another cycling catastrophe in San Diego
 

http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/loca...115377974.html

Friars Road and i-15. I'm not so familiar with that area, but I think the freeway exit merges onto Friars Road, without a stop sign, which is a recipe for disaster.

unfortunately, there are too many of these high speed freeway onramps/offramps near
cycling arteries here in san diego. i know my first impulse is always to speed up and cross these danger zones asap. With traffic, sometimes ya gotta remain in the rightmost/exit lane after the bike lane ends with traffic whizzing closely by at 50+ mph for longer than you'd like before cutting across into a bike lane. someone's always in a hurry to get off or on the freeway...

personally have never had a problem at that specific spot but for westbound friars just on the other side of the street, i have. thinking about it offhand, the onramp/offramp areas that cause me the most difficulty consistently are: fairmont northbound and southbound by sdsu and the 8 fwy, morena blvd both directions north of old town and south of usd by the 8 fwy, southbound ingraham st heading into sports arena/midway/west point loma blvd area by the 8 fwy and lastly, eastbound mira mesa blvd and the 15 fwy south onramp by buca di beppo. obviously, there are other hot spots but these are the ones that come to mind immediately.

i know there have been more than a few tragedies on kearny villa road through the miramar area. it is definitely high speed and sketchy in some areas. haven't ridden it during peak commute times and i definitely don''t plan on doing so.

I do the same thing, (speed up when approaching such situations.)
But after a deadly accident we just had a few months ago on Rancho Santa Fe, in which a woman was crossing 55mph traffic to get to a left-hand turn lane, I watch the traffic closely, AND especially be prepared to abandon the crossing and nail the brakes.

Sure it sucks to lose your momentum and stand there at one of those ugly non-places while speeding motorists stream by and stare with wide wonder at the doofus standing in an unlikely place in garish colors and spandex pants, AND it's also dangerous to restart and cross such a place slowly when it appears more clear of traffic, but it beats the alternative.

RIP Ben Acree.

+ 1.

+2

Be careful out there.

Sad, just sad.

Guess I don't understand how the police came to the conclusion that the cyclists violated the trucks right of way. I though cyclists had the right to use traffic lanes, at least the CVC says so anyway.

Very sad story. Too easy for the truck driver to place the blame on the cyclist who never had a chance to give his account of the events.

I was thinking the same thing.

what is especially galling is that it is an uphill offramp and there is a slight uphill on the freeway heading north at that point. it's not like the truck lost its' brakes on some descent such as the one a half mile south on the 15 fwy heading north. it is a merge lane and i suppose that no one driving wants to lose their uphill 'momentum.' verry sad...

whatever the vehicular manslaughter laws are...they aren't stringent enough. i'm guessing the truck driver would be in more trouble had he/she killed a fellow automobile driver. frequently seems
like peds and cyclists are 'lesser' beings. the stories about cyclists being seriously injured or killed seem to increase every year. not that there weren't some cyclists surely at fault there but it's getting to the point where i feel like i gotta ride with 4 helmet-cams to cover my ass(ets)...