(Applauds)
While I appreciate the gotcha (and I do), do they actively brake hard well enough, or just kinda slow down? (It’s part of why I talked about scooters, an effective brake is going to need something to brace against (as well as something to hold).
Though I must admit, if we’re going for both directly and battery powered, with real brakes, on a pavement, I’d prefer to do this:
If you’re going to play skittles anyway, get em below the knees. 
I don’t see why scooters should be relegated to ‘parade only’ status. They can do speeds of >100 mph and are generally safer and easier to use than motorcycles. (But it wouldn’t be very safe to say they should drive at 100 mph on the sidewalk.) They are street legal (assuming they’re licensed and registered, of course) most places I think, so stating that scooters aren’t legal seems likely to be either due to a weird, secret, unadvertised local law or a misinterpretation. Not that that really relates to skateboards in any way, but since it was mentioned…
Yeah, I was raised to always ride off street (yay dirt bike!) or facing traffic (so you could see oncoming cars in time to react instead of blindly pedaling along while drivers who weren’t paying attention were rocketing toward you from behind.) Trying to have bikes travel with car traffic that moves at 6-12x the speed (or more) always struck me as absurd and dangerous.
Because “You must comply with the law!” “Ok, what should I do?” “Doesn’t matter, you can’t comply with it, so you’re a criminal no matter what you do! hahaha! Gotchya!” is a ridiculous way to run a society. It breeds anarchists if you’re lucky and psychopaths if you’re not so lucky. People who were raised to do the right thing will of course naturally have trouble understanding a society designed to make it impossible or illegal to do so.
[quote=“Archon, post:21, topic:102639, full:true”]
… do they actively brake hard well enough, or just kinda slow down? (It’s part of why I talked about scooters, an effective brake is going to need something to brace against (as well as something to hold).[/quote]
Like big Segways, they seem to decelerate more than brake, though I confess I have not myself tried one (having a healthily accurate idea of my own abilities in that regard). However, not having any sort of handle or surrounding bodywork, the rider who needs to stop quickly leans back and either steps or falls off the back. With varying degrees of hilarity. Several of the older kids in my neighborhood have them, so I’ve at least witnessed the mechanics of it. And the hilarity.
[quote=“Archon, post:21, topic:102639, full:true”]If you’re going to play skittles anyway, get em below the knees. 
[/quote]Couldn’t agree more!
Certainly the ‘motorised scooter’ in my part of the conversation is this:
Not the road scooters and mopeds that, yes, can top 100 (albeit downhill, wth a tailwind). Maybe they mean that too?
I just drive a hovercraft everywhere. Since it isn’t actually on the street, cops can’t do shit.
Related only in the sense that it involves British Columbia, it is one of the few jurisdictions in the world to prohibit having your corpse frozen for (the implausible but non-zero chance of) later revival. This was done by an evangelical Premier in the 1990s under the auspices of consumer protection.
Well, that is a motorized scooter too! It wouldn’t surprise me if the law considered that to be the exact same vehicle as the 650cc 60 horsepower BMW in the picture I posted. But only until a local politician or lawyer gets one and wants to play with it. Then the law would get a lot of clarifications real quick.
Be careful, though, or your hovercraft might get filled with eels.
I live in California and bicyclists are supposed to ride with the traffic. Once in college, I decided to take a shortcut and ride against traffic because it would be more convenient. I got hit. The driver was exiting a parking lot and taking a right onto the street, and she did not see me as she was looking left. The motorist did nothing wrong and while I wasn’t hurt, the incident freaked her out. This is why bicyclists should ride with the traffic.
That’s unfortunate, although it is good that no one was hurt. It makes me wonder why it happened though. Did you not see the car, were you thinking that she wouldn’t pull out, or were you just moving too fast/downhill/unable to stop or go around in time? The latter would make sense especially if it was in an area with restricted edges or a blind entrance. But that would be dangerous no matter which way you were going.
I’m not blaming - I wiped out into an ATV once because I hit the brakes and slid in a rain puddle where normally I would have been able to stop just fine. But I’m trying to understand how riding with traffic would prevent that. It’s been many years since I rode a bicycle, but when I did, I found it much easier to react to cars in front of me than cars behind me. Since bicycles are slower moving and more agile than cars, it was usually relatively easy to stop or get out of the way (as long as the car was in front of you where you could see it).
Maybe I’m missing something - why is this guy a “gentleman”? I thought we had settled on gentleman == asshole.
I was on a flat road and yes, I was going fast. I saw her and I stupidly assumed that she saw me. However, she wasn’t looking right because she wasn’t supposed to look right. The law in my state is very clear and I chose to ignore it. My experience is a good example of why cyclists should be going with the flow of the traffic. Cars making right turns or merging right into traffic are not going to be looking to the right. Cutting in behind the first car may not be helpful if the car behind that one is also looking left.
However, I do understand why people are especially nervous to ride against traffic. Every day I pass a guy who cycles into Carson from Long Beach on a road that is packed with trucks heading to the port. And everyday I simultaneously cheer him on and breathe a sigh of relief when I see that he’s made it past the crazy commuters and the big rigs.
FTFY
Real alphas already know they are. 
Not doubting they exist but I would be interested to see such a one. The only ones I’ve seen capable of >60mph had rather small wheels and a lighter suspension leading to considerably less stability when it comes to high-speed maneuvers.
(I can’t tell if the pics in your post have mid-engine or under-seat, if mid they would be considered motorcycles in these parts.)
Misleading article re: electric scooters.
The streets in BC are filled with electric scooters, and no license nor insurance are required.
What -is- required is that they have pedals to be qualified as an electric bike, and that they have a limited speed, but they look and function the same as gas powered scooters.
Search “KGeez” for more info or visit ICBC.
and break lights…and turn signal, and headlights, and some sort of safety belt, and since it has to be insured, you need to install a license plate…
Damned good brakes on my bike, yet the pedestrians still get upset when I take to the footpath:
More seriously…
It varies based on local culture, but in my country I’d much rather bicycle on the road than the footpath. Footpaths are bloody dangerous; bad surface, shit sight lines, unyielding obstacles all over the place.
Kids pootling along at walking pace: sure, the footpath is appropriate for that. But as a not-very-fast commuter bicyclist, I’d usually be doing 30km/h on the flats and 60km/h on the descents. That belongs on the road.
I really don’t know anything about Canadian law. Do they not have a right of travel in Canada. It’s an ancient and well established right in many nations.
When MRA’s and Red Pill guys say “alpha” they just mean “jock.”
“Beta” means “nerd.”
That’s really all it is. If you go deeper into the biological metaphor, it’s obvious they’re using it wrong and don’t know what they’re talking about.
They basically take all of evolutionary psychology and replace it with pseudoscientific gobbledygook that basically justifies stereotypical high school power dynamics, then declare themselves to be the top of the food chain.
