Aggressive biking is just as dangerous and annoying as aggressive driving.

Will, I hear you on the honking. I was reminded of how much it sucks on my ride home tonight when a woman blasted her horn at me from behind instead of doing what should be done — drivers, take fucking NOTE — and simply gone around me. (She had ample room. I was passing a parked car, and no one was coming in the opposite direction.) But instead I got a nice long honk that scared the shit out of me. Oh, and then her well-manicured hand flipped me off. Classy.

So, this is one of my concerns when I ask what rides like CM will achieve. There are still going to be these entitled, impatient ass faces who think bikers have no business being on the road. How do we teach those people? Can we do mandatory Return to Driver Ed for them every five years?

zota, you are absolutely right. And if getting lots of bikers on the road (whether in daily commutes or group rides) will inspire more people to bike, too, that will bring more voices to the cause and more weight to the arguments for better safety measures.

I think getting people to make that statement more often and more emphatically is one of the best achievements of rides like this. What if LA had more and better bike paths? What if LA had bike lanes out of the door zone? What if LA had some cross-town streets that favored bikes? What if LA had equal enforcement of traffic laws (harrass overweight SUVs as much as bikes)?

You’re pointing out specific things that could make biking a safer option, and you only went out for half an hour. Imagine what you might come up with if you went on a whole ride?

its not really meant to achieve anything more than just awareness and bicycle advocacy. if this ride gets at least one person out of their car and on a bike, thats a win.

its also a brief time where we are the dominate presence on the road.

next time stick around and do more than a couple miles, you’ll see some different reactions.

Other rides such as RIDE-Arc (First friday of the month) and Midnight Ridazz (second Friday) are also prone to rolling through red lights but are notably more laidback in nature.

On a minor note, sometimes it can be really hard to decipher the intent of a horn honk. I actually have disdain for all horn honking be it supportive or deragatory because it can be jarring and distracting. But then I’m a “when in doubt just STFU” type.

Back to the corking issue. In my early participation with Midnight Ridazz I took great pride and joy in corking my share of intersections because it was my way of giving something back to the ride and my fellow riders. But I’ve long since stopped except for rare occasions because the rides can be so large and because of several tickets that have been issued to other riders who’ve been caught corking.

So to cut a long comment short, with group rides that exceed a certain number and get strung out along the route, there’s no real solution to handling intersections other than to do so individually. I run some and I stop at some always trying to ride with space around me so that if I decide to stop or if someone does something squirrely in front of me I won’t run them over or get rammed by a cyclist too close beside or behind me.

Anyway, letting the fear creep in on you isn’t a bad thing. Just don’t let it control you. You can’t do anything about the horrible shit like you linked to, but being ever aware of the bad that can happen is what will make you a safer and stronger cyclist.

Come check out an upcoming RIDE-Arc or Midnight Ridazz one of these days and I hope to see you out there on the streets.