Daily Commute

It would have been nice to see a stronger defense of the cyclist's right to be in the traffic lane from organizations that are supposed to represent the interests of cyclists.

shbikes, what prevented the bus driver from changing lanes to pass the cyclist? With a full lane to the bus driver's left, I don't see how anyone could say the driver had "frightfully limited space." Passing with only a foot of space is dangerous, regardless of the driver's skill. A strong wind gust could easily move a cyclist that far in an instant.

I also question the driver's need to pass the cyclist. Given the ebb and flow of traffic, it's clear that the bus wasn't going much faster than the cyclist. After all, the cyclist did catch up. That means the bus driver violated another basic rule of road courtesy--don't pass unless you can stay ahead. Maybe the bus driver should have just stayed a respectable distance behind the cyclist.

My experience with busses is that you generally must take the lane in front of them on roads with passing lanes. A lane that may be big enough for a car to pass safely is rarely big enough for a bus and a bike to share safely side-by-side. And if the bus is going to have to go into the left lane to get by us, it will block that lane anyway, so it might as well go into the entire left lane and leave us with the entire right lane.

P.S. I deleted the question that Dogbait answered because my question was quoted entirely in his answer. Brian, the 100-post limit is a very good experiment.