Cyclists Without Regard for Anyone or Anything in Park Slope

whynot_31

And rush hour traffic

bornnbredbrooklynite

That video is disgusting and exactly what's wrong with all the pompous morons moving to the city. F-U you stupid transplant cyclist. YOU ARE GOING THE WRONG WAY, YOU RAN INTO THE PEDESTRIAN. YOU ARE AT FAULT AND YOU WILL PROBABLY BE ON YOUR WAY TO CAUSING AN AUTOMOBILE ACCIDENT WHEN YOU RUN A RED LIGHT.

@eggcream: Down in Southern Brooklyn (for the yuppies aka, "where?" they took out a lane along Gerritsen Avenue. (500 bonus points for any yuppie that knows where the avenue gets its name from without looking it up.) Now traffic is backed up daily along Avenue T and U. There is a firehouse there and it can be impossible for them to get out of the house. It was done on the fly, no community input, no nothing. Ridiculous. Bike lanes cause accidents.

Don't get me started on crappy bikers. Oh and 20 mph driving? Yeah..good luck with that.

carnivore

BornnbredBrooklynite wrote: Bike lanes cause accidents.

You keep repeating this, but do you have any data to back up this claim?

whynot_31

Carnivore wrote: [quote=BornnbredBrooklynite]Bike lanes cause accidents.

You keep repeating this, but do you have any data to back up this claim?

Such data would have to include info vis a vis injuries sustained to bikers on roads without bike lanes. I think Portland's Dept of planning could help out here. They are often cited as doing the most in the US to encourage safe biking and driving.

Lots of traffic calming there

owler

I think the bike lanes being put throughout NYC are great, you can actually get where you're going without worrying about cars coming up and hitting you from behind, I just think they could have been better marked, possibly by making the lanes yellow or placing a more visual sign to watch out.

I'm for the overall safety of both bikers and pedestrians.

swngnmonk

owler wrote: Re: swngnmonk

No.

That bicyclist is a complete asshat, and completely in the wrong.

* Riding the wrong way against traffic
* Not looking at his surroundings (you could see the ped well before he got it)
* Riding up blind spots (ped was behind a van)
* Refuses to take responsibility for his actions.

But two things:

1. That video is from Seattle, not NYC (admittedly, same thing happens here all the time)
2. Notice how the pedestrian got up & walked away? When was the last time you saw that happen with a car?

Think about the poor guy who just lost his legs at the corner of 11th street and 8th avenue when you look at this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PERX22M3Q1Y

(it's not a gory video, it's long-distance and almost out of frame, but it's an intersection like many we have in the neighborhood)

swngnmonk

ok, I clearly need coffee. My point about Seattle makes no sense. Other than that if it had happened here, that bicyclist might have received a well-deserved ass-kicking, and then it would have all canceled out.

snarkslope

BornnbredBrooklynite wrote: (for the yuppies aka, "where?" they took out a lane along Gerritsen Avenue. (500 bonus points for any yuppie that knows where the avenue gets its name from without looking it up.)

Hey, Grandpa Simpson, would you quit it with the 1990 "yuppie" references? You give the rest of us native NYers a bad name. Unless you have native american blood, your family came from somewhere else, too. They just came earlier than some others. It's not an achievement.

idlewild

I imagine the name Gerritsen comes from some Dutch settler. Probably a vast land holder.

8thandprez

Yea, my god... "yuppies"? Between the ALL CAPS tendency of the anti-bike lane posts and the crowd that turned out to "protest" the bike lane, i think everyone who hates the bike lane is over 80 and has never left the neighborhood.

My main points, in ascending order of foaming-at-the-mouth rage:

1. Traffic on PPW is moving smoothly and more slowly after the bike lane was put in. Freeway speeds have been replaced by a calm street.

2. As someone else said, the bike lane serves a different purpose than the park road. Just because one bike lane is nearby, it doesn't mean the other is redundant.

3. I don't consider it a badge of honor to have lived in the same place your entire life. From what I see here, it results in a particular breed of sneering, anti-everything resistance to change, even when the change is for the better.

4. Get out of NYC once in a while. You'll see that other cities have learned to do things differently and better than us. We're not the greatest city in the world, especially when it comes to the public realm.

tyroneshoelaces

What color was the bike?

drano

"2. Notice how the pedestrian got up & walked away? When was the last time you saw that happen with a car?"

