SaddleBags

[RANT]

Not that I'm in school anymore - just had my 20 year reunion this past summer. This is a rant about how my morning ride is ruined now that school started back up again. Prior to Labor Day, during my weekday morning training ride of 20 miles, I'd encounter a dozen cars. This past week that number of cars is tenfold, including big yellow buses, minivans, and the worst, teenage drivers driving big SUV's. I was cut off by 2 SUV's driven by teens (on cell phones) and 1 minivan driver. The teens even made eye contact but decided to pull out anyway. At least one was visually apologetic. This past week has been perfect biking temps too - mid-up 60's but with alittle wind.

Next week, I'm starting my ride an hour earlier and see if that helps plus break out the hi vis jerseys too.

[/RANT]

konageezer

Oh, man, you said it. It's bad enough with the rich kids in their tuners and boombox SUVs, but there is not one single elementary school child that walks to school any more. Those school zones are full-on drop-off zones, with all the attendant erratic driving behaviour that goes with it. Flippin' dangerous places to be on a bike. Fortunately, I leave home at 5:30, so I can avoid it in the morning. In the afternoon, I take a much more circuitous route home just to avoid them.

cuda2k

I've stopped riding on weekday mornings on the roads and started hitting the local mountain bike trails in the morning, keeping my road riding to the weekends. What sucks more is I'm in school, and working so the time I have to ride is very limited when you pile on the texas heat that puts temps in the 90's by late morning after the school day and work day have begun.

ovoleg

I don't commute to work but I do pass a school on the way to work, Its horrible. I've seen parents let their kids out in the middle of the road, stop on the right when its green and all sorts of moronic things.

The basic idea that they have is to drop their kid off as soon as possible. Thank goodness I don't encounter the actual kids driving

oboeguy

I'll never understand kids being allowed to drive, let alone having their own cars.

That aside... I remember last year when school started and I was riding to a different job so had a different route than I do now. Cheese wagons appeared out of nowhere all of a sudden and created a whole new hazard, so I feel your pain, OP. My current commute avoids any such encounters (partly due to an earlier departure).

^*^BATMAN^*^

Man, I know, when i was in elementary school I walked to and from school almost every day. It was a 15-20 minute walk one way, and that was grade 1-6 I did it. then in junior high i for sure walked(lived a block away).

My little sister is telling me of how girls she goes to school with take the bus from like 5 blocks away. They are ridiculously overweight, and they take it because their parents dont feel safe having them walk to school.......WTF, this in a town of maby 18000 people on a busy day.

Meh, best thign about living on an army base, is that tropps have the right of way, so anyone not in a vehicle, gets the respect they deserve. Even more so when i walk. when i ride, cars will only drive around me if they can go far into teh other lane, it is nice, too bad it is only a small base.

bransom

Boo hoo, boo hoo! God, none of you guys must have kids. You sound like a bunch of whiny old farts sitting around the nursing home, just b****in'. ("Back in MY day, we walked 16 miles through snow and ice and blizzards to get to school!")

But you're right: people don't feel safe letting their kids, especially girls, walk to school, even in small towns. Pick up a newspaper and you might begin to understand why.

Oh, and I'm sure all of you were exceptional drivers who never made mistakes when you first began.

Take a deep breath and look around you. You're damned lucky to be able to get up and go out on a morning ride. The weather is nice, your legs work, you can afford the (probably expensive) bike you're riding. If you're inconvenienced by schools, choose another route. And if the driving around them is really dangerous, call the school and the cops, and keep calling until things begin to change. But for God's sake stop whining.

Kabloink

Did you know that we often had no choice other than walking or riding a bike. There was a time when schools would not pick up kids that lived within a few blocks. Most parents would not drive their kids to school either at that time. At least not my parents of my friends parents.

The majority of child abductions are done by parents, relatives and friends of the family not boogeymen hiding around the schools. The news usually covers the more sensational abductions.

I made a few mistakes when I first started driving, but we did not have cell phones to distract us at that time. The studies show that teens driving while talking on cell phones have the reaction time of a 70 year old driver. Combine cell phone use with the inexperience of teens drivers and you have drivers far more dangerous than we were as teens.

I will stop whining if you stop whining about others whining

^*^BATMAN^*^

lol

hi565

If it makes you feel better I walk to school everyday, even if there is about a foot of snow on the ground.

Treespeed

Scary driving, but the community pool and the beach are back to being empty. No more screaming brats. No more ten-year olds calling each other B!$@hes. I don't have kids of my own, yet (5 more months of sleep left), but I can tell you if I had been as rude as some of these young uns I would have gotten such a beating.

