Wednesday 19 December 2007

Stupid maintenance on the ANZAC bridge

There used to be a little concrete pagoda of some sort just next to the statue of the digger on the ANZAC bridge. I'm sure it was there this morning when I rode in. Imagine my surprise on the way home when I am belting down the path and had to brake hard to avoid crashing into a construction mess. The pagoda is no more.



Now if the RTA or a council does work on a road, you have warning signs galore to let you know about the road being ripped up a kilometre or so up the road. If you're on a road like the Hume, the speed limit will drop in increments to 80, then 60 and sometimes 40. The warning zones can be wider than the Korean DMZ.

The same philosophy is not applied to bike paths. Warnings are not part of the risk management plan. I'm quite capable of doing 50 km/h down this stretch, and it would have been pretty unpleasant to go smashing into this demolition zone at that speed. It would have been lawyers at 100 paces.

The worst of it is that when I pulled over to take a photo of this example of rampant RTA stupidity, I got a flat. A bit of glass went straight through my kevlar lined puncture proof tyre. I guess that is the tyre's way of telling me that it has reached its 6000km design limit, and it's time to go to the great tyre dump in the sky.



I blogged last week about how filthy changing brake pads can be. Tyre changing is no better. It's always better to get a flat on the way home, as it takes many scrubbings to get this stuff off, and walking around at work with filthy fingers is not a good look.

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