i read a blog the other day where the male writer was ridiculing another male figure. and he said all sneery (and i don’t tell you which one was Right or Left or White or Black or anything like that because i don’t even remember that part didn’t stick with me) ‘he is probably the kind of guy who rides a bike. on the sidewalk.‘ and i got a chill or something because that sure sounded bad and i could tell right away i didn’t want to be that guy who rides his bike on the sidewalk (clearly it was too late to not be a guy who RIDES A BIKE) so the next time i rode my bike (and i ride it every day, sometimes twice) i thought i’d try to figure out what was wrong with me, for crying out loud, for doing such a thing.
thing is, i am not the only one, like up the hill on willamette where the cars move at a decent enough clip and yet there is no bike lane on either side of the hill. its in the city, too, people ride on sidewalks as well as streets here. the great thing about a bike is that it is not locked down to a street (or a desk or a car seat) and can, at any moment, lift up over the curb and even move past the cul de sac by driving through the ruts in the mud that lead to the next street in the block. i have a mountain bike and love feeling it is always ready to adapt to the situation. and even as the nation’s “second most bike friendly city” (Portland being #1), there isn’t a uniform bike lane! i started out here thinking i could bike everywhere in bike lanes but what people like that don’t realize is that you can be riding your heart out, going nearly as fast as cars around you (and far more vulnerable, just peep the Ghost Bikes on various corners or roadways) and suddenly the bike lane is gone! or on the ride to see my daughters, along that highway with crumbly asphalt, ugh! there’s no sidewalk there worth riding on, but if i could get off the street, i would.
for those of us out here actually riding bikes—greatly disengaged from the gasonline suckfest for the moment but in more danger for it—know that you always have to be ready, and that the sidewalk belongs to us, too. at least i know this may be the case of the laws in oregon, as yesterday a cop-on-a-bike passed me, and I was riding on the sidewalk. he had no complaint, so i assume the law does not.
though believe me, i don’t prefer it. too many seams and cracks. too close to entrances and alleys. cars zoom to the road and they don’t seem to account for bikes. so bikes shouldn’t do the same to people, of course. i’m not interested in sidelining someone who steps out of a store without checking themselves. i always hop off with time to spare if elderly are walking with canes or dogs on the sidewalk far ahead or in fact just about anyone walking on the sidewalk. but when the street is too thin or there is no bike path, i’d rather not have a steady stream of cars edging past me. it’s a danger to the road, and to myself. and drivers are apt to have blindspots in their driving and sightline that make it not always the safest bet to rely on their sight.
of course the writer was just using it as an incidental metaphor and i’m sure if asked, they’d admit there are situations where a bicyclist damn well better hop on the sidewalk, and that even their own views are more nuanced than one might guess from the joke.
we have one view (puto bicyclists doin me wrong when i’m walking) and if you take it no further, and you stay there, where can you go with that?
and then there is another view when the cyclist nearly runs you down on the sidewalk, walkin: (i know what that feels like, i should be more aware of smaller/weaker vehicles than me from here on in) and you can extrapolate the feeling even when you’re driving your car, or your bulldozer or truck.
and yeah, we always have this choice, dont we? it’s not just bikes and blogs…