Posted on 07/18/2013 6:08:03 PM PDT by rickmichaels
In the 1980s, the conservative humourist P.J. O’Rourke wrote “A Cool and Logical Analysis of the Bicycle Menace.” He was joking. In 2013, Wall Street Journal editorial board member Dorothy Rabinowitz said, “the bike lobby is an all-powerful enterprise” and the presence of a bike-sharing program in New York was an example of “the totalitarians running the government of this city.” She wasn’t joking. Rabinowitz’s widely discussed appearance on a Wall Street Journal video, which was picked up by many news outlets and The Daily Show (“Slow down, lady, they’re just bikes!” Jon Stewart exclaimed), did more than draw attention to complaints about the effectivness of the Citibike program, New York’s attempt to compete with the bike-sharing in other cities such as Paris and Montreal. It made people aware of just how hostile some conservative commentators are to bikes.
Rabinowitz was hardly the first conservative pundit to express scorn for bicycles and the people who ride them. One of the most-publicized recent bike-bashers was Don Cherry, who showed up to meet Toronto Mayor Rob Ford in 2010 wearing a loud pink shirt, explaining: “I’m wearing pink for all the pinkos out there riding bicycles.” Popular southern California radio host John Kobylt, an opponent of plans to build more bike lanes in Los Angeles, recently explained that cyclists are members of “a bizarre cult that worships two-wheel transportation, not a traditional God.” And Rush Limbaugh, the leader in conservative radio punditry, has always been willing to tee off on the pesky pedal-pushers: “Frankly, if the door opens into a bicycle rider, I won’t care,” he once said. “I think they ought to be off the streets and on the sidewalk,” where bike riders aren’t actually allowed.
Why would bicycles become a political issue? Partly because things like bike-sharing programs are often placed in opposition to cars and the people who drive them. Lloyd Alter, an adjunct professor at Ryerson University’s school of interior design and the managing editor of TreeHugger.com, says conservatives sometimes associate bikes “with environmentalism and anti-capitalism. Bike riders live in denser places, don’t go to big-box supercentres, lead a suspiciously different lifestyle.” The political splits in cities are often strongest between urban areas and the suburbs or exurbs, and that pits suburb-friendly transportation, mainly cars, against more “urban” vehicles such as bikes and light rail.
So just as conservative politicians such as Ford have often won votes for their support of the automobile against non-traditional transportation, conservative pundits often stick up for suburban car drivers in the culture war, and portray bicyclists as elitists. Kobylt, cited by The Atlantic’s Conor Friedersdorf as a practitioner of “the paranoid style in bicycle politics,” told his listeners he fears that cyclists are trying to make him feel like, “I’m second class because I drive a car, or I have a commute to work, or I live in a suburban neighbourhood.” Journalist George Will, a prominent opponent of trains, also mocked then-U.S. secretary of transportation Ray LaHood for his support of biking: “Does he think 0.01 per cent of Americans will ever regularly bike to work?” Will sneered. Alter says that, to some pundits, cyclists are “a powerful force trying to squeeze cars off the road,” and “every advance by the cyclists is seen as an attack on the suburban way of life.”
But just as there are plenty of liberals who drive SUVs, there are plenty of conservatives who contradict the bike-hating stereotype. Nicole Gelinas, a contributor to the conservative urban policy magazine City Journal, published an article about Citibike that, while critical of the program, also tried to counteract some of the stereotypes about it: “Despite fears to the contrary, especially among the elderly,” she wrote, “bike share won’t harm pedestrians.” Still, as bike-friendly conservative radio host Mitch Berg told the Utne Reader, “people on both sides of the political aisle do ascribe political significance to biking.” Or, as P.J. O’Rourke put it all those years ago, “I don’t like the kind of people who ride bicycles.”
I don’t mind bikes in the city...I kind of expect them there. What I do mind is a gaggle of spandex-clad bikers, sloooowly winding there way up a canyon road in the mountains, forcing car after car to slow down and then cautiously pass them.
Read the whole thing before calling me names
I would suggest that the people complaining about cyclist ride a bike for a few days and then consider an apology
Q: Why do cyclist ride a bit out into the lane?
