General Cycling Discussion - Spare a thought

Coming home from work today I spotted a beautiful little tri coloured tabby cat by the side of the road, he'd obviously been run over earlier today
What a stupid waste, somewhere tonight someone will be missing this little cat. I spent an hour knocking on doors but never found the owner. perhaps he was a ferral cat from one of the local farms

I really hate drivers some times.

Yes, when there is oncoming traffic, you should always swerve to avoid a cat and sacrafice lives of the people driving in the other direction. JUST SAVE THAT CAT!

I am with Klein on this one. If it is anyones 'fault' it is the owners. I purposely train myself not to dart when an animal runs onto the road. Dangerous habit to get into.

Luckily I only bike. I usually just scare the crap out of animals. :)

Ditto the two previous posts. If an animal were to jet out infront of me I would not swerve to avoid it. If I can not jump it it will get squashed. Be it by my truck, motorcycle or bicycle. The life of an animal is not worth the damage or pain I may suffer or another person may suffer. If there is no one behind me I may slow down a bit but if the animal does not get out of the way then so be it.

Slainte:beer:

As cyclist, I would have thought there would be a little more compasion for smaller beings. I am just glad that SUV drivers don't say, "If that bike wasn't so slow, I wouldn't have had to smash him."

Granted, I will side with a cyclist most of the time but if the cyclist were to dart out unexpectedly in front of that SUV, then he/she deservs what ever may happen.

Slainte:beer:

Reminds me of something that happened a few months ago. I saw movement out of the corner of my eye while riding to work. It was a cat that ran in front of my bike. I barely had time to react. I think I caught part of his tail but he ran off and didn't appear hurt. Woke me right up though! :)

for me, it's pretty straightforward: if I can't avoid the animal by braking or veering prudently, then my friend, that animal's time has come. I'll try to avoid them within reason, but I won't do it by driving recklessly or in a panic.

so I've run over one squirrel and hit one pigeon with this in mind. the squirrel, poor thing, ran out and didn't know just when to change direction. I did brake firmly, but a simultaneous check in the rear view told me that a car was right behind me, so that was one less squirrel.

then that pigeon really did dart out from between two parallel parked cars; I couldn't believe it -- there was a cartoonish cloud of feathers when I looked back.

I feel bad for them, but not that bad. the world's not a harsh place, I don't think. just supremely indifferent.

--alex.

"Yes officer I had to dart all over the road before I hit him"

Really guys I had expected a little more compassion seeing as we cyclists are in the same vulnerable boat where vehicles are concerned.

I have to say you are quite right about veering to avoid hitting animals but what I am talking about here is sheer excessive speed .
Drivers here in the UK are going through village lanes at speeds in excess of 50mph! and the roads are not wide enough for 2 vehicles to pass!

Cars kill not only animals. I heard somewhere that about 50000 Americans killed in car related accidents every year.

In 9/11 about 3000 people were killed.

But this is only the tip of an iceberg. The main killer is the exhaust, not the car itself. How many this baby kills we will know much later, as the damage is accumulative this time.

I saw on TV yesterday that French start selling a new type of car. It runs on the compressed air. It covers 300 km without recharge.

What is remarkable is that the compressed air can be produced directly at powerplants, without converting energy into electricity.