Originally Posted by
staehpj1
FWIW, my observation on my tours has been that:
1. People are generally far nicer than I could have imagined especially in the rural and small town settings where I tour. I think that people tend to be at their worst when crowed more closely together in big cities. Since most of us avoid big cities when touring that isn't a problem for most of us.
2. The one guy who I met on tour that expected the worst from people was the one guy who constantly had problems with them. People tend to rise or fall to met your expectations. If you are generous, open, and friendly you will mostly meet folks who are generous open and friendly.
3. I personally have usually felt that I was safer on tour than at home, in part because I lived in Baltimore and toured through mostly rural small towns. So I figure that extra protection was not needed on tour. I'd be more likely to carry some kind of protection at home than on the road.
It makes a ton of sense. Most folks in smaller towns are intrigued or baffled when you say you are biking with all of your stuff and are usually quite nice. The city people are rude and nasty mostly because nobody wants to be there and they see bikes all the time, smaller towns might not.
I might have protection if I plan on riding through private property a bunch without permission but small towns are usually pretty chill. I don't hear a whole lot of bad things happening to cyclists (aside from incidents with vehicles which happen everywhere) in smaller areas but in the big cities they happen quite often.
Originally Posted by
Steve B.
Could you maybe clue me in on where and when these incidents occurred ?
Ive been bike commuting the Rocks for 25 years off and on, Seagirt, Edgemere, Shore Front and Rockaway Beach Blvd thru Jacob Riis.
Ive never, ever even seen a dog, much less a pack.
Skeptical.
SB
Generally any dog who might attack someone is regarded as a pitbull or rottweiller even if that is not the actual case. It is the media's fault. There is a possibility of attacks but probably not a whole lot. Most of the incidents posted by Vintage are over ten years old.
However there are some bad people up there who do use actual American Pitbull Terriers and Stafordshire terriers for breeding, fighting or just mistreat them in other ways. I have friends up there who do Pitty rescue but from what they said last time I talked with them it is mostly dog on dog violence these days and the strays aren't as prevalent.
Of course the answer lies not in demonizing the dogs as some would do but to get them to loving homes and punish the humans who mistreat them and breed them. Not saying anyone here believes that just saying it as a statement