Couple weeks ago I got hit by a car and walked away. Yes, it was some asshole car-service car.

flynn

there is so much worse shit going on in the world right now than the feud between bikers and non-bikers. i swear, if some of you people focused your attention on other worthwhile things instead of making 18 posts on bikes, pp bike lane, omg cyclist ran red light, etc.

you would think the damn sky was falling.

whynot_31

flynn wrote: there is so much worse shit going on in the world right now than the feud between bikers and non-bikers. i swear, if some of you people focused your attention on other worthwhile things instead of making 18 posts on bikes, pp bike lane, omg cyclist ran red light, etc.

you would think the damn sky was falling.

or we wanted to do anything but work.

aquamann

flynn wrote: there is so much worse shit going on in the world right now than the feud between bikers and non-bikers. i swear, if some of you people focused your attention on other worthwhile things instead of making 18 posts on bikes, pp bike lane, omg cyclist ran red light, etc.

you would think the damn sky was falling.

this is always such a tired point. by your logic we should talk only about cancer, genocide, child obesity, etc. on the nieghborhood message board.

please tell us what the acceptable subjects are and we'll address them. thanks in advance for your wisdom.

flynn

Aquamann wrote: [quote=flynn]there is so much worse shit going on in the world right now than the feud between bikers and non-bikers. i swear, if some of you people focused your attention on other worthwhile things instead of making 18 posts on bikes, pp bike lane, omg cyclist ran red light, etc.

you would think the damn sky was falling.

this is always such a tired point. by your logic we should talk only about cancer, genocide, child obesity, etc. on the nieghborhood message board.

please tell us what the acceptable subjects are and we'll address them. thanks in advance for your wisdom.

no, the tired point is creating a new thread about how much everyone hate bikes, bikers, and bike lanes every other day. make a thread, fine. but this topic seems to re-appear every other day. we get the point. bikers run red lights and are inconsiderate...thanks for the newsflash.

whynot_31

How the heck would anyone achieve over 7000 posts if that was the standard?

....some of us have goals, damn it!

We will not pursue mediocrity by typing about new and different things each day!

flynn

whynot_31 wrote: How the heck would anyone achieve over 7000 posts if that was the standard.

....some of us have goals, damn it!

hells. i can get that. keep going! you are almost there

my goal is to log in here and not see the same tired topic about bikes and bike lanes every day. :P

whynot_31

flynn wrote: [quote=whynot_31]How the heck would anyone achieve over 7000 posts if that was the standard.

....some of us have goals, damn it!

hells. i can get that. keep going! you are almost there

my goal is to log in here and not see the same tired topic about bikes and bike lanes every day. :P

Your goal may be less achievable than mine. but I wish you the best.....

Protip: Pick a goal that can be achieved without others changing their behavior.

flynn

also, if we did not have bike lanes you could never do this:

whynot_31

Drano wrote: "2. Notice how the pedestrian got up & walked away? When was the last time you saw that happen with a car?"

Couple weeks ago I got hit by a car and walked away. Yes, it was some asshole car-service car.

aquamann

I will add a post to this thread every day for all eternity.

aquamann

and as mike tyson said, if you don't like it, change your station.

flynn

Aquamann wrote: I will add a post to this thread every day for all eternity.

that's cool. just don't start a new one. :P

aquamann

amen. anyway, i doubt i'll have the chance to do either. if the anti-bike lane people are to be believed, i'm due to be killed while crossing the bike lane any day now. it's quite likely that we will all meet the same fate.

whynot_31

I heard the entire city of Seattle is killed in this manner on an annual basis.

....the dead pedestrians get to come back as cyclists, and the dead bikers get to come back as pedestrians.

After a few go arounds, they look both ways and/or slow down. It's crazy.

squindar

Gerritsen ran a grist mill powered by the tides, you can supposedly still see the pilings that were the foundation of the mill, if you know where to look (I didn't look that up, nor am I a yuppie)

yoda

bikers and motorists are not mutually exclusive. what a bunch of maroons!

illig

i keep reading about all these people constantly ALMOST BEING KILLED BY SPEEDING CYCLISTS OH THE HUMANITY... where exactly does this happen?

i walk my dog all over the slope, walk to stores, to/from subway for work, etc. and i've never had a bike come close to me here...

now i admit, this may have something to do with the fact that i look both ways before crossing, but i assume everyone does that, right? right...?

whynot_31