It's not just young kids either, the USC students are the most clueless drivers ever. Not to mention the wrong-way cyclists on their cruisers, though I have to forgive the cute co-eds as long as they keep riding in the short running shorts.

bike756

What about those of us who have to sit in the f-ing place for 7 hours a day? I walk to school, but my sister (7yo)doesn't and her school is literally a few hundred yards away!

cradduck

Yeah, I think that it is amazing that almost no children walk to school anymore. I walked from kindergarden through high school because my parents worked. Worst thing that ever happened was having a decent size earthquake happen while my sister and I were walking to school one morning. I was a latch-key kid and damn proud of it.

Now I live on a block with a lot of children and the number of children who walk to school is nearly zero. And it shows too. These kids are fat...not just a little fat...but the kind of fat that makes you half expect them to have a Snickers bar in their hands every time you seem them.

It is also funny that while these parents are entirely overprotective, every Amber Alert that I hear on the radio has to do with a parent or relative abducting the child; not Joe Somebody out on the street.

It is scary out there when school lets out for the day; even in my car. There are something like 5 elementary schools, 2 junior high schools and, and two high schools within a short distance of where I live and all of these people are more worried about jockying for position in traffic than their own safety and the safety of others.

DocRay

Most kids still walk to school up here. I'm not surprised about the U.S. with the cult of fear currently in place, basically the press is doing nothing but telling people what they should be afraid of. They take abduction cases of 1/10 million and hype them constantly, but ignore the fact that it is farrr more likely to get into a fatal accident in a car than any bogeyman-related incidents.

My favorite recent expose was on lead in plastic window blinds and how it can ****** your kids...if your kids happen to enjoy chewing on window blinds.

Polonswim

Up hill both ways.

Are they safer driving themselves and their friends? Take them, don't let them drive.

I work at a high school. Most of the kids I see aren't making mistakes. Most of them think that they are entitled. And the parents are even worse. It's kind of a "My precived rights are more important than being polite." type of a thing from both the kids and parents.

The school cannot do anything to solve traffic problems and the police have better things to do. I will agree that picking a different route should be seriously considered.

richardmasoner

I understand we live in a mentally-ill culture of fear that is fed by sensationalist media. The truth is that child abductions and assaults are no worse now than they were 20 years ago.

The reaction to the imagined risk creates a greater real risk -- hospitalizations from traffic collisions at schools are up dramatically because of the ridiculous taxi drop-offs. Obesity and the health problems that derive from that are at epidemic levels because kids are no longer allowed to play outside.

Remember also the cub scout who got lost in Utah -- he was so afraid of "stranger danger" that he actively avoided his rescuers and nearly died. And this kid lives in an affluent suburb of Salt Lake City. Telling your kids to avoid strangers when they're lost is about the worst advice you can give them.

Yes, I have two small children -- a son and a daughter -- and they walk, bike, or rollerblade to elementary school every day without adult supervision or help. They'll be more independent, more capable, more physically fit and less pathologically fearful of the world than the ninnies who are chauffered in their cocoons, that's for sure.

RFM

inthe_fall

in the span of one generation, the number of kids who walk/bike to school has gone from 73% to 18%.

and people wonder why so many kids are obese.

lmans66

I ride during school...about 1 or 2 pm....by the time I return, they are out and the cars are gone. Just adjust your work schedule!

caloso

Quoted for emphasis. Well said, richardmasoner.

Boatdesigner

In our community, your kid is not allowed to leave the building unless an adult picks them up (showing a little green pass with the kids name on it). One odd thing though, the kids who ride the busses get dropped off on a corner whether anyone is there for them or not. Not that the stop is far from the house, they won't let you walk more than a block! I pick my son up myself as the discipline on the busses is non-existant and the younger kids get picked on everyday. I ride after I drop him off, so I rarely see a car, just senior citizens working in their yards or walking. I guess I am lucky!

The fear here in Citrus County is very high and everyone is in near panic mode after what happened to Jessica Lunsford. She was taken from her bedroom though, not the school. In a small, rural county like this one, the overwhelming coverage makes it seem as if it happened next door.

UmneyDurak

Yeah I ride through that hell now too. I actually stopped wearing my collegian jersey, so I can have few choice words to parents doing something ********. Oh well.

brinstar

In my home town (70k pop) a good percentage of children still walk to the elementary i attended and walk to. Here in San Antonio however I have never seen a child walking to school.

uctke283

I live about 200 yards from the local emementary school is. My daughter is required by school policy to either take the bus or be dropped off by a parent! They will not allow the kids to walk to school as they are afraid they will be held liable if the kids are hit while walking to school!

It amazes me how things have changed in the years since I was in school...

brinstar

can you walk with her?

bean4158

A friend and I were riding two Friday's ago and almost got crushed by a school bus. When it went past I could have touched it without extending my arm. I have to admit that I was rattled by it and I generally take it all in stride. My friend is a new rider and it really freaked him out. I do that same ride almost every morning and things have certainly changed since school started a few weeks ago!

Mike
Bradenton, Florida