Cyclists aren’t leaving, and add Editor to ranks

May 28, 2010

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Wheels Editor

The mood between local drivers and cyclists is probably as low this week as it’s ever been.

Cyclists are on the roads now in packs, mostly for recreation (in the country) but also for transportation (in the city), so they’re in your face.

Jim Kenzie is writing in his blog at wheels.ca that an MPP’s attempt to legislate a specific distance for motorists to pass cyclists is unrealistic, but that since cyclists are greatly outnumbered by motorists, they shouldn’t be making any demands anyway. Comments to the blog are overwhelming in their derision for his view.

And now it’s officially accepted that former attorney-general Michael Bryant was the victim of a violent assault in which a bicycle messenger created the circumstances of his own death.

Motorists and cyclists are supposed to share the road, yet some still have difficulty with this concept. The irony is that almost all cyclists are also drivers — and probably better ones for the experience, too.

So let’s clear the air of a couple of things first:

• The incident between Bryant and Darcy Allan Sheppard, the bicycle messenger, was not a cycling issue. It was an assault against a driver by a disturbed man who appeared to be looking for trouble.

However, Toronto’s streets are not designed for bicycle use. Cyclists don’t like to lose momentum — I don’t blame them, especially with those tricky clip shoes — and we have far too many red lights and stop signs for comfortable pedalling.

Cyclists should use bicycle lanes whenever they’re available and when they aren’t, they should ride defensively, on the alert for diving taxis and opening car doors. Frankly, drivers should be doing the same thing, but the risk is greater for the cyclist, as with anywhere in the world.

• Cyclists are not going away. In fact, as bicycles become better designed and more pleasurable to ride, they’re gaining in numbers. So it’s not an option for drivers to ignore their concerns.

The idea of legislating a distance for passing is two-fold. For one thing, it provides a guideline for drivers of the recommended space that’s needed, which increases with speed and its accompanying wind turbulence.

Also, it provides teeth for a police officer to apply the law against a driver who has just been seen almost clipping a cyclist. The current definition of “so far as may be necessary to avoid a collision” is a subjective idea and tough to prove in court; the proposed definition of three feet (0.9 of a metre) at speeds below 50 km/h, four feet (1.2 m) at 50-80 km/h and five feet (1.6 m) at above 80 km/h allows for no argument.

I know something about this. I wish a cop could have witnessed me being almost clipped on my bicycle last weekend.

Yes, the editor of Canada’s largest automotive publication also rides a bicycle. I wrote here last summer of how my cruel and unusual wife, a keen cyclist, has been prying me from the broad saddle of my Harley-Davidson and onto the spindly seat of her old Fisher hybrid. My kids bought me Lycra cycling gear for my birthday, and on a pleasant afternoon, the two of us will head out on the country roads near our home in Milton.

I say “near”; we take loops of 20 or 30 km, and now that I’m a little better conditioned, I’m no longer as exhausted as before with hills and headwinds.

We argue along the way about how much room to provide passing cars. She tells me to own the road and leave a good metre between my narrow tires and the edge of the asphalt. I tend to tuck myself well off to the side so that I ride on all the crumbled bumps with less room for error, but provide more space for vehicles to overtake.

Last Friday, we were riding home from Campbellville when a large red duellie pickup truck overtook us. It was a wide country road with no other traffic, and I was leading the way. The pickup gave me maybe a couple of hand-widths of space as it drove by and then, once it was past, it gunned the engine so I was enveloped in black smoke from the poorly tuned exhaust.

Choking back the diesel fumes, I hated that driver. I still do. It was clearly intentional, but there was no reason for it, none at all. It was just a yahoo’s version of cow-tipping.

It was potentially lethal, too. With little space to the right, I almost went into the ditch in my coughing spasms. After all, we were just a few kilometres away from where a pickup truck in 2006 clipped and killed Greg Stobbart, an off-duty cycling OPP officer. The “Share the Road” ride is held in his memory every September to raise awareness of the need to provide cyclists with space to ride.

So from now on, I’m going to own the road and leave myself room to manoeuvre on my slow-moving bicycle. And in early July, I’ll be doing it all the way to Quebec, when I take part in the Great Waterfront Trail Adventure Tour (www.waterfronttrail.org), cycling 700 km from Niagara-on-the-Lake beside Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River to the Quebec border.

My wife has persuaded me to take part because, as she says, it’ll be all downhill with the wind behind me. She says it will turn me into a hunk, as well. It’s an organized ride with a couple of hundred like-minded people, many of them more enthusiastic than fit. It still has a few spaces to spare if you want to join us.

There really are some times when it’s good to leave the engine at home. Not many — I’m keeping the Harley and the cars — but some. And when I do that, why should I let other traffic ruin the experience?