Posts Tagged: cycling
Posted by Anthony | May 13th, 2012 | 5 Comments »
At the beginning of May, the Vancouver Police Department announced that – in conjunction with other police departments across the province – they were going to be “targeting” high-risk driving during the month of May. VPD Staff Sgt. Jack Sarna was quoted in the article that the most common high-risk activity that he observes is distracted driving. The media focused on motorists, but “distracted driving” — in particular using a cell phone while driving — is a behaviour you can see in cyclists too.
On one day on my ride to work last week, shortly after the announced “crackdown,” I saw three motorists with cells to their ears as they drove by me on the bike route. On a ride home the very same week, I had to deal with two cars stopped at green lights because their drivers were looking down at their mobile instead of up at the light.
For some reason, the place I notice the most people on cell phones are those who have just dropped their kids off at one of the many schools that I drive by on my ride to work. They drop off little Johnny or Jane at school then reach for the phone as they pull away. Clearly “distracted driving” by motorists is a safety issue for cyclists.
But what about cyclists themselves? I occasionally see cyclists riding along, usually pretty slowly, with phones pushed up to their ears. Rarely I see the odd person texting. Last week (it was an odd week) I saw a guy remove his cycling jacket and stuff it into the backpack he was wearing while continuing to cycle along the bike route. It was both remarkable and frightening. Clearly these cyclists can’t react to sudden problems on the road with sufficient reaction time. And the path that they follow, meandering here and there as they maintain a generally forward motion, is hard for both bikes and cars that might want to pass or just avoid running into them.
Probably the biggest issue in “distracted cycling”, though is the issue of headphones. read more »
Posted by Anthony | April 30th, 2012 | 7 Comments »
Earlier this week, an upset cyclist turned to me as we were riding along the Off-Broadway bike route and asked, indignantly, “Don’t bikes have priority on the bike routes?”
It turns out that she had approached the intersection at Hemlock and 7th and pushed the bike-button on the side of the road. This is one of my least favourite intersections as it has one of those makes-no-sense configurations: Stop signs east/west on the bike route and a flashing green light on Hemlock north/south.
Anyone in Vancouver will recognize this as a typical “pedestrian-controlled intersection,” and I think that it borders on negligence to have them on this part of the bike route.
read more »
Posted by Anthony | April 16th, 2012 | 5 Comments »
For the past three weeks, my wife and I were living at the BC Children’s Hospital while one of my kids dealt with a serious infection. This, of course, made commuting by bike pretty impractical. Things are better now, and last Wednesday I got back on the bike to ride to work. I was expecting the worst — my commute includes climbing the hill to UBC — but it was pretty good.
I had driven to work a few times over those three weeks, and while in “motorist” mode I felt the same irritation that many motorists feel about cyclists. There was the cyclist riding down Broadway that vehicles were gingerly working their way around, only to have the cyclist ride up along the side of the line of vehicles stopped at stop lights and proceed to ride right through the red light. Everyone had to gingerly try to pass again.
There was the cyclist that was a cyclist until the red light, then became a pedestrian on a bike as she rode across the intersection in the crosswalk, then reaching the far corner, rode across the street against the red light and down the sidewalk.
There was the cyclist who didn’t even look for traffic, never mind stop at the 2-way stop sign. You know what? Cyclists like this ruin the reputation of all cyclists around the city. read more »
Posted by Anthony | February 19th, 2012 | 3 Comments »
ICBC runs a campaign in the Lower Mainland with signs that proclaim “Car Thieves are Everywhere!”. Last week, a local team of filmmakers and bike enthusiasts got a lot of press on the release of a trailer for their web video series called “To Catch a Bike Thief“.
