Mr. Bike Lane, can we talk?

Michael and I took advantage of another unusually warm day to attempt waterlogging ourselves in the rain. It seems Atlanta is trying to make up for this year's rain deficit all in the last week.

Along Glenwood, a gentleman out for a walk looked over at me and pointed with his arm outstretched toward the curb. I saw no hazard there, but within a moment or two, it occurred to me he was pointing out the bike lane. There was a car about 100 meters back and since we were approaching an intersection where most traffic would turn right, I had moved to the left of the center of the lane in preparation to either let this guy by or prevent him from trying to come around as we were reaching the stop light. Indeed the car did turn right as I expected.

When I looked back to see if the gentleman was still watching, he was gone. He may still be thinking he was right in pointing out that I should have been in the bike lane. I didn't get a chance to send him the URL of the Vehicular Cycling article in Wikipedia. I would have pointed out that the Vehicular Cyclist ignores bike lanes when choosing lane positioning, takes control of the lane when approaching an intersection, and chooses a lane position that indicates their direction of travel. The words about the door zone would have been appropriate as well since along that stretch of curb a few cars had been parked.

What can we do? Misundertanding perpetuated. He could be blogging somewhere about another cyclist who ignores the bike lanes when there is a car behind him.

Don't get me wrong about bike lanes. I like bike lanes for the following reasons:

• Indicates the road is wide enough that the lane can probably be shared (if the door zone is not also present).
  
• Indicates that the road is favored by cyclists. This does two things: 1) alerts drivers they should look for cyclists and 2) helps new cyclists choose appropriate routes.
  
• Constricts the lane which encourages slower motor traffic.
  

What I will do is bring a camera the next time I ride this route. Sorry, this is a subject change.

Our variations on the route took us across a suspension bridge in the woods behind Emory's President's house. This is a good shortcut over to the VA Hospital and Clairmont from Emory's main campus. It is only a single person wide and it is advised to walk bikes (the bridge swings quite a bit), but as you cross South Peachtree Creek, you forget you're in an urban area.

Another variation took us over to the first segment of the Beltline Trail that has been constructed near the historic West End. The signs marking the trail are made from steel rails that resemble the rails the trains run on. Mile Marker 0 is where we started although I did not plan it that way.

When it's dry, I'll come back with the camera to grab some shots.

Ride Summary

Round Trip Distance: 33.0
Number of Cyclists seen: Lost count, but around a dozen.
Route: Variations on Intown Medley; we wanted to stay rather close to home so we could bail if weather conditions got worse.
Weather: Overcast and raining, but low wind, temps in the low 60s