Friday follies

Boy's rule: if you have a grade separated bike path that is even different in colour to the pedestrian path; then if you have two pedestrians, at least one of them will walk on the bike path.

Cyclists are requested these days to dismount and push their bikes past the UTS rowing club. This is the first one that I have ever seen do that. Pussy.

Secret message in the number plate?

Stupid, stupid, stupid

The City of Sydney is ripping up the road in Pyrmont and building a fancy bike path where it is not required. This particular stretch of road is one of the heaviest cycling routes in Sydney - bikes outnumber cars through here at least 10:1. In my opinion, this stretch does not need ripping up and modifying as there are so few cars using it, the risk of a bike/car crash are minimal. We have the road to ourselves.

I guess though the City Council put a certain amount of money aside for a bike path, so the engineers and planners had to work out how to spend it. That meant building a bike path where one is not needed, and not building them where they are needed as that would mean fiddling with budgets, arguing with accountants, lots of pointless meetings and mountains of paperwork. Much easier to tear up tarmac than to push paper.

Now, I have just told you that this is perhaps the heaviest cycling route in Sydney. So you'd expect there to be lots and lots and lots of bikes pouring through this stretch morning and evening. This stretch looks like Saigon at peak hour.

Given that there are hundreds of bikes traversing this route, if you were going to block the street and divert traffic, would you plan and make special arrangements for diverting bikes? Especially if you are building a frigging bike path? You'd at least expect signage directed specifically at cyclists, the majority users of this road.

We're talking about local government here. Of course they didn't. Bikes have not been considered at all. It's a clusterfuck from hell. The engineer in charge deserves to be boiled in tar.

If these idiots were working on a runway at the airport, they'd forget to tell the aircraft to land somewhere else.

Greg the Stop sign

Look, a cyclist going through a Stop sign.

Err, maybe not.

Now for some light relief.

Funny cop

Went through my fourth RBT in one week. This lot were all smiles, and politely moved out of the bike lane as I went by. The third bloke in line was a funny bugger - as I approached him, he held out the testing unit and said, "Give us a quick puff as you go by". So I puffed out my cheeks and went "pfff", and that at least gave the whole crew a good laugh.

Bleah

Current temp - 21 degrees.

Humidity - 93%.

I am going to be sweaty by the time I get to work.

What stuffs up your commute?

I currently commute by bike, but over the last few years, I have commuted by train, bus and car at various times. Of the four methods, the bike is most consistent. My commute almost always falls into the 40-45 minute time frame. The only thing that blows it out significantly is flat tyres, and even then, a commute with a flat is rarely more than 50 minutes door to door.

Trains and buses by comparison were all over the place. The length of commute varied from 40 minutes up to two hours. When I ride, I can tell you that I will arrive at work in 45 minutes, +/- 5 minutes. If I go by bus, it is 40 minutes + any number you care to mention.

The following graph is my estimation of commuting times by car. Most days, it would take 45-47 minutes to go door to door. The best time was achieved coming home at 3am one morning - 38 minutes. The worst was 2 hours, and there were a few 90 minute shockers as well.

However, the bulk fell into the time frame of 46 minutes +/- 4 minutes. It was amazing how consistent my commute times were. The main factors which affected how long it took were:

1. Weather (rain, storms)
2. Traffic light phasing (did I get lucky and get every light?)
3. The number of other cars on the road

The really horrible times - those over an hour - were all caused by car crashes that took ages to clear.

The biggest factor by far in how long it took me to drive from A to B was the number of other cars on the road. I think we all know that. Sure, traffic slow down during a downpour, but it is the density of traffic that is the killer when it comes to commute times.

So I can comfortably say that on an average day, if it took me 4 minutes longer than average to drive to work, that delay was mostly caused by other cars. Think of that number - 4 minutes.

Assume you drive to work for 48 weeks of the year. Being delayed by 4 minutes on 25% of your commutes would add up to a total delay for the year of 480 minutes, or 8 hours.

