What is it about bicyclists?
Talking with my sister the other day, she made a comment that a lot drivers get pissed off when a bicyclist approaches a red light, but goes right through if there is no cross traffic.
As a bicyclist and driver, I personally don’t see a problem with it.
Why? Lots of reasons. First, you don’t need a drivers license to ride bike. I think it’s unfair to expect bicycles to obey the same traffic laws that cars must obey. The laws were made because of cars, not bicycles. Cars have the ability to kill somebody. Riding my bike around, I have come to realize that the line is fuzzy as to how to classify this vehicle. I can be a “pedestrian” and ride my bike across the crosswalk or I can really be pedestrian and walk by bike across. With one swift swing of my leg I am a bicyclist again, going at least three times the speed of any walker. I can go where cars can’t: crosswalks (already mentioned), in between bushes or buildings, between cars during a stand still, around stopped trains on the track, through crowds of people, and even on the frozen lake. The flexibility offered me by my bike is so vast, that I wonder how people manage with the incontinences of their car every day. Parking, gas, insurance, rush-hour traffic.
Don’t get me wrong, I think cars a wonderful machines. You can haul heavy loads and go great distances in them. The problem I have with cars are two-fold: people rely on them too heavily and lose perspective of the greater good. It’s possible to do some amounts of grocery shopping on your bike. It’s a good workout physically and mentally. Physically, that’s obvious. Mentally, it encourages you to be more organized. If you shop on your bike, you will only buy what you need when you need it. Cars allow us to cram more stuff into our living spaces, causing cluttered homes and minds. Then we spend all our time cleaning our cluttered houses, less time with friends, losing contact with the outside world and becoming depressed, and losing perspective. Driving in a car, we are protected from outer dangers, other cars, street sales people, exhaust. We are also protected from smiles, respect, and (I know this sounds cheesy) love. The car has enabled us to move faster than any vehicle invented before, so we can make quicker deadlines, be some place “right away”, and get things done faster. As a result, our mind forgets that it takes some time to move from one place to the next and we become impatient. The other person is preventing us from getting to our destination and we become upset, and so I think that the person who gets mad at bicyclists going through red lights is jealous. Not because they want to ride a bike, but because the biker is moving and they are not.
So the next time you find yourself in that situation, I ask you to think: if you were a pedestrian, and there was no traffic coming, would you cross the street? The bicyclist is asking the same question.
As a bicyclist and driver, I personally don’t see a problem with it.
Why? Lots of reasons. First, you don’t need a drivers license to ride bike. I think it’s unfair to expect bicycles to obey the same traffic laws that cars must obey. The laws were made because of cars, not bicycles. Cars have the ability to kill somebody. Riding my bike around, I have come to realize that the line is fuzzy as to how to classify this vehicle. I can be a “pedestrian” and ride my bike across the crosswalk or I can really be pedestrian and walk by bike across. With one swift swing of my leg I am a bicyclist again, going at least three times the speed of any walker. I can go where cars can’t: crosswalks (already mentioned), in between bushes or buildings, between cars during a stand still, around stopped trains on the track, through crowds of people, and even on the frozen lake. The flexibility offered me by my bike is so vast, that I wonder how people manage with the incontinences of their car every day. Parking, gas, insurance, rush-hour traffic.
Don’t get me wrong, I think cars a wonderful machines. You can haul heavy loads and go great distances in them. The problem I have with cars are two-fold: people rely on them too heavily and lose perspective of the greater good. It’s possible to do some amounts of grocery shopping on your bike. It’s a good workout physically and mentally. Physically, that’s obvious. Mentally, it encourages you to be more organized. If you shop on your bike, you will only buy what you need when you need it. Cars allow us to cram more stuff into our living spaces, causing cluttered homes and minds. Then we spend all our time cleaning our cluttered houses, less time with friends, losing contact with the outside world and becoming depressed, and losing perspective. Driving in a car, we are protected from outer dangers, other cars, street sales people, exhaust. We are also protected from smiles, respect, and (I know this sounds cheesy) love. The car has enabled us to move faster than any vehicle invented before, so we can make quicker deadlines, be some place “right away”, and get things done faster. As a result, our mind forgets that it takes some time to move from one place to the next and we become impatient. The other person is preventing us from getting to our destination and we become upset, and so I think that the person who gets mad at bicyclists going through red lights is jealous. Not because they want to ride a bike, but because the biker is moving and they are not.
So the next time you find yourself in that situation, I ask you to think: if you were a pedestrian, and there was no traffic coming, would you cross the street? The bicyclist is asking the same question.
posted by nicole @ 1:32 AM
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