The crew has created a “bait bike” in the style of the Vancouver Police Department’s “bait car” program. This bike has been outfitted a phone-home GPS hidden in the frame of the bicycle. The bike will be set up in a high-theft location and monitored to see if it is stolen. Motion sensors in the GPS will alert their “intercept team” (and security detail) to the bike’s theft, and using a web app that reports the bike’s location the team will confront the bike thief. You can watch the trailer to the series here. read more »
Posted by Anthony | February 13th, 2012 | 1 Comment »
On February 7 the City of Vancouver, along with partners ICBC, the Vancouver Police Department, and Preventable, launched a “safety awareness campaign” targeting some activities that they call “common yet inconsiderate, risky and illegal behaviours that can cause serious harm to pedestrians, cyclists and motorists.”
read more »
Posted by Anthony | January 29th, 2012 | 10 Comments »
Last week I had another “adverse interaction” with a motorist. These seem to be happening with increasing frequency.
It started with the traffic circle at Blenheim St. and 8th Ave. I was heading east along the Off-Broadway bike route (aka 8th Ave.) and two vehicles were heading north along Blenheim St. It was dark, but not raining. I was lit up with my reflective riding gear and 5 blinking LED lights: a bright headlight, one in the spokes of my front wheel, a bright omnidirectional on my seat post, and one hanging from each pannier.
In short, the only way you won’t see me at night is by not looking in my direction. read more »
Posted by Anthony | January 23rd, 2012 | 3 Comments »
With our mild winters here in Vancouver, we don’t have the same winter riding conditions that others face. Last week was the exception as we got multiple hits of snow, freezing rain, and frigid temperatures. For many commuters, it was just the one week a year that cycling isn’t in the cards. For others, it was just a week that needed a different approach.
There are two things that a cyclist can control when it comes to riding in snow and ice: gear and riding technique.
read more »
Posted by Anthony | December 12th, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Christmas is approaching fast. Are you stuck for ideas on what to get your bike-commuter friends? Yeah, me too. Lucky for you, I’ve done some research. Here’s my top 5 list of handy gifts for cyclists.
Five gift ideas for cyclists
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Lights
You can never have enough lights. No matter how bright your clothing is, no matter how covered in Scotchlite™ your body is, nothing beats the visibility of lights. LED lights are cheap, durable, small, and light-weight. White ones for the front, red ones for the back. You can get handlebar mounted lights, seat-post lights, helmet lights (front & back), safety-vests with integrated lights, fender-mounted lights, and rear-rack mounted lights. You can get lights that go on to your valve stems. A personal favourite of mine are lights that get mounted in your spokes. Particularly in Vancouver’s dark, rainy winters, being visible to motorists and pedestrians from all angles is crucial. A recent trend in bike lights is the ability to charge them via mini-usb. It’s a convenient way to keep your lights charged, but it also means you’re hosed if you the battery runs out in the middle of a ride. Unless, of course, you have a dynamo with a usb port on it… read more »
Posted by Anthony | December 5th, 2011 | 17 Comments »
Last week, city reporter extraordinaire Frances Bula posted in her blog about whether or not cyclists should be banned from using arterial roads. This was an issue that councillor-elect Adriane Carr clumsily raised during the civic election. Bula cited two pieces of evidence for an existing arterial-jam problem: watching “traffic jam up behind a cyclist who has decided to take up a lane on 12th or Hastings or Granville during rush hour,” as well as an anecdote about a lady riding along Broadway.
I don’t really want to rehash the question of whether or not cyclists should be banned on any city road — you can read through the comments on her blog for an interesting (but somewhat derailed) discussion. My take on it is: bicycles are traffic, deal with it.
The “deal with it” means not only should motorists learn to drive with cyclists (and vice versa), but also the city’s engineering department should design and build infrastructure that accommodates all forms of traffic in the city.
read more »
Posted by Anthony | November 20th, 2011 | 4 Comments »
It’s a situation you see more and more often: an adult heading along the bike-way with one or more kids along for the ride. Getting the kids to school, daycare, or the babysitter’s by bike is becoming a more frequent activity for many. The introduction of the dedicated bike lanes downtown has led at least one person I know to sell their car, and she now takes her child to daycare via bike.
There are several options to get your kids from point A to point B with a bike. There are additional seats you can attach to your bike, front-mounted or rear-mounted, there are trailers, and finally there are so-called “tag-alongs.” read more »