Now, how many times was I delayed on my commutes by a cyclist?

The answer - nil.

How many times are the angry letter writers at the Telegraph delayed per year? Once? Twice? How long does each delay last? 5 seconds? 10 seconds?

The thing that gets me is that if these angry idiots at the Telegraph were honest with themselves, they would note that they are delayed every single day by other cars - not bicycles. In this example of mine, a 10 second delay by a bike once a year vs 8 hours of delay by cars per year equates to 0.035% of your annual delay total.

And that is worth getting upset over? These people need to get a life.

Thursday

Worked late last night, so I was late to rise and leave for the big smoke. The sun was well and truly up by the time the rubber hit the road.

Being out so much later than usual, I saw some species of cyclist that are never seen at zero-dark-hundred; teenagers.

Here is a pack of three of them; hunchbacked mutants on their stupid little monkey bikes. They pedal like crazy on these single speed, small wheeled contraptions and never seem to make any useful forward progress. They also gaggle in such a fashion as to block the path for the faster members of the cycling clan - I thought about saying something, but it was more interesting to hang back and observe their style.

They thought they were cool. I thought they were muppets.

A rapidly growing genera - cyclist relaxist. Casual work clothes, casual shoes on the feet, upright, laid back bike that - horror of horrors - has a kick stand. I should mention that in the road bike fraternity, the kick stand went out of use about the same time as Jimmy Carter.

I find the growth of these relaxed cyclists to be comforting - it means the hardened road warriors who paved the way in making cycling acceptable are being followed by a much larger wave who have stuck a toe in the water and decided that they can in fact ride to work without being squished by a bus - unless they live in the northern suburbs. The early adopters are now being followed by what I hope is the early majority.

Here's another relaxed cyclist - the bike frame and the mudguards totally give it away to frame-aficionado's like me. And the thongs on the feet.

The thing is, these relaxed cyclists move at about half the pace of those of us in the lycra crowd. Yesterday, the Telegraph ran a story which was one long whinge from motorists about being held up on the road by "lycra-clad fanatics". If motorists think being held up by a lycra clad loon like me is bad, when I can move at 50km/h on the flat in good conditions (which is the speed limit on most streets around here), wait until all these casual non-lycra cyclists hit the roads and start cruising around at 15-20km/h.

When that happens, angry motorists will look back on the days of lycra cyclists as some sort of golden age of motorist/cyclist harmony.

Idiot of the day

Spotted a driver yakking on his phone as I walked through town this morning.

The cost of a hands free kit couldn't have been the reason why he didn't have one installed.

You see, he was driving a Mercedes C63 - an AMB badged beast that will set you back between $200,000 and $250,000.

Conclusion - rich, but fucked in the head.

Think quick

A short clip - 2 seconds. This shows how little time you have to react when some dill throws their door open in front of you.

This is why I always ride at least a metre out from the line of cars. Some motorists don't like it, because it makes me harder to pass. My response is this - if I could rely on 100% of you to not try and kill me with your doors, I'd hug the cars. But I can't, so in order to protect myself, I have to put a buffer between me and your stupidity.

This driver was a classic. As I went by, I noticed that he had been talking on his phone, and was fiddling with papers on the passenger seat. His head was down, and he was looking at the passenger seat. He flicked the door latch, then kicked the door open with his foot - all the while as he was looking anywhere but behind and to his right.

I really should have stopped and slammed the door on his leg.

From the SMH:

US cannot feed its hungry millions

WASHINGTON: The number of Americans who lack dependable access to adequate food shot up last year to 49 million, the largest number since the Government has been keeping track.

If that's the case, why are so many yanks so fat, particularly those who are poor, who you would think can least afford food?

Something is fishy here.

Attack of the hubbards

There are days when it all comes together - the legs never tire, the lungs don't give out and you feel like you have energy to burn after cresting the steepest of hills.

It's on days like these that every other cyclist looks like a hubbard. They can't climb hills and they fail to tear it up on the flats. Days like this feel good.

I know I am going to pay for it tomorrow........

