Sharing the right of way to do the right thing
Last month I followed a series of opinion-response articles on Chattanooga’s alternate alternative-news source, chattanoogan.com. The subject: bicycle lanes. I am a bike commuter. I understand the frustration that cyclists and motorists seemed to be heaping on one another, and for whatever it’s worth, I’ll try and explain what the situation looks like from behind my handlebars.
If you read the negative responses to the request for more bike lanes in Chattanooga, you have to wonder what people really have against cyclists. Their complaints about bikes being on the road make sense, sort of. It’s just that they don’t seem to realize that bike lanes may be a solution to the problems that they are talking about.
True, fast-moving cars are lethal weapons. Cyclists and pedestrians are potential losers when cars are driven carelessly, but last I checked, so were motorists. One commenter compared bicycles and cars sharing the road to 50-mph traffic combined with Grandma driving at 25 mph. The disparity between traffic speeds of bicycles and cars is much smaller on roads where motorists are supposed to be traveling 25 or 30 mph. But this is all academic, because if bike lanes were available, cycling traffic would be segregated from motorists.
Every day on my way to work, I turn left off Central Avenue onto McCallie. And nearly every time, a motorist lingers behind me after I make this turn. Even though I’m riding a level 12 inches from the curb, and there is no oncoming traffic, every day, the motorist behind me will not pass until I give them a little hand wave indicating it’s OK to go ahead. I do my best to communicate with people on the road, but I get the feeling that many drivers are afraid I will suddenly swerve left into the traffic lane or do something equally unexpected. In reality, I ride my bike according to the same rules that they drive their cars by. And I’m very aware of how much margin I have between the curb and the passing cars.
That margin is often a problem when riding on a single-lane road with cars parked on the side. Against the charge of being inconsiderate, in a situation like this, I have many things to consider. If I ride too closely to the parked cars, will I get doored? If I take a little more room so I don’t get doored, will I block traffic behind me? Is that motorist honking because she wants me to know she’s behind me, or because she thinks I belong on the sidewalk? Will I hit that pedestrian if he jaywalks now or will he wait for the signal to change? I’m considering a lot of things at once—just like the people driving cars.
Because there is safety in numbers and Chattanooga does not yet have cyclists in numbers, the real problem is that motorists here are unaccustomed to driving with bicycles on the road. Compare Chattanooga with Portland, Oregon where two-to-five percent of the population commutes by bike. As a member of the growing minority of bike commuters in Chattanooga, here are a few things I’d like to say to the city’s motorists:
I know you’re behind me. I’m anticipating in good faith that you will safely pass me, that you will not bully me, and I in turn will make as much room for you as possible. If there is no room for you to pass me, due to oncoming traffic or a narrow road, I’m not going to stop or move onto the sidewalk. Why? Because I have never been in a situation where there was so little room or so much oncoming traffic that the motorist behind me is “stuck” for more than one city block. I plan my routes with this in mind, like avoiding the stretch of Georgia Avenue between the post office and McCallie at rush hour.
Let’s return for a moment to the initial question: Should Chattanooga get more bike lanes? While bike lanes do help to segregate cyclists from faster-moving traffic, they are not always the best option. An educated cyclist and driver both aware of the need to share the road do much more for road safety than bike lanes. If a traffic situation is perceived as unsafe (lack of bike lanes, sidewalks, or traffic signals), the tendency is for motorists, cyclists, and pedestrians to be more careful and generous with others. This kind of thinking has spawned very interesting mixed-use road projects all over the world, the U.S. included.
The conflict between motorists and cyclists seems ideological in nature, and represents the growing pains of a culture and city in transition. If Chattanooga wants to be a progressive place, then by all means we should continue funding ventures like the electric shuttle, extending the Riverwalk, and putting in pedestrian and cycle paths. Unfortunately, this seems to be mostly lip service to the issue of building a greener community. The residents of this city reveal what they really think about sustainable transportation when they honk and yell at cyclists on the roadways.
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