Originally Posted by
buzzman
Whoa, easy cowboy!
...I don't know what "ideology" you think I am so strongly adhering to- perhaps it is my prioritizing infrastructural changes as primary and that creating safe routes and passage for cyclists is more important in my mind than thinking that laws and enforcement will suffice. Perhaps you interpret my use of the word "infrastructure" as a reference
only to bike specific infrastructure. If so, that is not the case. When I say infrastructure I am talking about roads, bridges, streets
any place cyclists ride whether there is bike specific infrastructure or not...
Edit:
Your post made me question my perception...especially due to the long duration between when I last rode the PCH... I felt like maybe I was way off base. But then I found this from Bike Portland and it makes me feel like my criticisms are still valid. And I suggest a google search of bicycling and the PCH and it turns up a whole lot of negative about this very scenic and popular route. Maybe not enough to discourage riding it but certainly enough to question the safety of relatively long sections of it.
http://bikeportland.org/2013/09/24/t...ke-route-94151
I was over-the-top negative and a bit too personal in my characterization. I apologize. We differ in strategies, but not in most aspects of the overall goals we pursue relative to cycling advocacy. I should keep that in mind and feel chastened for allowing a spur on my saddle to distract me.
As to the link on riding on the OR coast, bear in mind that I don't ride the coast in the northern portion of the state. The police up there are notoriously anti-cycling and the fatalities that occur on the coast are almost all in the first hundred miles. Down here, we have only a handful of bridges, only one is at all long (into North Bend) and no tunnels. I suspect our criticisms of the infrastructure would be nearly identical, as would our solutions.
Do take a look at the close pass that was shown in the link. I hate blaming the victim, but riding the fog line in an eleven foot lane is not a wise thing to do. Sure, we all do it sometimes, but not when it would invite an RV to "share" the lane with us. Such situations are too common everywhere and I'm sure we both agree that such builds are inadequate and uncomfortable. They needn't be dangerous, but that depends on many factors (social, training, enforcement...) They certainly create unnecessary risks for all road users and should never, in my opinion, be allowed to remain thus. (There are very few such circumstances in the southern portion of the state, but the portion of US 101 in CA between Orick and Patrick's Point is similarly built, and is not as easily avoided as the similar section north of Leggett.)