Some taxi drivers are just arrogant pricks

I've traveled with the entire cross section of taxi drivers in my time - the chatty ones, the silent ones, the smelly ones, the mental ones, the nice ones, the non-English speakers, the scammers, those with pristine cabs, those driving rubbish dumpsters, the smokers, the coughers, the political types, the racists and the incredibly, depressingly, scarily incompetent.

For instance, I had a driver last year that insisted on driving at 11pm with two blown headlights. The low beam on both sides was gone, but the high beam still worked. His modus operandi was to drive along the street flashing his high beam constantly. He drove for some distance along the Pacific Highway using this flashing method (which annoyed and distracted every other driver on the road), and then continued to use it as we pulled into quiet suburban streets. When I suggested he needed to get the lights fixed in order to safely operate his cab, he got quite irate. Those sort of morons are out there driving cabs, every day.

Here's another one.

I'm boodling along in my lane, when Mr Aggressive decides to ram into my lane without:

1. Using his mirrors

2. Turning his head, or

3. Indicating

I know that he didn't look, as I could see his head from my position. He saw that the space next to his cab was empty, so in he went. He didn't even consider that there might have been someone about to move into that space. I had to haul on the brakes to avoid imprinting his number plate on my forehead.

Driver of T.355 - you are a fucking moron.

Windy Wednesday

Why do clothing companies adopt such strange names these days? What happened to using your name, like Thomas Pink, for your clothing company?

The knicks (shorts) being worn by this bloke are made by Cannibal. I'm sure cannibals would love to chew on his sleek and muscley legs.

This bloke has knicks by Capo. Is the Mafia moving into cycling? Again, his legs are very smooth. I am still firmly in the hair-legged camp. Note the clean lines on their bikes though - no panniers for these dudes. They'd rather suffer the discomfort of a backpack than admit that they have joined the ranks of the commuter. There's a strong sociological/psychological element at play here. Those that train or race on weekends abhor the idea of panniers - it's like a tow ball or a roo bar on a Porsche. By avoiding panniers, they maintain the idea that they are lightweight, low drag racers.

Racing to get home. I didn't sit on the back of this pack of hubbard for long - just long enough to get this photo.

See the lady with the arrow pointing at her head on the middle-right? She had a paddle in a padded bag strapped to her back. Up the creek without a kayak. That's different.

Notice the bloke on the left hugging the pole? Typical behaviour of those of us with cleats - it's easier to lean on something than click out of the pedal - and you get a faster take off.

Insane cow in a car

I had the small pleasure this morning of witnessing a near run thing from close up. I was approaching a set of lights with a Hilux to my right. The lights went orange, and the Hilux stopped.

The driver of a black sports car of some sort that was tailgating the Hilux almost rear ended the Hilux, and the idiot tailgating driver immediately leant on her horn to complain. I look over my shoulder, and beheld a furious woman behind the wheel of the sports car. From the expression on her face, and the set of her shoulders, I could see that she was incensed that something as lowly as a Hilux would impede her progress. Unfortunately, the field of view of my camera is too narrow to pick up the near impalement of her radiator on the silver tow ball of the Hilux.

When the lights went green, the black sports car took off, swerving closely around the Hilux and then went speeding up the road.

Not long after, the woman spotted a parking spot, and proceeded to park very badly. She parked so badly, she had to drive out and then reverse in again. However, in doing so, she came shooting out of her parking spot without looking my way. If I had been a bit faster, she would have run me over. If there had been a car in front of me, she would have T-boned it.

She was, in short, a fucking idiot. Nothing worse than a combination of entitlement, aggression and poor driving skills behind the wheel of a relatively fast car.

The thing that got me is that if she was nuts enough to take on a Hilux - the indestructible beast of the road - how would she react to a bicycle getting in her way?

Tuesday hot rodding

Damn this bloke on the fixie was quick. His legs were something else - watching him pedal, it looking like a bunch of fat pythons were having a root under his skin. I sat on his tail for all of half a minute, and then I was spent. Gone. Rooted.

