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Old 11-03-20, 10:48 AM
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Biker395 
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Location: SoCal
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Bikes: Serotta Legend Ti; 2006 Schwinn Fastback Pro and 1996 Colnago Decor Super C96; 2003 Univega Alpina 700; 2000 Schwinn Super Sport

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Originally Posted by jppe
We had similar social media conversations going on last month when one of our towns put up signs which said cyclists could use the full lane. The ordinances hadn’t changed, the signs were just placed as reminders. It created the usual bantering about use of the roadways. Maybe at least it brought attention to cyclists being on the local roadways???

As a side, last Saturday a group of 7 of us were doing a group ride and riding 2 abreast. It’s legal in NC to ride in a double pace line, and as you know it’s easier for vehicles to pass the shorter line of cyclists. A vehicle pulls along side us in the oncoming lane, rolls down his window and slides almost over into the passenger seat while still driving.......and instructs us to ride single file and to stop talking to each other......at least that’s what we think we heard. He sped off. A few blocks up the road he had pulled into a service station, gotten out of his car and was on the sidewalk hollering the same messages. He then pulled out behind us and started blowing his horn, especially as he was passing us again. We never broke our stride and just waved and smiled. I’m sure he was thinking that if we were riding single file he could have passed us by squeezing between the yellow line and us.
Re the BMUFL signs, we had the same here. It was impossible to get across to those that objected that the signs merely represented the vehicle code.

I later spoke privately with some of the residents and found out that their objection was more because of the signs than the message ... they don't like signs in their hood. They were more amenable to sharrows where applicable. But by then, the battle lines were drawn. The cyclist group was essentially taken over by people who would not compromise, and saw it as some kind of civil rights protest from the 60s, just further antagonizing the residents (who in the past, had been very reasonable about all the cyclists in the hood). In the end, the BMUFL signs they erected were removed, and no sharrows took their place.

Ugh ... politics.
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