Originally Posted by
Al_in_NH
It's funny how you all assume everyone who rides a rail trail is a "professional" who pays attention, watches where they run, walk, or ride, and treats everyone with respect. Well, we must ride different trails I guess (though I do ride the Minute Man Bikeway quite a bit) I guess I'll just go back to lurking now that the name calling has commenced. I didn't come here for that, but i suppose Rule Number 5 applies. Just for a point of reference, i'm not a newbie. I started riding seriously in 1978 when I was in Japan. Bought my first real bike, an Austro Daimler Olympian when I came back to the states in 1980, and have been riding ever since. I was a member of the League of American Wheelmen when it still was the League of American Wheelmen. Rode a bike from outside of Chicago Il to North Carolina when I was younger. Putin around 3000 to 4000 miles a year depending on when the ice and snow start piling up. You can spot me on the trail quite easily. I'm the guy with the low blinking strobe who waves and says hi to everyone. Even those of you too engrossed in your own greatness attempting to win the Tour de MyBackYard on the local rail trail.
I don't know if by "low blinking strobe" you're referring to intensity or speed, but I'm specifically referring to fast strobing very bright lights, which is a lighting technique used to disorient people.
Who said anything about "professionals" who "always pay attention"? If you're using a technique to try to get the <1% who don't look in front of themselves on a path to pay attention at the cost of fast-strobing everyone else who does, that's a pretty foolish calculation of risks.
I've been riding about 1000 miles a month, much of it on MUPs--maybe I've just encountered more of these unreasonable lights than you have. I'm getting the sense they may have been a bit of a fad. I still see a few once in a while, but there's a lot fewer than last year, when I took to actually yelling at people who were blinding me. Speaking of the Minuteman, they've now posted signs telling people to turn off the strobes. Your obnoxious snark aside, it is not just me who has found these things to be a problem.