Nothing like having the advantage of rolling into a green traffic light to jump the group. Wouldn't have made much difference, as the last two in this pack were complete hubbards.

Check out how fast the guy in front is pedalling - that's what it looks like when you're doing 50-55km/h on a nice downhill. His lead didn't last though - like many a cyclist on this route, he failed to apply enough power going up the next hill, and he was easily reeled in.

More Monday photos

Photos? Sorry, I only have one cool photo today. I liked the single cloud hovering over the city, which is under that big ball of light in the middle of the photo. Not often you see just one cloud over the CBD. Unless a building is on fire.

Monday

Monday. A day when the muscles are rested and the body is feeling good after a weekend of naps, nanna naps and afternoon sleepy-sleeps. Monday is the only day of the week when I feel like this. From here, it is all downhill. Well, actually the body starts to feel more and more wretched because of all the uphill. If I was only coasting downhill to and from work, I'd be feeling as fit as a fiddle all the way to Friday.

So we start another short series of comments on cyclists seen out and about today.

I don't get the riding in sandals thing. I guess it is ok for short distances, but the soles are not stiff enough for laying down the power when required. Bike shoes hardly flex at all, so when you push your leg down, all the power goes through your foot and then the shoe and then to the pedal and that makes the cranks go round and round that much faster.

Nice pair of knicks. These ones read "Army Navy Air Force", and as is right and proper, the Air Farce gets the bottom slot, right next to the bung hole.

What? That's not a bicycle. Damn right. I passed three of these things in quick succession this morning. All of them stunk to high heaven. That's part of the downside of riding - you get lots of air, fresh and foul.

I also went past my 3rd random breath test in 3 days. Tomorrow, I should stop at the pub on the corner, order a pint, tip it over my head and then ride past the cops at the RBT as close as a I can and see if any sniff me and start chasing me going, "Oi, pull over".

Where are the Greenies complaining about pollution?

I've blogged time and again about how much cleaner our air and most of our rivers are these days than when I was a kid. Controls on industrial waste, scrubbers on power stations and enormous improvements in motor vehicle engine management systems have produced great improvements in air quality. I know - I breathe in large quantities of it every day as I ride to and from work, and I can tell you, it's quite breathable.

Then we have pollution in China. This series of photos is quite incredible (thanks to Watts Up With That). I've visited the old steel plants in Wollongong and Newcastle (when it was still running) and they were nothing like this.

Nothing quite explains the cheapness of life in China as these photos.

Safety Nazis are out to kill you

I was not the only one riding home in the wet this week. However, I was the only one pulling over several times to wipe what I thought was stinging sweat from my eyes.

I have long thought that when it rains, the rain gets into the foam padding on the inside of my helmet and washes out all the accumulated sweat in the form of a super-salty brine, and it is that brine which has been running into my eyes and causing me to pull over with excrutiating pain in one or both eyes. Apart from regularly washing my helmet in order to remove the salt build up, I figured there was not much else I could do.

This week, I discovered the real cause of my eye aches. I peeled off the foam pads that sit against my forehead, and there under the pads was the remains of a safety sticker. What had been washing into my eyes was not old sweat - it was old glue. No wonder it hurt like buggery.

I'm sure the sticker had some useless Safety Nazi warning on it - like "Do not use this helmet as a serving vessel for hot soup", or "Unsuitable for wrestling badgers", "Do not set fire to this helmet whilst wearing it".

If that glue had run into both my eyes whilst descending at speed, the outcome might not have been pleasant. Think traction, skin grafts and metal things holding your bones together.

I have now removed every Safety Nazi sticker from the helmet, and scrupulously scrubbed every bit of glue off the liner. I think I will now go hang out at the offices of these awful Safety Nazis, and ride over the first one to leave work. I will then claim that I was blinded by the glue from one of their stickers, and failed to see them - even if I just happen to run one of them over in the lobby of their palatial office complex, and even if that lobby is on the 19th floor.