Originally Posted by
twobadfish
Uhhh... that doesn't coincide with the one-size-fits-all absolute world that some people in this thread live in. All distractions affect all drivers equally and nobody is able to personally judge the level of distraction they can handle.
It should be left up to a group of motorist hating cyclists to decide what all drivers can handle.
What's funny is I didn't read this comment before I responded. Thus making the "one-size-fits-all" comment even more hilarious.
My proposal (aside from my previously proposed bannings) is to repossess any person's vehicle whose owner engages in ANY thoughts outside of the prescribed thought patterns the collective group of traffic geniuses whom travel only by bicycle.
Seriously though, nothing short of banning cars altogether will satisfy some of the proponents of safe driving here. It goes beyond safe driving. It's personal and it's based on autonomous studies rather than any real personal experience. It goes beyond being able to recognize factors that distract from a driver's concentration and moves into selected items that on paper create an entire race of horrible and distracted drivers.
It concedes that drivers are incapable of overcoming distractions and remaining safe drivers. It moves into the realm of
all drivers = blank staring idiots
There is little room for discussion here.
I see you are from St George UT... which means you are surrounded by vast areas of very open land, and between you and Las Vegas is probably the straightest, most featureless highway in America... with I believe an 85MPH speed limit on I 15 as it heads southwest. My wife, who loves to drive, and does 80% of the driving when we do any long distance trip, called that stretch of highway "the most boring road she has ever been on."
<sarcasm on>
You could probably tie your steering wheel into place and put on the cruise control and play a video game on stretches of that road.<sarcasm off>
About 5-6 hours southwest of you is the second most populous city in the US, with highways filled with people, and surface streets with pedestrians (that is people walking... you know, across the street...) and cyclists, and even kids playing in the street, and roads that are not dead flat straight, and lots and lots of cross traffic... you may have heard of the place, it's called Los Angeles. You had better pay attention to the road ahead in LA, it is not empty.
Most of the folks on BF do not live in St George (I have relatives in the area, just to the east, in the middle of nowhere, really), on the other hand your blanket statements may not apply where most folks live, such as in LA, or in older east coast cities such as Boston, or even NYC, or perhaps in Portland, all places where you are likely to encounter more humans per minute than you might encounter in an hour or two on the outskirts of St George.
Different rules apply... drive accordingly. And BTW when on those roads in northern Arizona (just east of St George) or in Zion... pay attention on the roadways, the cyclist you may almost hit because you are distracted by a cell phone could be me! Yeah those are not the same roads as I15, they may appear "empty" but they are not... I have quite enjoyed riding long distances in and around Kanab, Page, Fredonia; the breakfast is great at some wide spot on 9 outside Mt Carmel Junction, and Zion is just freaking beautiful. Did you see me on the road? Or were you trying to text?
Do you think you might have seen me out on Route 9 when I was in the middle of the lane 'cause there was no shoulder... or were you doing 75MPH and deep in the middle of some engrossing conversation either with a passenger (who might have noticed me) or on a cell phone with an emotional loved one while focusing on trying to hear their words in spite of spotty cell phone coverage in the area?