N_C

This was yelled at me yesterday while on my commute home. I had to stop at the bank on the way. The branch I went to is sort of on the way home. I have never ridden in this section of town on a bike before. It is a heavily travelled commercial area. The bank is next to a new shopping complex that is still underconstruction which means the traffic has increased because of the businesses that are open in the new area. The roadways leading up to & around the shopping area are 4 lane, most are 30 to 35 mph. This is right next to the hwy 20/75 bypass where there are also entrance & exits to the bypass.

Instead of turning left at the intersection I normally turn at on my commute I turned right to go to the bank. I then had to turn left at another intersection, then turn right to get to the bank. when I made the second turn which was left it was in a left turn lane with an arrow. I was the first one in the lane with traffic behind me & traffic oncoming that wanted to turn right. We got the green arrow & proceeded through the turn. As I was doing so the oncoming vehicle that wanted to turn right attempted to do so. I made eye contact with the driver, shook my head no & sounded my airzound. He got a ugly glaring look on his face indicating he was not happy I was in his way & preventing him from turning. He had the red. While it is legal to make a right turn on red, you can only do so if there is no oncoming left turning or cross traffic. Those of us turning left were the oncoming traffic in this situation. This was during a very busy time of the day. I was turning left from a 4 lane to a 4 lane divided roadway. When I make left turns like this at busy intersections I take the shortes possible route across with out cutting the corner.

The oncoming right turning vehicle had to wait for those of us in the turn lane to get through before he turned. I was almost to my 3rd turn, a right one when that vehicle passed me in the left lane, I was in the right. As it passed a lady rolled down her window, yelled "GET OFF THE ROAD!", then rolled the window back up. I gave them a big cheesy smile, waived at them like they were my best buddies & sounded the airzound at them. They looked at me like I was nuts or something. They also looked confused & then more pissed off. They turned left & I turned right & that was the end of it.

I used to flip people the finger, now I do as I mentioned above. It drives them crazy, makes them look really confused & makes them more angry. I don't know why they get more angry with me though. All I am doing is smiling, waiving & I now sound the airzound. A while back with one person I even was able to talk to like they were my best friend I had not seen in a long time. Boy was that guy confused at that one.

The bank had no problem with me going through the drive through on my bike as the lobby was closed.