Helmet Head

Exactly.

Say someone came up to in an alley with a gun pointing at your head and made the following offer: "I will shoot you in the head, OR, I will let you toss a coin and if it comes up heads I won't shoot you and will leave".

Do you agree to toss the coin, even though doing it "may or may not have had any use in this situation"?

The two choices are:

a) Ride in the bike lane.
b) Ride centerish, move into the bike lane only when fsdt is present or approaching.

To me, (a) is analogous to refusing to toss the coin, and (b) is at least giving it a chance.

The difference is that inadvertent drift/swerve is so unlikely in the first place that doing (a) or (b) will almost certainly not make any difference in any given situation.

However, if you ride for years and years and thousands and thousands of miles, your chances of encountering a driver approaching from behind who is about to be distracted by something increase with time and miles. It seems to me riding in a manner that increases the likelihood of such a driver to be aware of you presence before he gets distracted only has a plus side. More importantly, riding centerish makes it less likely that you'll overlook a potential cross traffic conflict up ahead, which is more likely to cause a crash than are threats from behind.

SSP

Or, you could get distracted yourself while riding in the middle of the road, hit a pothole, fall down, and then get run over by fsdt.

What a ludicrous argument...not to mention a shallow and ridiculous analogy.

randya

it didn't take serge long to recover from his smack down, did it?

SSP

I've been staying out of A&S because it's just gotten so tedious, lengthy, and "all about HH" and his apparently insatiable need for control and attention.

Do you have a link to the smack down thread?

zeytoun

I don't accept false dichotomies from gun-wielding strangers in alleys, so I'm certainly don't accept one from you. The best course of action is to know which streets/alleys to avoid at what times, not obliviously enter an alley and accept a game of Russian roulette. But let me know how that works out for you, ok?

Helmet Head

Anything can happen. The issue is how likely is it to happen.

Has anyone ever hit a pothole fallen down and then was run over? On average, how many per year? How about inadvertent drift into bike lanes or shoulders? My sense is it's less than one, and dozens, respectively.

Helmet Head

Fine, ignore the whole point.

randya

smack down starts here:
https://www.bikeforums.net/showpost.p...&postcount=298

zeytoun

Your point has no basis in reality. Riding in a bike lane is not a recipe for certain death in the case of a guy panicking over a bee. And riding centerish is not necessarily a recipe for improvement.

Heck, it could have been worse. Maybe he rides centerish, the car swerves into oncoming traffic, and the cyclist gets killed along with a couple more people. It happens (see the article I pointed to last)

Who knows, right?

Of course, Rando's method would be the most likely to avoid the freak accident. What do you think? If a stranger in an alley points a gun at your head and says that you can either 1) play a round of poker with him, and if you lose, he will shoot you, and if you win, he will merely expose himself and let you go, or 2)tweak your nipples saucily through your shirt and go free, which will you choose?

Helmet Head

My point is not that riding in a bike lane is a recipe for certain death in the case of a guy panicking over a bee.
Nor is my point that riding centerish is necessarily a recipe for improvement.

Very lame, Zey, I expect better from you.

Indeed it is an issue of probabilities. Even though wearing a seat belt could result in causing a drowning (if you happen to flip over into a water filled pond or ditch and the buckle is jammed shut such that it can't open), I never-the-less wear my seatbelt? Why, same reason I ride centerish: I believe the odds are much higher that I will encounter a situation where the seat belt and centerish position are helpful than a situation where they are harmful.

zeytoun

So what is the point of you "alley dillema"? How is it consistent with reality?

The big difference between the two examples is that much hard data shows the great improvement of survival odds with seatbelts over none. I am not aware of any thorough data comparing riding vehicularly in a bike lane to defaulting centerish in terms of accident or fatality prevention.

I'm so sorry to disappoint you. But you need to establish that there actually is a man in the alley before your point will work.

btw, what choice will you take in the situation I outlined in post 434?

RobertHurst

If that is the case, expressing much concern about either possibility is unreasonable.

R.

Helmet Head

Bingo! A winner!

I fully agree. My point is it's more unreasonable to express concern about getting hit from behind while riding centerish than being hit while riding in a bike lane by inadvertent drift.

So what matters is what is in front of you, and for reducing your odds of getting hit with respect to what's ahead, which is worth expressing at least some concern about, riding centerish wins hands down over riding in the margins (be it in the bike lane, shoulder or even right side of a WOL).

