Controversial road diet reduced accidents, say scientists

What do you mean by “legally using the road”? I’m not aware of any ‘obstructing traffic’ tickets issued to deer. They were here before the first road was constructed, we put roads through their habitat, so if anything we have the duty to accommodate them, not the reverse, I’d say.

Where I live, I’m fairly sure there are ‘no bicycle’ signs on freeway onramps - particularly where it’s not visually obvious where the turn is going to end, so a cyclist who didn’t know the area could inadvertently find themselves in a situation where it’s too late to safely turn back.

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I meant using the road under auspices of law. Deer don’t do that, they aren’t law-abiding citizens.

This is very interesting to me! @Mister44 posted some pictures. I’ve never seen anything like that around here; it’s illegal for all but specific classes of motor vehicles to enter a restricted access highway, but we simply have physical barriers made of concrete and steel, and cops that will arrest you if you go around them. No signs.

But my road is not a freeway. It’s just an old road. That is incredibly dangerous for cyclists and pedestrians, and has been ever since shortly after the automobile was invented.

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You DO know that you could swap the cables & housings from one side to the other in a couple of minutes, right?

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Most interstate freeway on-ramps in California have signs prohibiting bicycles and mopeds and shit, similar to the signs that @Mister44 posted. There are a few places where bicycles are allowed on the freeway, generally in rural areas where the alternative is a long-ass detour miles out of your way. I could have sworn there was a stretch of I-5 where it goes through Camp Pendleton where bikes were allowed, but maybe I’m misremembering.

More rural states seem to be more permissive:

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That’s true, but the default configuration is rear brakes on the right. That was the point.

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But as a designer, I get annoyed at people complaining that something so easily customized didn’t come exactly the way they wanted it. At some point people need to be less helpless, especially someone who’s going to ride a mechanical device that needs regular attention anyway.

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There was no complaint- only the observation that the default was for righties.

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Oh, I don’t think it was necessarily a complaint about it being a major pain to rectify the situation, just that by default, bikes are safer for right-handed riders (if you subscribe to my theory of bike braking, at any rate). Yeah, you can fix it if you know how and happen to be of the opinion that doing so would be safer than just adapting to the status quo. But the fact remains that (if there really is a difference in safety) a certain percentage of new-bike buyers will have to make the swap in order to fix the issue, and I suspect the vast majority of casual lefty bike riders don’t bother. Even though it’s not all that hard to fix.

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Also: totally not an easy switch if we’re talking about a bike with hydraulic disc brakes. Which is increasingly common, FYI.

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my maternal grandmother always said that. I assumed it was one of the Briticisms she inherited from her parents, but maybe not. A really fun saying, though I don’t get how “teakettle” fits in; maybe because the English are often carrying one, I guess?

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I’d assume it’s a bowdlerism of the British “arse over tit”.

Like tidbit instead of titbit (which I’ll probably now find out isn’t a bowdlerism).

EDIT: Yep (or nope, rather)

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I would assume by the point one buys an expensive bike with such brakes one is experienced enough to know one’s preferences and ask the shop to swap them if need be. My only point is there LOTS of things in this world biased against lefties, something designed to be easily swapped isn’t one of them.

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It has never been about weight… They use a wire loop and the metal of the car will disrupt the magnetic field. bicycles and even motorcycles don’t always have enough metal to trip the sensor. Here in WA I can make a left on red if the bike is not causing the signal to change.

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I pointed out in my post that the problem is not well known (in fact, I was asked to explain it right here!). People are not likely to swap out the cables on their bikes if they don’t know it’s a problem, until it’s too late.

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I learned this fact the hard way, at around 15 years old. Not everyone rides expensive bikes, or is worldly enough to know how they’re constructed.

It was an example used to make a specific point because it was germane to the thread in general. That’s it. End of story.

Why is it such a big deal to you?

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I’d known two people fatally hit by cars. One got T-boned by an 18 wheeler. Another was riding through a quiet neighborhood and got hit by an 84-year-old woman who didn’t even notice she hit anyone or anything :rage:

It only goes to show you, you’re never perfectly safe.

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I was trying to find the giant white signs I remember from the Kansas Turnpike.

And remember kids, just because something is legal, doesn’t make it safe. Be careful.

What grinds my gears is this neighborhood my kid lives in has sidewalks and bike lines nearly everywhere.

Yet the runners are IN the bike lane, and the bikers IN the road?

WTF, people?

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It’s more than your privilege: if doing so significantly reduces the risk of your violent death, it’s your right and duty, and you’d obviously be pretty foolish to do anything else.

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This whole argument is still based on the mistaken assumption that you should brake harder with the back brake. That’s just not the case.

There’s a small chance that an inexperienced biker will panic-brake the front brake hard enough to flip, but there’s a much higher chance that the inexperienced biker will panic-brake the rear brake hard enough to skid under the car they are trying to avoid. Not only is this much more likely to occur, it’s much more likely to be fatal when it does occur at the wrong time.

In general, an inexperienced cyclist should not be going fast enough to have either of these things occur, as there are all sorts of ways they could kill themselves.

An experienced cyclist knows how to use the front brake as their primary brake, as Sheldon explains: http://www.sheldonbrown.com/brakturn.html

And therefore, as he also says, your premise is actually backwards: bikes should be set up the other way for right-handed users, and he always switches the cables. Naturally, some people disagree with this, but let’s agree that on this part the case isn’t cut-and-dry.

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Just more reasons why I can never take up motorcycling… :disappointed: