Buffalo & Doozerie - The mild musings of two grumpy old men!

magicbastarder

don't forget the several traffic light poles/signage poles in the middle of the cycle lane.
plus the sign that if you're quite tall, you'd prbably have to duck to avoid.

JMcL

Weepsie wrote: »

He maybe realised that he had to update the Microsoft driver.


Gets coat and flees

But the driver just crashed....

Can I borrow your coat?

magicbastarder

JMcL wrote: »

But the driver just crashed....

Can I borrow your coat?

it'll be alright if you power cycle the system.

Mc Love

On my cycle home the other night and despite multiple motorists flashing their lights at and me signalling to the driver she had no lights on, i knock on her window and she nearly ejects out of her seat and then turns on her lights.

Some people do be off in their own world

nomdeboardie

Some sort of bus comes out of a side road in front of me, but shure it's all OK as I didn't have to brake too hard to avoid being squashed. Besides, it was Santa himself driving. Apparently. Shure, maybe it was a sleigh in disguise (albeit not in the skies, unfortunately) :P

magicbastarder

one of my favourite junctions - outbound from fairview towards clontarf approaching the alfie byrne junction, in the right-turning lane. there was a car in front of me and one behind me. the lights went red when we were still (at a very minimum) 100m away. the driver in front drove straight through them. i pulled up at the lights, and the car behind pulled in behind me for a second or two, then pulled out around me and gunned it through the lights.

it's kinda comical how common it is.

Weepsie

A fellow cyclist today was annoying me. Stopped at lights at Ballymun Rd/Collins Avenue. Rolls on ahead of me. No problem here, happens all the time. I pass. Next set of lights, same thing again. Further up the road, same again.

Get to bottom of Whitworth road and they do it one last time, and position themselves as if they were turning left, bike pointing that way and their gaze fixed.

Lights change and they swing right without signalling, trying to occupy the space I am already in. They then got in a huff with a taxi who was already in other space they wanted to be in!

Ray Bloody Purchase

Weepsie wrote: »

A fellow cyclist today was annoying me. Stopped at lights at Ballymun Rd/Collins Avenue. Rolls on ahead of me. No problem here, happens all the time. I pass. Next set of lights, same thing again. Further up the road, same again.

Get to bottom of Whitworth road and they do it one last time, and position themselves as if they were turning left, bike pointing that way and their gaze fixed.

Lights change and they swing right without signalling, trying to occupy the space I am already in. They then got in a huff with a taxi who was already in other space they wanted to be in!

Happens at every fcuking set of lights for me. I'm no speed demon, but it annoys the sheeeeeite out of me when i pass someone along the road, then at the next set of lights they sail to the top of the queue and i've to go by them again or stay stuck.

Are they totally oblivious? I don't get their thinking at all.

cdaly_

magicbastarder wrote: »

one of my favourite junctions - outbound from fairview towards clontarf approaching the alfie byrne junction, in the right-turning lane. there was a car in front of me and one behind me. the lights went red when we were still (at a very minimum) 100m away. the driver in front drove straight through them. i pulled up at the lights, and the car behind pulled in behind me for a second or two, then pulled out around me and gunned it through the lights.

it's kinda comical how common it is.

On the right turn?

I so often see multiple cars running that red light when there's a green for straight ahead. I usually ride up to the top of the queue and stop and wait in front with a big hand signal...

CramCycle

Coming down the N11 today where the cycle path is closed. Traffic is light. I look, it's clear, indicate, still clear and I move out. As I pass the closed section I am doing 63kmph. The lights turn amber as I pass through them. I stay in the lane as there is another traffic lights ahead and there is no point hopping a kerb. All of a sudden I get a beep. I am still doing north of 50, heading to a red so starting to slow but nothing crazy. I am tired and emotional and simply don't get it, so I pull right, wait at the lights and ask what the issue was. Bike lane was closed, I was doing north of 60kmph, we were approaching a red light.

He looks shook by my calm but fair assessment. He says sorry but he was worried he was going to hit me.

HE WAS WORRIED HE WAS GOING TO ****ING HIT ME.

