cycling rank

Here is what I’m sick of: The near constant bullshit from the venom spewing mouths and angry typing finger tips of people who simply want to hate on cyclist. That, and the fact that this morning crazy-driver-dude aggressively passed me on my left between signs within a block when I was attempting a left turn in to my place of business. This rant won’t be about how cyclists are without fault, because they/we clearly are not. We roll through stops, we run lights, we fail to yield – all pretty much the same moving violations that automobile drivers find themselves doing, or being ticketed for from time to time. In fact, cyclist and drivers aren’t so very different. We often use the same roads. We abide by and break the same traffic laws. Hand signals, of all manner, are the same between cycling and driving. Drivers often lock a Club to their steering wheel to avoid theft, while cyclists lock up their wheels to avoid theft. The difference is, and this is the very basic, underlying difference - besides the two wheels and no motor thing - that when a car hits a pedestrian (or a cyclist) there will be significant injury for the person being hit. When a cyclist hits a pedestrian, sure there will be injury, but certainly not as catastrophic as a 150 pound person being tackled by a 2500 pound, metal object moving at 35 miles an hour. So, the bottom line is, resulting injury from mistakes made while moving. I contend that mistakes on behalf of drivers account for more injury than mistakes on behalf of riders, and when injuries occur with the contacting force of a moving automobile, the injuries are far more serious. Does this simple idea escape folks? Does this idea of mass and force mixed with speed evaporate for folks when they get into their vehicles? I think yes. Failure to realize that the basic result of a driving mistake can lead to death of another person is really the only reason I can come up with that explains why: 1) drivers behave the way they do on the road and 2) drivers behave the way they do when writing or speaking about cyclists.