silverz

Do you do it?

Have they ever given you problems?

JoeyBike

I take the shortest route I can. Curbs, parking lots, vacant lots, apartment complexes, whatever.

jdmitch

Just a short crossover through one parking lot as otherwise I'd have to either salmon or go a mile out of my way on a busy street to get to the bike path I use.

artimus

Problems, no. But the dynamics of a parking lot are not conducive to safe cycling.

duke_of_hazard

Only if I want to increase my chances of being hit by a car tenfold.

Wanderer

The Casino parking lot near me, is actually the southern end of one of the MUPs. No other choice.

uke

Exactly. Parking lots are one of the few places I avoid whether on bike or on foot; I don't even like maneuvering them in cars.

degnaw

If it's busy, I would not use it as a shortcut.

If it's a corporate or otherwise calm parking lot, I would.

unixpro

I completely agree. People driving around in a parking lot are looking for empty spaces and not bikes. Heck, they'll back up into people walking down the aisles, and they're moving slowly!

Not to mention the fact that at the other end you've got to merge back into traffic again. Another chance for people not to see you/act stupidly. If you're in traffic and just go around the corner, you're visible all the way.

It's like speeding on the freeway. What, in the end, does it really save you? 20 seconds? 30? Is that worth your life?

{someone traveling 50 miles at 80 MPH arrives in 37.5 min. Someone traveling the same distance at the rural speed limit, 70 MPH, gets there in 43min. Someone going 60 gets there in 50 min. Is 12.5 minutes worth the danger of going 80 MPH in a suburban area? Is 5.5 minutes worth it in a rural area?}

ascend

As long as you are aware of your surroundings, ride at a suitable speed, and understand that the only person watching out for you is yourself, carparks don't seem to be a big deal. So in that respect, they're not much different from riding anywhere else, really.

The clincher is the "suitable speed" bit. Does riding slowly through a carpark save you any time over maybe riding faster with traffic the long way round? That'll depend on you and your carpark.

chipcom 

Parking lots can often be great detours to avoid congested intersections, traffic jams, etc.

benda18

it depends. i ride through the parking lot of an amusement park at around 6:00 am when the only moving vehicle in the entire lot is the security team. not much chance of being hit by a car in that circumstance.

segue: i've definitely been hassled by security but was able to convince them i was no "threat" and that i preferred riding the lot as opposed to the 5-lane limited access highway that paralleled it. much love since.

bugly64

I cut through a dorm parking lot on base, and I have almost got backed over about 3 times.

degnaw

+1

Unless it was around 7am or 2:30pm, I'd cut through the school/community center parking lots and track at mason-montgo and tylersville to bypass half a mile of 35mph (45 RealSpeed) arterials. There's a roadside MUP too, but a deserted parking lot is way safer.

That said, if I have a heavy tailwind, I might not (It's always fun doing 30-35mph in traffic).

chipcom 

dorm? DORM? Marines have barracks...dorms are for the other services and college girls.

no motor?

Me too, except slower than Joey.

TheLifeOfBryan

Like so many other things in cycling, it all depends on the particulars of the situation. The folks above are generally correct about the heightened dangers of parking lots, but sometimes they can be the safest path. But it really is true that once cars enter a parking lot, they seem to finish abandoning all pretense of giving a damn about the rules of the road.

SaladShooter

Good lord, it's a wonder some of you folks even get out of bed in the morning for fear of a piano falling from the sky and crushing you. The world is a dangerous place, act accordingly.

BTW, yeah, I ride in parking lots.

bugly64

What does the Navy call it's single personnel living quarters? I thought the Marines was just another part of the Navy.

norskagent

At some shopping centers and other large building complexes you can ride behind the buildings to get from one side to the other, and avoid most of the issues w/ cars, people, etc.

DataJunkie

Your comment makes no sense. These folks are riding in the streets instead of parking lots. Streets are safe?

Anyhow, I generally avoid them unless I need to make a detour. Then again there is virtually no benefit in riding through parking lots on my route.

unterhausen

I ride through a couple of parking lots. One behind a strip mall that is treated as an arterial by half the town. The other avoids one block of the main drag and a bike lane that is really a sidewalk and has all the attendant dangers of a sidewalk. I feel compelled to note that riding through parking lots is illegal in most state's vehicle code.

Marines are supposed to bivouac. When I was deployed to Desert Storm with the Air Force, we lived in air conditioned tents. There were stories of tank crews sleeping in their body bags on the front lines because that was the most comfortable thing they had with them. Bad optics though.

SaladShooter

I was responding to the "cars in parking lots are super dangerous!!" posts. Yes, cars are dangerous in parking lots, on streets, and coming out of driveways. These posts seemed to imply that parking lots are a veritable sea of manic drinkers high on paint fumes and crushed dreams when they are really pretty predictable. Been driving in 'em for years...

If you're reasonably aware of your surroundings then you really are in no more danger in a parking lot than on a street, we agree on that point. I ride a motorcycle, and when people ask me "dear god you're crazy, aren't you afraid of getting hit by a car?" my response is always that I ride with the idea that EVERYONE and EVERYTHING on the road is trying to kill me, and it is my job to make that as hard as possible for them.

chipcom 

I think we actually Accomplished the Mission on Okinawa back in the 40s...which earned us the right to permanent imperial bases that include running water, clubs that serve booze and actual barracks..even if they were just the corrugated Quonset huts they used to be in my day. Granted, today they look more like dorms...and are even co-ed!

DataJunkie

I beg to differ. Parking lots tend to be filled with drivers going too fast in unpredictable directions.
Throw rain in the mix...