure is sub-standard where it even exists. City of Houston trying to become more ‘bike-friendly’ I’m hard on Houston, but really they wasted a whole lot of money making junk bike infrastructure during the ’90s and the ’00s while ignoring the example set by the Dutch.

Finally, in Washington state, a writer gets it backwards. OUR VIEW | As bicycling increases, so do dangers It’s not the cyclists that are the danger, it’s the motor vehicles that are actually causing the death and destruction.

And that’s all I have today, tomorrow will be Wreck-free Rant Day, or something.

Billed @$0.02, Opus

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