Forming an attachment to the roads
 

Not literally. But every spring I get back onto roads that I haven't been on for a couple months over winter, and it always feels like seeing old friends after a hiatus. The synapses of memory fire and re-establish dormant connections with every dip and curve and grade, and I fancy myself like the captain of a ship revisiting a port not seen since the wilder days of his youth. The roads here are my Hong Kong, my Singapore, and the elation is every bit as thrilling as the prospect of a rum-serving wench in a harbourside inn is to the men on a ship who have toiled so arrrr-duously on the high seas.

Not that I've pegged the crowd here as the type who'd necessarily be hooked by hoary marine metaphors ("pegged," "hooked"...eh? Eh? Is this thing on?), but I can't help but feel enraptured at finally doing more riding after the freezing cold April that the middle and northeastern part of the North American continent had to endure after we'd been promised a milder winter and an earlier spring.

There really is nothing like a good bike ride, is there?

Another thing: I consider streets and roads to essentially belong to one of two classes: those with lines, and those without. Line markings signify the presence of voluminous motorized traffic, something to be endured for the first 4 or 5 km of my ride (in any direction! I'm lucky) until I get far enough out of my city of 32,000 to be surrounded by little more than cows and corn. There are stretches of pristine tarmac around here where in the early evening I can ride for minutes/kms at a time without encountering combustible engines. To say that this is a joy and highly to be prized is an understatement.

Ten years ago, when I got back onto a bike as an adult, I never would have foreseen myself feeling so sentimental about, even possessive of, the roads I ride on. But I do. I really do feel rooted in my community and region because of my bike. And that I'm a roadie saying this is a bit ironic, considering that many of us (older types) are seen as lycra-clad middle-aged narcissists without a bone of local consciousness in our bodies.

So here's to consciousness-raising on a road bike. Cheers!

I get this sentiment - "like, totally". Two things: a comment and a question.

Comment: anyone who 'gets' XTC is A1 in my books. Best ... band ... evaaar (and this from a 64 year-old).

Question: where the hell are you -- rough indication will do! I'm in Middlesex County.

Whoa, didn't expect any XTC love on this board. Nice.

I'm in Stratford. I should probably change my location to Southwestern Ontario to be more accurate.

Edit: Cripes, Middlesex County is massive. About which part are you in?

Been a fan since forever; I've always had a -- shall we say -- 'catholic' -- taste in music. Like anything if it's good of its kind (rap excepted).

London here, but love Stratford; we're usually at the Slow Foods market on a Sunday grabbing stuff from Soiled Reputation and McIntosh Farms.

I've not ridden out your way. Good/quiet routes? Traffic can be hell here.

To be honest, the times we've taken Hwy 7 past Hwy 4 to Wonderland and taken that all the way down into London we've always seen cyclists seemingly doing an out-and-back ride on Wonderland, and I think to myself: too many cars and too highway-ish (it's got lines on it, you see).

In Stratford you always do headwind-out, tailwind-home because the winds are something fierce. When they're from the northwest, which they often are, Line 42 and Line 29 west of town toward Mitchell are two of my favourite routes.

That market will be outside again starting this Sunday. PM me next time you're out this way so's I can say hello.

Yes, traffic here (volume and speed) is an issue, seems to me. Popular route (N/E) is out Adelaide, toward #7 in fact. Problem is that urban sprawl is encroaching, so that what was a quietish country road is rapidly becoming an ersatz expressway. Last time I rode it I tired quickly of being passed by large vehicles w/inattentive drivers doing 100+kmh.

Certainly will give a shout (PM) if we are heading up of a Sunday.

There's a road I ride when I get the chance. I have to drive about 45 minutes to get there. It's a beaten down road, with tons of rough pavement and potholes. My aluminum framed bike rattles like the dickens most of the way along that road. There are times I'm concerned I'll rattle some fillings out on this broken pavement.

But this road happens to be along some of the most beautiful water on the planet, the Little River out of Townsend TN. Every time I ride it I get the feeling of spending time with an old friend.

Yeah, I get it.

I feel the same way, but not with riding; more so with running. For me, it's more the early morning weekend rides that I get attached to, any road will do because there's usually no one on it.

Sometimes I like the feeling of being on an old route with memories of riding in a younger era of my life.

I did get out and hit a couple of old roads yesterday. Coming down a 20% slope with cracks in the pavement and big chunks missing scared the #$&$#X out of me.

Another aspect of knowing the local roads so well is observing their gradual degradation over the years. I'm starting to see finger-width-sized honeycomb cracks along the edges of roads that for so long were smooth as glass.

