BIKE: (no subject)

[Stephen Peckham]

 >  Many of you may not realize this, but in the rest of the                
 > world, a "bike lane" is equivalent to a "car lane" in the sense that     
 you                                                                        
 > don't allow parked cars in a lane designed for through travel. Again,    
 > this presents problems in the fact that car drivers get mad when you     
 > leave the bike lane to get around the parked car -- they don't know      
 how                                                                        
 > early you must merge in order to do this safely. This creates friction   
                                                                            
 > which hurts us politically - I've spent half a dozen mornings here at    
 > work defending cyclists to suburbanites on issues just like this one.    
                                                                            
 I've been living in Heidelberg, Germany since August 2003, and one of      
 the most important differences I've noticed between here and the US is     
 the attitude of car drivers.  In my experience, car drivers don't get      
 mad when they see a bicycle, or when a bicycle slows them down.            
 Bicycles are simply treated like other slow-moving vehicles, and drivers   
 wait patiently until there is room to pass.   And when a car does squeeze by 
 where there's not enough room, it                                          
 frequently turns out to be an American driver (identifiable by the         
 license plate).                                                            
                                                                            
 In the US, whenever I hold up automobile traffic, I'm conscious that I'd   
 better hurry and get out of the way before the driver loses patience and   
 runs me over.                                                              
                                                                            
 Steve Peckham                                                              
                                                                            
                                                                            
                                                                            
                                                                            





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