Treks, pains, and automobiles

LOOK OUT!!! SCREEEECH….C-R-A-S-H….

Living in our bustling, car-thick City of Atlanta, we hear the tires squealing so often that we are relentlessly conditioned to hear the ensuing crash and are wonderfully surprised when we don’t hear it. 

We have drivers distracted by blaring radios, ringing cell phones, crying babies, and wandering minds, occasionally with all these distractions conspiring fiendishly together to create a racket that would rattle a mortician. We have young drivers, whose often underdeveloped sense of mortality runs a close second to their need to be somewhere else faster than the laws of the State and physics allow; and we have my personal favorite: drivers unfamiliar with the area studying their GPS while rolling merrily and hopelessly along!

Given all these factors, along with the many more unknown dangers lurking right around the next bend in the road, I’m often amazed by the defenseless innocents who behave as if none of this were so – namely, bicyclists and pedestrians.        
The under-fed sons and daughters of anarchists, bikers apparently believe that drivers will always (a) notice them wherever they are, even if they can’t be seen; (b) obey all safety, traffic, and spiritually-inspired regulations governing the behavior of humankind; and (c) faithfully hold that none of these rules apply to their freedom-loving, self-propelled, two-wheeling, otherwise health-conscious, furiously pedaling persons and bodies.

I myself am the occasional bicyclist (ignore my bike with two flats hanging in the back of the garage) and have nothing but admiration for those brave souls who scamper to work and play on less than four wheels. I dutifully “share” the road all the time, moving over to give a wider berth. I find myself worrying about what happens if the little sports car can’t see the biker getting ready to blow through the stop sign at 45 MPH on a 25 MPH residential street. I’m concerned about the older woman getting out of her car who’s about to open her rear passenger door and can’t see the biker zooming in for the kill, or sacrifice as the case may evolve. Such folly and foolishness.

Sadly, a well-loved bicyclist, out for an early-morning training ride before sun-up, was killed last spring. In the news this week comes the disconcerting announcement that there will be no prosecution of the driver for lack of any evidence that he did anything wrong. This is sad beyond words for both families.

But a word, if I may, for bicyclists: the next time you’re feeling the wonderful and refreshing Fall breeze in your face, please stay focused on the road. While you don’t have the crying baby on board, you could take the iPod earphones out and listen for the car coasting up behind you, and you might, every once and awhile, slow down or even stop at a stop sign or red light. And remember to yield to pedestrians! Which brings me to my next point.

Pedestrians! Here’s the deal: I stop for pedestrians to cross the street anytime I see them. The problem? Peds can’t always be seen! Nor can their intentions be read when walking parallel to the street and abruptly making a 90 degree turn into the path of oncoming traffic. We have the PEDS movement lobbying for the “rights” of pedestrians, a right that some are evidently willing to die for. Now I want to start a new movement. I want pedestrians to RAISE THEIR HAND before they cross the street. I know it sounds simple. But if pedestrians will stop, look, listen, and RAISE, they have a better chance of being seen and acknowledged. Dog trainers teach new companions to sit before they cross, partly because a dog on a leash can’t be seen coming out from behind a telephone pole or parked car. For that matter, neither can a baby stroller. So if we stop, look, listen, and raise (if there is or may be oncoming traffic) wouldn’t we all be a little safer? 

What do you think?