Just curious, how many people start commuting because of loss of their license through alcohol?

Damn and I thought you were going to be talking about beer bellies!

I thought it was going to be about beer runs.

DUIs

While I do enjoy jokingly referring to drop bars that have been loosened and flipped upside down as "DUI-bars" (pronounced, dooeybars), I do have a friend who got into cycling because of a DUI.

Lost his license, got a bike, started riding to work. Turn out, he liked it. He has his license back now, but still commutes by bike.

-Sam

I also have a friend that has lost her license because of a DUI. Right now she is under house arrest (done with her jail time) and I keep talking commuting while I'm around her - she was allowed work release during the jail time, and is also allowed to work her scheduled shifts while under house arrest. I know it will be several years before she can get her license back, so I'll keep working on her.

She lives about as close to work as I do (7 miles), so she can see it isn't bad.

Not me. I started commuting to elementary school and kept it up when I started to work.

Not me. I was just too poor to buy a car, and really, REALLY sick of buses.

Will you be able to escort her at first? Perhaps some shorter rides with her? Something like that would help relieve any anxiety about traffic and the unknown. Real hands on bicycle advocacy, as it were!

Same here...except the buses didn't run where and the biggie WHEN I needed them. Nothing like a bus service that starts running 1/2 an hour AFTER you have to be at work

Aaron

Only one person attached to my circle of friends started commuting because of a DUI licence-suspension, and he's a meathead who has emphatically stated that he'll be consigning his bicycle to the back of the shed when his licence returns to active status. Now and then we try to cajole him into coming on a weekend ride with us, to see the enjoyable side of cycling, but he always refuses.

I ride through a couple of industrial suburbs, including some of Melbourne's docks and wharves, on my way to work. I see quite a few twenty- and thirty-something looking guys in overalls, workboots and visibility jackets, usually riding clapped-out Xmart bikes or BMX's with no lights or helmets and smoking as they pedal. They cast these looks of absolute loathing at commuters as we zip past them in one direction or another. I've always imagined they're on bikes because they've lost their licences. Maybe one day I should ask, but to be honest, I'm a little frightened: they all look so fiercely ... embarrased .

I don't know if there are many people riding bicycles around here due to losing their license, but many moped riders appear to fall into that category. Many bicycle commuters in this area are Hispanic immigrants on department store mt. bikes. Most fast food restaurants have a few such bikes parked near the back doors.

personally, i have been commuting because i like to bicyle.

i bicycle to work because i need a paycheck-insurance.

i need insurance/paycheck to live so i can ride...

what do you ride? are you asked this while commuting?

do you have a dui charge, or know of someone who does?

thanks for your input in advance!!

No I'm 19 and never had a DUI let alone driven drunk. I got into it because I broke both hips and needed to get in shape and running wouldn't allow that. My cousin rode his bike for a while. Our family is very niave and so he said he did it to get into shape, since his dad died at age 52 from CVD. He is now back to driving.

No-one I know - most people do it to keep/get fit and because the alternatives (public transport, car, walking) suck.

+1! I indirectly got into full time commuting, to the extent of giving up the car, because of alcohol.
Not a DUI, I just... can't... leave the beer and chips alone! Without the cycling, I would look like a blob.

Not due to alcohol. I had brain surgery to remove a tumor. I lost my license for one year and then my doctor had to approve my application to take the written and driving tests. I have some problems due to the surgery. Minor stuff like not being able to write freehand on paper but whats strange is I can sign my name but don't ask me to date it, I just can't get the date from my brain across to the paper and whats strange is I know what the date is. My doctor tells me it's something to do with motor skills coming from different parts of my brain. I can type on my keyboard just fine. I retired the day the doctor found the tumor. I continue to ride and enjoy it very much and yes; I did get my drivers license back including motorcycle and vessel endorsements.

I don't drive when I drink, but I found myself 'not driving' an awful lot. About four years ago I was at a routine doctor's appointment which happened to be the Monday after an all weekend golf tournament/drinking binge. My BP was 230/110 and I was a few shades of unhuman color. I was told to go see my GP (this was a foot doctor), and was told that if I continued down this path, I would not live to see my daughter graduate high school. I stopped drinking for 8 months and got back on the bike - the rest is history.

I got back on the bike because of alcohol, but not because the law told me to. I now moderate my drinking and am able to enjoy a cocktail here and there while still being able to ride whenever I want to.

I know people who should, but they take a friggin taxi instead...

Non-DUI response:
I, too, got back into cycling, if not commuting, due to poor health and largely because of alcohol consumption. Commuting to school while between jobs and in a career change was part of it, then road riding, the club riding, and commuting to work which is halfway between my home and the club ride location, was a natural evolution. I now ride about 200 miles a week to and from work, club rides and on the club rides themselves.

DUI response:
I also stopped drinking and driving (always "being careful", but occasionally pushing the limit) after a good friend got a DUI and lost his license for a year. He rides as much as I do, but ended up commuting for 6 months until he got driving privileges for work. His lesson learned: bicycle commuting by choice is awesome, bicycle commuting with no choice is horrible. I was pulled over and tested on the side of the road not too long before his incident. Those two combined were enough to convince me, it just ain't worth it.

I'd like to add that a major turning point was when I was drinking more and bicycle commuting at the same time, nothing got me down more than my own bad decisions. I can't ride the bike hung over, and nothing pained me more than knowing the previous night's decisions kept me off the bike the next day.

I was sitting outside a bar near where I live and noticed that the bus that stops at the front door of the building where I work also comes to within a mile of where I live. I also noticed that the buses run on natural gas and not diesel like they used to. I started feeling stupid for driving my car to work (especially when there's a transit subsidy through work that pays for pub transit). After taking the bus for a few months, I got tired of waiting for late buses and pulled the bike out of mothballs. I then realized that I don't even need a car, and so let the tags lapse.

So not because of a DUI, but I was drunk when I decided to ditch the car.

I ride hung over - I just look at it as fair punishment.

On the topic of the thread, no DUIs for me as I don't drive drunk. I like to drink occasionally, sometimes I have to drive, and I avoid mixing the two. I've had a driver who was harassing me ask me if I had a license (and to prove it), the insinuation being that I was riding because of a DUI. I not-so-politely suggested that he engage in a rigorous course of self-copulation. In slightly harsher language.

I'm more than willing to help her get started - if she'd accept the help. Which she very well may do now. Part of her 'sentence' has been counselling, AA meetings and mandatory classes. She does realize now that she has a problem.

A major impact on my life growing up was my mother being hit by a drunk driver. I was 10 and she was in the hospital for 3 months - life sucked! But the one thing that always comes to my mind first (I guess because of the thought processes of a 10 year old), is my dad's cooking sucked sooooo bad.

The only time I drink is when I'm at home and don't have to go somewhere later, or if someone is a designated driver. The 'smallish' city that I live in doesn't have any public transportation.

No.

Years ago I did start riding my bike to work after losing my license - not a DUI though. I went about four years with no license and no car. I would have probably been better off if I'd stayed car free.