tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18676999.post115850944862696962..comments2024-02-27T01:52:06.519-08:00Comments on Kent's Bike Blog: Passing Clearance, Helmets and Lane PositionKent Petersonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12906603746565831689noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18676999.post-60089052730075714782007-12-13T17:39:00.000-08:002007-12-13T17:39:00.000-08:00Great post with great quotes and references, Kent;...Great post with great quotes and references, Kent; thanks for linking me to it. Great comments, too. And a couple new resources for me in your sidebar. Thanks for visiting my blog and for your helpful comment!Ellie Hamiltonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03592691217213028495noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18676999.post-1159062826993112382006-09-23T18:53:00.000-07:002006-09-23T18:53:00.000-07:00The comment from Mark Boyd is spot-on. It's a comm...The comment from Mark Boyd is spot-on. It's a common-sense cooperative approach (take the lane unless you're screwing up traffic), and, in my opinion, the most constructive for cyclists. While my pride wants me to take the lane <B><I>all</B></I> the time, my common sense is usually good at making my pride shut up. Good post.Wallet B. Grundlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05666300218195376898noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18676999.post-1158775001278015562006-09-20T10:56:00.000-07:002006-09-20T10:56:00.000-07:00You mentioned pulling off when necessary to let ca...You mentioned pulling off when necessary to let cars go past. Too many cyclist forget that we are considered motorists and must follow the rules of the road. One of those rules is that if you are holding up more than 5 car you must pull over, when safe, and let them pass.<BR/><BR/>This is safer and more helpful than just continuing.<BR/><BR/>My issue is what are you supposed to do for the moron who won't pass because they can't get their 6 foot wide car past you in the 11 foot wide lane? Is that you holding up traffic or them?<BR/><BR/>So far I have never been stopped but it sure is aggrivating when they will not pass because the motorists behind them all are getting mad at you.<BR/><BR/>Ride safe.<BR/><BR/>BobAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18676999.post-1158527600220374402006-09-17T14:13:00.000-07:002006-09-17T14:13:00.000-07:00Kent,A couple of things. The Walter Study, as repo...Kent,<BR/><BR/>A couple of things. The Walter Study, as reported, raises some significant ethical issues. Researches (whether or not they are tenured or whether or not they need notoriety to become tenured) ought to be very careful with what results are furnished to the press before those results are conclusive or the full study is duly reported. This alone is beyond the issue of whether or not people should wear helmets. Professional integrity dictates – ought to dictate – that the results from any study that might have immediate consequences are properly reported and not misused as sound bites and headlines. Let’s leave that to politicians. It is thus that I must conclude from what has been reported till now that the study should not be taken seriously at all; it (the “experiment”) sounds frankly ridiculous – unless and until we are given full information of its methodology and results. For instance, wearing a wig while cycling does not make you a “woman” cyclist. It makes you a cyclist-wearing-a-wig cyclist. Perhaps one is more deserving of more room on the road while wearing a wig! I donno. I do not judge. <BR/><BR/>Notice – and I think this is serious – the lack of backbone on some of the professor’s findings: it might be OK for children to wear helmets because, anyway, helmets have proven effective in low speed falls. Does this suggest that adults do not benefit from the use of helmets on slow speed falls? Or that adults simply don’t ride slow enough to make the benefit viable for them? What it suggests to me is that since adults are supposedly responsible for their actions they can choose to ride – slow or fast – without a helmet and take the consequences. Fair enough. But the good professor wouldn’t want that to apply to children – just in case he’s wrong – because experiments are just that and theories are just theories and children hitting their heads on concrete are hurt children. (Those of us who ride quite often with our children take this shit very seriously.) We cannot make such easy leaps to conclusions without assurance that they hold water. Specially when the professor’s own results point out that the increased or improved separation between car and helmet-less rider is only ONE INCH AND A HALF.)<BR/><BR/>To each his own might be fair enough, but to mislead – even unconsciously – is no experiment worth my while.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com