Welcome to the jungle
The pacemaker deserves its moniker. Today, on the way to uni, I was riding through town. I came up to a set of traffic lights (outside Ladah, for those playing at home), which turned green as I approached. I put the foot down in order to speed through, not thinking that anyone would want to turn left in front of me.
The first car at the lights took off just as I arrived along side it, quickly making a few metres on me, before turning sharply to the left (without indicating). I was forced to make a relatively high speed turn (~30km/hr) in order to avoid ploughing straight into it. I hit the front brake, ripped my feet from the pedals (less control, but more chance of jumping free), and leant in.
I’m making a good turn, but with one brake and the risk of striking my left pedal and sliding under the back wheel of the car, I can’t turn sharply enough. I ram into the front left panel with a nasty crunching noise. There’s a little squeel of brakes and the two policemen standing outside their station across the road look over. However, I manage to stay upright and keep some speed - I stamp on the pedals some more and I’m out of there and onto the bike path in no time.
I immediately thought about returning to see how much damage the crunching noise had resulted in (I think it was the end of my right pedal), but thought that since they hadn’t indicated, stuff it. I ended up with a slight graze on my right knee. Fortunately, the bike is fine - although it may be time to get a slightly smaller frame and add another brake…
Ahhh the joys of riding to work…
July 26th, 2006 at 11:48 am
We should never have got rid of those trainer wheels off your first bike
July 26th, 2006 at 3:54 pm
I went to the website about why cycling is safe. To some extent I agree cycling is safe. I often Take a lane of traffic when the bike lane dissapears. This means that the motorist have to tke account of you they cannot ignore you entirely.
You only have to put up with people honkig an yelling at you.
I think that one of the biggest dangers is the parked car that opens a door about a meter infront of you.
Nice to see your alright Tom.
July 26th, 2006 at 5:08 pm
Cycling is safe in cities that are built for it, but during ‘rush hour’ in Townsville, there’s no such thing as safe cycling. People don’t care about anyone else - it’s depressing. I mean, if the cyclist that they’re getting cross with (for doing nothing wrong) was their son/daughter/father/etc… they wouldn’t be acting so foolishly would they?
July 29th, 2006 at 8:42 am
as a dutiful pub servant I must inform you that council has been continuing to seek funding and bit by bit upgrading bike pathways across tsv, so that there ARE safe places to cycle. RRR is obviously full of wankers, which is why this stage of the path has been finished for ever. keep an eye out for next stages! FYI a delegation from across country are here next month to hold conference on this issue, b/c tsv is leading in q with this initative. can’t do much about bad drivers, xcept scrape their paintowrk with your full metal pedals.