Being centerish improves sight lines to and from you, gives you improved buffer space to the right, and makes you more conspicuous.

The only reason to not ride centerish when fsdt is not present or approaching is unreasonable expression of concern for traffic behind you, or not feeling it's worth it to move aside for faster traffic and back again during gaps.

genec

Of course your centerish stance and the safety involved are derived from the studies and data of the '70s.

I still contend that cell phones and other distractions have "changed the mix" since then... and auto accident data DOES show that rear end collisions are the majority type.

Since so few cyclists readily ride centerish... we have no supporting data to show that centerish is either more or less safer than riding right biased.

I do however agree with your contention of greater visibility both seeing and being seen.

My point being that your point: may be invalid... but we have no data to support either contention.

RobertHurst

You say you 'fully agree' that expressing concern for such things is unreasonable yet you continue to express concern for this 'inadvertent drift.' Or are you just fearmongering to advance an anti-bike lane argument?

Did you see the video of the Loch Ness Monster, btw? Weird, wild, stuff. A friend of mine once had a brilliant idea -- start collecting donations for a Bigfoot Preserve.

There is no foundation, other than your own emotional response, for your claim that it is more reasonable to express concern for one possibility rather than the other.

[QUOTE = Helmet Head]So what matters is what is in front of you, and for reducing your odds of getting hit with respect to what's ahead, which is worth expressing at least some concern about, riding centerish wins hands down over riding in the margins (be it in the bike lane, shoulder or even right side of a WOL).

Being centerish improves sight lines to and from you, gives you improved buffer space to the right, and makes you more conspicuous.

The only reason to not ride centerish when fsdt is not present or approaching is unreasonable expression of concern for traffic behind you, or not feeling it's worth it to move aside for faster traffic and back again during gaps.[/QUOTE]

True. But this is primarily a strategy for urban traffic, and becomes far less important in the outlying areas, and even less on rural roads.

Robert

I-Like-To-Bike

And believed by VC addled Loony Tunes!

I-Like-To-Bike

I used to have a Joe Palooka Bop Bag. He always snapped back for more smack downs. Just as clever, too.

John C. Ratliff

HH,

I thought you told me to stay in the bike lane during my tests. Now you say to be out, until the fsdt appears, when presumably you would move back into the bike lane. But when the fsdt is pretty constant, wouldn't that mean that you would stay in the bike lane? If so, then again, why is this consistant with your past advice about a bicycle fatality, where you said that the bike lane was a death trap, and you should stay out in the center of the lane all the time. Consistancy???

John

John C. Ratliff

Now, also why don't you equally track those fatal bike accidents which do not occure in bike lanes, or even on roads with bike lanes. I've seen plenty of those in Oregon.

By the way, I've noticed that this thread, which started some years ago, was imported into the Vehicular Cycling forum from the Advocacy forum.

John

natelutkjohn

SI is like poison Ivy man, if you don't throughly get rid of it, .... you better watch the hell out!

Helmet Head

Whether you were in or out doesn't matter while fsdt is not present. When fsdt is present, and it's safe and reasonable to be in the bike lane, that's where you should be if you are riding vehicularly. When I told you you should have been in the bike lane during the test, that was in the context of fsdt being present (they were honking at you). Same consistent principle/rule in all cases.

Yes, if the gaps are not sufficiently long, then you stay in the bike lane (as long as it is safe and reasonable to do so - if it's not, then you need to use negotiation to establish ROW to move out).

I never said anyone should "should stay out in the center of the lane all the time.".
I have always recommended strongly considering being out of the bike lane any time fsdt is not present (which was apparently the case in that Oregon fatality - evidence: the gap was big enough for oncoming traffic to turn left "slowly", and there were no witnesses from same direction traffic). And even when fsdt is present, you should be out of the bike lane when it's not safe and reasonable to be in the bike lane, which was almost certainly the case in the Oregon fatality considering the cyclist was approaching a junction, was in the shade, sun behind him, and there was oncoming traffic that could and might (and did) turn left in front of him.

What's inconsistent? Seriously.

genec

Is John confusing "default position" as "all the time?"

The default positon as centered only occurs in the absence of fsdt.

Helmet Head

I have no idea what is confusing him.

zeytoun

Is the second example the same as your reason for not riding centerish when fsdt is not present on KV road, for example?

Helmet Head

That plus the utter dearth of any side activity whatsoever, combined with excellent side visibility and huge shoulders (thus there is no signficant value to moving left in terms of increasing right side buffer space).