I simply replied maybe you should sit further back, the irony of the statement was too much for my small mind to take. Maybe, just maybe, if he was going to hit me, he should back the **** off. Mother of God their wasn't even a hint of irony in his voice. He remained only 50m ahead of me for the whole trip into town.

nomdeboardie

magicbastarder wrote: »

one of my favourite junctions - outbound from fairview towards clontarf approaching the alfie byrne junction, in the right-turning lane. there was a car in front of me and one behind me. the lights went red when we were still (at a very minimum) 100m away. the driver in front drove straight through them. i pulled up at the lights, and the car behind pulled in behind me for a second or two, then pulled out around me and gunned it through the lights.

it's kinda comical how common it is.

Yeah, bloody cyclists always stopping at red lights :rolleyes:

magicbastarder

cdaly_ wrote: »

On the right turn?

I so often see multiple cars running that red light when there's a green for straight ahead. I usually ride up to the top of the queue and stop and wait in front with a big hand signal...

yes - this morning, i did a very obvious right turn signal, and sat pretty much dead centre in the lane, but he still swung out and straight through a clear red. would have been red for about 10 seconds at this point.

magicbastarder

CramCycle wrote: »

He says sorry but he was worried he was going to hit me.

<physics hat on>maybe he was hoping that the extra energy the pressure waves of the sound of his horn, as they hit you, would add to your momentum and increase your speed marginally, but just enough that it would create a bigger gap and reduce the likelihood of him running into you<physics hat off>

makes as much sense as his explanation?

Ray Bloody Purchase

The cops are giving out free sh1te for cyclists on O'Connell bridge ATM.

Edit: A Garda handed me a set of lights and a hi-vis armband.

They seemed to be filling goodie bags on the spot. It would have made more sense to have them pre-filled. It created a bit of a hazard for pedestrians as it was forcing people out on the road, to get around the line of people who were queuing to get the freebies.

magicbastarder

at the risk if igniting a tired debate, the sheer number of cyclists i pass these days with no or completely inadequate lights on their bikes, but sporting hi-vis covers for their bags is amazing.

RayCun

magicbastarder wrote: »

at the risk if igniting a tired debate, the sheer number of cyclists i pass these days with no or completely inadequate lights on their bikes, but sporting hi-vis covers for their bags is amazing.

I see a fair few with some variety of high vis instead of lights, but plenty with nothing at all.

CramCycle

magicbastarder wrote: »

at the risk if igniting a tired debate, the sheer number of cyclists i pass these days with no or completely inadequate lights on their bikes, but sporting hi-vis covers for their bags is amazing.

Interestingly the last few days of commuting the number of motorists, both numbers and percentage wise with no lights/parking lights or busted lights, compared to cyclists with no/inadequate lighting was heavily skewed towards motorists.

Anyway, about 10 minutes from my front door, black Volvo pulls up alongside me and moves over. I can't pull into the edge of the track as there are kids to my left walking to school. Not sure why they attempted an overtake as traffic stalled right in front of them. Needless to say I struck out at the car as I couldn't shout in case the kids at the side of the pavement got a shock and fell out towards me.

i hate that the schools are back

CramCycle

Hands up I made a mistake this morning. I thought a car beeped at me for no reason.

Looked at my camera when I got into work, wasn't them beeping. The car merged right to overtake but merged right on top of another car who was beside them, who obviously beeped to wake them up as they dropepd anchor to avoid a collision.

magicbastarder

wasn't you who made a mistake though?

Fian

magicbastarder wrote: »

wasn't you who made a mistake though?

I imagine that depends on how he reacted to the car that beeped "him" for no reason. On a good day I would just let that go, a bad day would involve me taking the lane, turning around, large hand gestures and possibly even a bit of roaring. Though that would probably only happen if my blood sugar was tanking, so unlikely on a commute.

But maybe I am only projecting my own intemperance onto him and in fact his mistake was no more than tut-tutting internally.

CramCycle

magicbastarder wrote: »

wasn't you who made a mistake though?

I raised my arms in a quizical fashion and if the light hadn't went green as I came alongside them I would have asked what that was about. Not in an aggressive way but in a condescending way.

I looked a bit like this in their rearview mirror:

Mc Love

CramCycle wrote: »

Hands up I made a mistake this morning. I thought a car beeped at me for no reason.