Makes you aware of the passage of time.

When I'm coming home at night, it feels as If I'm at home on some roads.

Forming an attachment to the roads

I have that renewal experience every year, as I expand my usual year-round 14 mile commute onto revisited training rides all over metro Boston. In fact I post about the "road" as a physical structure, and "Road" as a unifying, virtually metaphysical concept. This winter I had to drive one of my usual summer cycling routes, and posted about it on a local Boston Northeast Regional Discussion thread:

I once categorized the roads I ride on in reverse order of cycling desirability (couldn’t find the quote, and this is a recollection) as heavy commercial, urban downtown, light commercial, urban/suburban residential, exurban and rural. I had a special term for those intimate, tree-lined, low volume, grass abutted roads, often without lines:

I also recently posted on the Living Car Free Forum:

Finally, I grew up, and began my adult cycling lifestyle in Southeastern Michigan, and had relatives in Kitchener. Pinery Provincial Park was a favorite day trip (by car). My then-girlfriend-now-wife and I did some touring in Southwestern Ontario, including a memorable ride along the Lake Huron shore from Sarnia to the Bruce Peninsula, ferry to Manitoulin Island, on to Sudbury, train to Toronto, ride to Kitchener, then home via Windsor. Currently we visit Detroit from Boston a couple times a year via Buffalo though Ontario to Sarnia and Port Huron.

I find myself occasionally conflicted with the pleasure of riding. The mountains which i love are often congested with traffic, making them not nearly enjoyable as they could be. What's worse, i always fool myself into thinking that because it's the "country", it shouldn't be. It always leaves me disappointed, especially having rode an hour and a half to get there. That being said, the nearby farmlands have provided wonderfully quiet, if flat, roads to take. With soft melodies humming from my blue-tooth and the buzz of my wheels, i sometimes find myself almost being lulled to sleep! Once more, i've convinced myself wrongly to believe that the lack of population would mean poor roads, but perhaps it is the absence of traffic that leaves these roads to be in wonderful, though narrow, condition.

The weather here in New York has been spotty at best, but i'm certain that the coming days of shine will be filled with glee as i can finally get back to adventuring to my hearts content! <3

I was recently having this thought having moved back to an area I used to live. When I got my first road bike over ten years ago, I had a 32 mile route that I did almost every other day. Part of the route was idiotic on a bike, and I haven't done it since, but one part is THE main thoroughfare for cyclists in the area. Lots of smaller roads cut off of it and you can stitch together all sorts of loops.

But now that I've moved back, bought a house, have a *real* job anda family it's looking like I'll be here for a long time. I wondered how bored I would get with the roads, but then realized that there are enough of them and they change day to day depending on weather (mostly wind). A ride today will be different from a ride 2 days from now. You can have a good or bad day and so can the roads. We'll have lots of good and bad times together I think.

I saw XTC on the drums and wires tour at a little club in NYC called Hurrah. Had my elbows on the stage. They were brilliant! Andy Partridge sweated on me. (Ew. And awesome!)

It must have been a fine thing indeed to see XTC live. I didn't really get into them until after Andy stopped touring, so that's a dream never to be realized. You are a lucky person.

I have a couple roads I ride all the time. They both have been repaved in the last few months. It's amazing how different a road can be after getting repaved. It must be 1-2 mph better. One road (Kaukonahua) is a long downhill. Average about 30 mph +/-. Before it was like constant watching for potholes and picking the right line was critical (and there's choke traffic so veering into the center of the lane requires some forethought). Now I can ride confidently without much thought.

scott s.
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Some things change. Some things don't.

I've ridden the road near Mom's house since High School, over 30 years.

There is a moderately busy section where the wide shoulders disappear. Then there are these crosswise cuts about 4" wide, extending about a foot across the fog line. Perhaps they were intended as drains, I don't know. But they've been a dangerous annoyance for my whole life.

I know the feeling of well laid fresh asphalt. Not a lot of real course chipseal around here, but even the fine stuff is rough compared to freshly laid asphalt.

I am at that. However, I missed them on the Black Sea tour because the girl I was going with bailed. That was, of course, their last tour. :cry:

And sometimes it goes the opposite direction. Popularity of chipseal roads can be devastating to a good route. There's a lake north of Denton and the road that went across its dam was a really popular route back in the day. They put really chipseal on the whole length of the road years back, making it a nightmare to ride. I'll still do it on occasion just to get in more miles, but it even sucks on my CX bike with 32mm slicks.

XTC? "Generals and Majors" is about all I got. :p