Responsible road sharing and usage

[Wyatt Earp]

As I was on my home yesterday (in my car) a guy did an illegal u-turn at a traffic light which made me swerve and almost hit a row of parked cars. I gave him a flash (lights, ahem..) and received a single finger salute in return.

 

Car: Toyota Fortuna or similar.

Driver: Wrap around 90s style shades, big 'tache, massive stomach (I could see this at the next set of lights).

Plate: GP.

 

What exasperated me was that I was the only car for at least 800m, so he could have waited for a couple of seconds and not scared the crap out of me.

But no, he typically drives like a selfish tw@t.

 

Ah well, got home and after an hour and a half on the bike and I was calm.

 

The cycle lanes are very clean, I often see the guys cleaning the centre section of Blouberg road.

 

As they say https://twitter.com/justasecond0001

Edited January 9, 2014 by Wyatt Earp

[Hennie VR]

Actually the lanes are spotlessly clean.

 

It was such a joy to train in the George region over the Dec holidays. The roads were so clean and the number of times I had to avoid glass on the road I can count on my one hand. I don't have enough fingers and toes to count the amount of times I have to dodge glass on one ride in Pretoria. And everyone was patient towards us. Must be the extra oxygen at sea level.

[Patchelicious]

I have been a MTB'er all my life but have started doing road cycling to save on maintenance etc. I have soon realised the bigger someone's paycheck the more that person thinks the road belongs to them.

 

Technically they pay more tax, so........

[cfcjim]

As regards the respect for others theme:

 

In a car: I think just slowing slightly, thinking about how other vehicles are likely to behave (this encourages anticipation thus making the journey smoother and probably quicker) and KEEP LEFT as much as possible, only use the right hand lane (if available) for overtaking.

 

On your bike: anticipation, anticipation, anticipation with a massive barrel of anticipation thrown in just for good measure. Oh and enjoy it, it's not always a race...

[Eugene]

Thanks for your thoughts guys, the underlying thread through out is respect for others, which is drastically lacking. and perhaps thats what we need to try and develop, any suggestions how?

We as cyclists need to take the first step. No motorist is going to respect someone running a red light, riding 3 or 4 abreast, holding up cars when there is a perfectly good cycle lane to use etc.

 

Charity begins at home.

[Pinarello1]

All the cycling lanes in the world will not help SA. The biggest problem in SA is the fact that we do not have respect one another. Until that is fixed things will not change. Just look how we like to generalise to make us feel better.

 

We already had the response that it is Blue Bull country. You have the same k@k in Cape Town, JHB, Durban, everywhere in SA. You have threads daily of the guys on the MTB trials who don't respect each other.

 

You can put up a thousand cycling lanes here and then there will be war between the cyclists and the pedestrians. I also had a car on Monday telling me I am not allowed to cycle at 08.00 on Pretoria roads.

 

Simple solution .. respect one another ... it is really that simple but yet so difficult for us in SA.

 

 

1000 x yes

[Cellar]

I have been a MTB'er all my life but have started doing road cycling to save on maintenance etc. I have soon realised the bigger someone's paycheck the more that person thinks the road belongs to them. They have no patience toward fellow road users. Honestly I feel safer riding around a township than riding through Pretoria East.

 

Correction. The bigger someone thinks their paycheck is, seems to be the problem. Looking at the price of bicycles, as a tribe, I think we are earning a lot more than the motorists seem to think.

[rkeetsa]

https://community.bikehub.co.za/topic/134936-2-ladies-on-tandem-killed-this-morning/ very sad

[Bateleur1]

 

We as cyclists need to take the first step. No motorist is going to respect someone running a red light, riding 3 or 4 abreast, holding up cars when there is a perfectly good cycle lane to use etc.

 

Charity begins at home.

 

Yes and no. I agree that charity begins at home but not with we as cyclist must take the first step. That is the general attitude of the motorists that cyclists must start before they will respect us. South Africans as a whole need to respect one another and stop waiting for the other person to do something to earn their respect.

 

It would have been easy had only the disrespectfull and arrogant road users been killed or hurt on South African roads. It is normally the innocent guys that get hit.

[jcza]

.

[Capricorn]

applies to all road users, such a brilliant road safety ad..

 

http://youtu.be/bvLaTupw-hk