A: because if they hug the curb you will hit them trying to squeeze past. They are using the oncoming traffic to keep you from accidentally killing them. If you want them to move over don’t squeeze past them
Alternately to above some cities have storm drains gratings with holes or slots that are about 3 inches wide. These don’t bother car tires but will literally kill a bicyclist. Riders have to ride far enough out to avoid obstacles like that.
Q: Do you complain every time you see a motorist slightly breaking the law or call for the abolition of autos when you see a rude driver? I didn’t think so. So why when you see one out of 50 or 60 cyclist doing something rude do you complain?
Believe me. Being polite on a bike does not help. I still have idiots throw things at me. Yell at me and try and run me off the road
Cyclist have much more valid grips about the problems rude ignorant Fat-a**ed drivers cause them than drivers ever will about cyclist. I am hard press to think of how a cyclist can ever put a person in an automobiles life in danger yet I have PERSONALLY spent 15 days in the hospital because a driver came onto the SHOULDER of a road to hit me with his pickup truck when I would not have come closer to 6 feet from him if he’d stayed in his lane.
I realize that posters here will deny that this kind of thing ever happens because all car drivers are simply misunderstood good people that never complain unreasonably or threaten anyone who as in my case CANNOT legally drive a car due to medical issues
That said, I agree with some of the comments.
1. Bicycle riders should have to have their rigs inspected for safety once a year.
2. Bicycle riders should have to display a license tag or sticker like a license plate if they are used on the road that says they have paid a road use tax.
3. A lot of bikes used by bicycle messengers in large cities should be illegal as the fixed gear bikes have no brakes. In fact I think most of the bicycle messengers in large cities should be abolished. The way they are paid encourages them to break the law and do dangerous things.
Conversely:
4.Drivers should get their car towed for parking in a bike lane.
5. The biggest problem with bike lanes is that they do not allow cyclist to cross intersections. This is simply a design issue that should be fixed
For what it is worth to the person that complained about “riders on bikes that cost a $1000.00” I wish! The bike I have and their approximate cost are listed below. There is not a speck the hated carbon fiber on any of them and only the Vitus is aluminum!
Cinelli Super Course w/Campagnolo Super Record $2800.00 in 1978
Battaglin Triathlon frame with Sun Tour Superbe Pro about $3800 in 1991
Sam Hillborne touring bike with NOS Suntour XC Pro About $3200 in 1999
Vitus Stag built from dead parts about $600 in 2001(I can lock this one outside)
Soma San Marco Campagnolo Centaur 10 speed about $4000.00 July 2013
A thousand dollar bike is entry level.
Possibly, but I've put over 10k on mine, and I paid <$250 in 2000. Just recently changed the cassette and chain from the original. Course they were in pretty poor shape. :)
Most bike riders are libs
Most apple users are too
Most pot smokers outside Dixie...ditto
Most Subaru drivers.....Prius too
Most people non white or non Christian....liberals
Fact based generalizations
Exceptions do not make a rule
A notion lost on folks under 45 today unlessa generalization about white and Christian
The knee jerk impetus to form political thought on exceptions is crippling
The majority of cyclists are not a problem, but sometimes one will give cyclists a bad name. We had to drive slowly behind one on a one lane road in the Smoky Mountains (Cades Cove) for about 15 minutes. He backed up a long line of cars and during that time would not pull over to let anyone pass. Cyclists are given their own separate time on this road (no cars allowed for several hours two days a week). The rest of the time bikes and cars share the road.
I want to print up a bunch of stickers to put on the Colorado signs that say, “Share the road,” with a picture of a bicycle next to a car.
These stickers will say:
“SHARE THE TAX BURDEN!”
We have thousands of miles of taxpayer-funded bicycle paths out of the way of traffic in Colorado.
They should use those.
I have no objection to people riding bicycles, so long as they don’t do it in the streets and frighten the horses
Share the road, share the pain.
Ninety percent of the bicyclists I see do not comply with the law. In the last year I’ve seen only one cyclist stop at a red light. Not once have I seen one stop at a stop sign.
The problem is that many people don't just use bikes for recreation, but also for transportation. They need to get places, just like you do in your car.
Also, the vast majority of bicyclists also drive cars, pay gasoline tax and income tax, etc. There is no division you can draw between taxpayers and cyclists.
Here’s a thread related to that video:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3042977/posts
Unsafe to ride! [YouTube video of youths trying to mug cyclist]
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