Riding home from my daughter's school, we got hassled again. We were taking the lane approaching a stop light. I usually take a center-left position here in what is a wide lane, to leave room for cars to legally turn right on red, because we go straight through the intersection.
The light that had just turned red when I heard a honk behind me, and then another as we stopped at the light. I pulled back alongside the car and this older guy is motioning that my daughter and I ought to be riding far right or on the sidewalk. It's hard to have a conversation with a man who is afraid to open his window, but I did my best to inform him that we have both the right and the responsibility to be on the road and to take the full lane for safety's sake and to facilitate the movement of right-turning traffic - I mean, heck, in part I'm doing it to be nice for crying out loud! He wasn't having any of it though and he obviously thought that what I was doing was unsafe even though this particular road gets about two cars per minute. I mean what can you do with people like this?
It would be nice to simply be able to cycle on the road without the risk of being hassled by morons.
At least it didn't escalate.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.labikes.blogspot.com/2010/11/road-rage-comes-to-bomb-town.html
I was really annoyed, though I would never get physical. As I said, he wouldn't even open his window. I'm guessing that when I get up close, maybe the facial piercings can make me look a bit intimidating to the older set. Then there's the mohawk that I'm sporting lately, though there's no way he could possibly see that with the helmet on.
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