Looked at my camera when I got into work, wasn't them beeping. The car merged right to overtake but merged right on top of another car who was beside them, who obviously beeped to wake them up as they dropepd anchor to avoid a collision.

Something similar happened me last friday. White Van overtook me as I was moving into a lane having crossed a junction from a two way street to a two lane one way. Managed to catch up to him at the lights, fair thick. And he couldn't have been nicer. Felt like a right thicko

CramCycle

Left early this morning, all grand until Shankill when a taxi decided to overtake right as I was about to enter the mini roundabout on the Bray side of the Village. Thankfully copped it and slammed on. Met the taxi returning through Shankill, looks like they were doing laps, front light on the right completely gone.

I was not civil in my voicing of letting him know that his light was out.

magicbastarder

CramCycle wrote: »

Interestingly the last few days of commuting the number of motorists, both numbers and percentage wise with no lights/parking lights or busted lights, compared to cyclists with no/inadequate lighting was heavily skewed towards motorists.

the commute home last night was remarkable for the number of motorists with no lights, busted lights, or DRLs.

CramCycle

magicbastarder wrote: »

the commute home last night was remarkable for the number of motorists with no lights, busted lights, or DRLs.

The irony of people giving out about all cyclists having no lights (my commute in South Dublin would put it at well under 5% of commuters, though this will sky rocket when the University students return). There is at least an equal percentage but realistically a far higher percentage doing one of the above in regards motorists during lighting up hours.

CramCycle

Feel free to criticise my cycling here, at the time it felt like they pulled in on top of me but the video doesn't make it look nearly as bad, perspective is a funny thing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zq4trrLfkxQ

From 1min 20sec

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dg-cz9uMlPU

From 25seconds

Leroy42

No, you were right. Look how far the vehicle is out on the rear view, before he moves in on you.

So they know you are there, they were giving you plenty of room prior to that. But when faced with oncoming traffic decided to sqeeze the room rather than slow down and wait.

This happens all the time and is incredibly dangerous and scary for the cyclist. The driver thinks nothing of it though.

I always ask would they do the same if it was a horse instead of a bicycle.

buffalo

Leroy42 wrote: »

No, you were right. Look how far the vehicle is out on the rear view, before he moves in on you.

So they know you are there, they were giving you plenty of room prior to that. But when faced with oncoming traffic decided to sqeeze the room rather than slow down and wait.

This happens all the time and is incredibly dangerous and scary for the cyclist. The driver thinks nothing of it though.

I always ask would they do the same if it was a horse instead of a bicycle.

+1 on that. Also, where are they going in such a hurry? Straight onto the end of a tailback. :rolleyes:

CramCycle

Leroy42 wrote: »

No, you were right. Look how far the vehicle is out on the rear view, before he moves in on you.

So they know you are there, they were giving you plenty of room prior to that. But when faced with oncoming traffic decided to sqeeze the room rather than slow down and wait.

This happens all the time and is incredibly dangerous and scary for the cyclist. The driver thinks nothing of it though.

I always ask would they do the same if it was a horse instead of a bicycle.

The weird thing is that while the road pinches in ahead, it doesn't there and there really is no need too. I also have two rear lights, a Lezyne strip (supposedly 150Lumen although I am doubtful) and a Cree one from Aldi which is twice as bright.
The thing that actually panicked me was the kids to the left, in the video it looks like we have passed them but when I seen the car first move in, they were ahead of me and I was freaked I would clear them out of it.
As you say though, stationary traffic ahead, they cannot honestly believe there is a benefit to the overtake as I have a bike lane for the next 400m and they have a traffic jam.

Leroy42

It is not that they think there is a benefit, IMO drivers simply don't care. You are in their way. The road is made for cars and as such you are merely getting in the way of the real traffic. And real traffic is dangerous and if you have a problem with that get off the road.

The amount of times I have had friends complain to me about being held up by cyclists (I am one so therefore am the spokesman for them all apparently!) but when I ask them why they don't rage about being held up by other traffic, traffic lights, having to wait because of parked cars on skinny roads they simply say that that is part of traffic.