Machka 

What kind of cycling is this ...

-- I ride like a vehicle of the road ... obeying all the rules of the road as itemized in the highway traffic acts, and city traffic laws, etc.

-- I ride all sorts of different roads from quiet country lanes to busy highways, from residential streets to congested downtown roads. (not saying I necessarily enjoy all types of roads, but I ride them)

-- I avoid bike paths whenever possible, only using them in two circumstances: 1) when I have no other choice; 2) when I feel the urge to ride at an extremely slow pace, walking occasionally when there are other people on the path.

-- I pull over and stop (or walk) on occasion to let motorized traffic have the right-of-way in situations where I know I am (or will be) holding up traffic, or when I feel it is safer to get out of the way of the larger motorized traffic.


Is this vehicular cycling ... or just normal, common sense cycling ... or something else? I'm a bit confused why there is such a split in this forum over how people cycle.

Bekologist

i thought you've never seen a bike lane.

walking your bike for the benefit of traffic is pretty timid.

Chipcom coined it well this winter....Adaptive bicycling.

Machka 

Sorry ... I meant to say paths. I've seen lots of bike paths.

Walking my bicycle for the benefit of traffic might be an option to keep me alive ... the better part of valour and all that ... a wise decision.

And "Adaptive Bicycling" sounds pretty good.

filtersweep

Timid? It is the law in many places, like Alaska--and several foreign countries that slow moving vehicles must pull over to let regular traffic pass--- when they impede traffic. In many mountainous areas, there are no straight, safe roads to pass.

CB HI

But "Adaptive Bicycling" in these forums has been used to include sidewalk cycling, wrong way cycling, running stop signs, running red lights, cutting through pedestrians in crosswalks, etc.

Basicly riding however you dam well please, regardless of the laws.

maddyfish

I'd call that mostly vehicular cycling, without the dogma.

San Rensho 

I would call it normal, sensible, courteous and very safe riding.

I don't subscribe to any "school" of cycling, no one school has all the answers all the time. Some elements of a certain school are applicable in one situation but not in another.

"Situational riding", hey, I coined and new school of riding that we can now argue about ad nauseum!

nova

I ride the local towpath trail all the time (every morning in fact) I do not walk past any one period. If i did id never get any where. I hit and keep a 15mph average. Pretty much i don't care to go any faster. I still do way better time using the path than the road and the distance is nearly exactly the same. I get irritated when i see some other cyclist trying to use it like their own personal training grounds doing 20+ mups are not made for those sorts of speeds. Even solo on a good cross bike with all the turns etc thats just to fast to be safe. Toss in a few peds now and then and your asking for trouble.

I also do not tend to pull over for traffic as in cars etc the law does not say i need to and by god they can wait the 30 seconds till its safe to pass me to pass. I have not held up traffic imo ever. Simply put most roads here are 35 mph max and i can hit 28 fairly easily in short sprints. So when theres alot of traffic behind me ill sprint for 50 or 100 feet so i can slide over and let them by. But i will not pull off the road to let them by. Again if i did i would end up waiting all day to get where i was going.

Machka 

OK, that is definitely NOT my style of cycling!

Machka 

I'm not pulling over and stopping all the time because it usually isn't necessary ... only in certain circumstances. I've done it maybe a handful of times this year. The drivers of the vehicles seem to appreciate it and if I can do something to make drivers regard cyclists in a more friendly way, all the better.

As an example, I was doing a century on one of the highways around here and discovered that a rig move was in progress (they post signs). At first it was not a problem because the vehicles weren't too large and could get by me without difficulty, but then the wide-load stuff started coming by, and in one place, I decided it was probably in my best interests to pull off the road and let the convoy go by.

Tom Stormcrowe

Machka, it's pretty simple: "You ride your bike" school of cycling!

LittleBigMan

Just don't mistake your confusion for a lack of clarity.

Don't forget, there's a war on!



(Say...just who's side are you on? )

JohnBrooking

My thought exactly. Perhaps also with the modifier "courteous", to distinguish it from the practice of holding up traffic for extended periods of time with no consideration for those behind, which I think is wrong both ethically and tactically (in that it engenders needless animosity from motorists), even in places where not specifically illegal. I also think that holding up traffic for extended periods is really not that common among experienced vehicularists, as opposed to those who are new to it or don't know much about it, and think they need to prove the point whenever possible.

In places where it is the law to pull over and let faster moving traffic pass, I would not agree that that means you must walk your bike out of the way. I would say it means you only let traffic pile up behind for a short time and vehicle depth before pulling over for a while. I have done this on occasion riding in the right-tire track during a snowstorm, when the shoulder is completely unusable, and encountered no ill will from motorists. (Although sometimes snowstorms make everyone slow down and drive more carefully anyway.) I think this strikes the right compromise, and there must be some compromise, between the ethical, tactical, and sometimes legal requirements to avoid needlessly impeding faster traffic, and the cyclist's need to get where s/he is going in a timely fashion. This spreads the compromise out most fairly, IMO. In places where the traffic is light to moderate and has frequent gaps to allow you to get back into the flow, this should be no problem. In continuous fast traffic, or a long uphill (I'm thinking of Diane's experience with Ortega Hill), it is admittedly harder and may require looking for a saner route.

lima_bean

Sounds like straight up very clearly VC to me, besides the last part sounds like you just about defined VC.

But yeah, even the pulling over to let faster traffic pass I consider VC (Which I did commonly in my car, and I thought was common practice for cars everywhere until I started talking about it on the internet, so guess it depends on what part of the country you are in).

Keith99

COURTEOUS

Which makes Machka part of an all too small minority.

ignominious

I can't understand why anyone would have a problem with this. If Vehicular Cycling demands that a cyclist be forced out of their comfort level without justifiable cause then as a concept it is fundamentally flawed.

Pulling over to avoid unduly holding up traffic obeys that tacit compact that as road users we should not just obey the rules but also respect the flow of traffic, regardless of whether the design of the road meets the needs and demands of it's users.