What kind of jackasses live in Colorado, anyway?

[Qingdai]

There was a widely reported incident, some years back in San Francisco, of a bicyclist foiling a "bike jacking" by pulling out a gun.
I can't imagine biking and firing, then again one of those guys on a tall bike keeps cycling through our neighborhood talking on his cell phone. I don't find that to be particularly likely either.

[Stephen Maturin]

What kind of jackasses live in Colorado, anyway?

Word around the campfire has it that every change in Colorado's criminal code since late 2003 is a direct and proximate result of my presence here.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

It's amazing to me what needs to be so fucking specified. Like, the old law stated it's only illegal to throw shit at other vehicle operators if you actually hit them?

Just happen to have a copy of Senate Bill 148 right here (pdf, 6 pages). It got passed and signed into law back in May. It's making news now, I suppose, because today is its effective date.

The main thrust of the new law is the requirement that drivers give bicyclists a minimum clearance of three feet when passing. The idea that such a rule needs to have the force and effect of law is appalling, but I've seen innumerable close calls over the years.

The law also amended C.R.S. § 18-9-116, the "Throwing missiles at vehicles" provision of our criminal code. Oh, the fist fights THAT law has caused!

Turns out that the dumbass quoted in the USA Today article was wrong. It was indeed unlawful to throw shit at bicyclists before S.B. 148. However, it was just a class 1 petty offense. S.B. 148 makes throwing shit at bicyclists a class 2 misdemeanor.

Not to worry, though. We can still throw cinder blocks from freeway overpasses at speeding tractor-trailer rigs without fear of serious reprisal. That's still a petty offense. (Disclaimer: Not true! Throwing shit from overpasses is covered by whole other sections of the criminal code!)

Originally Posted by Brimshack

It's that goddam soviet Boulder isn't it?

Right-thinking people nowadays call it the People's Republic of Boulder, hippie.

[Adam]

Originally Posted by Stephen Maturin

Word around the campfire has it that every change in Colorado's criminal code since late 2003 is a direct and proximate result of my presence here.

I suspected as much.

Originally Posted by LadyShea

Not to worry, though. We can still throw cinder blocks from freeway overpasses at speeding tractor-trailer rigs without fear of serious reprisal. That's still a petty offense. (Disclaimer: Not true! Throwing shit from overpasses is covered by whole other sections of the criminal code!)

Figures. Someday, we'll be telling our grandchildren stories about what it was like when Americans were free.

[Stephen Maturin]

YouTube - Richie Havens Freedom Woodstock 1969

[Miisa]

Can someone either confirm or tell me to piss off with my second-hand lies: is getting a tattoo really illegal in South Carolina? I just read the on the webs. Which, of course, never lie.


Sorry to diver from your throwing-shit-at-cyclists thread, but I didn't want to start a new one for just this teeny little question.

[Smilin]

Originally Posted by Miisa

is getting a tattoo really illegal in South Carolina? ......Sorry to diver from your throwing-shit-at-cyclists thread, but I didn't want to start a new one for just this teeny little question.

It used to be, but not any more.

[Miisa]

Ok, thanks, my info was from a few years ago.

[BDS]

Here's my question: since bicycles are required to obey traffic laws, can a bicyclist pass another bicyclist without giving three feet of clearance?

[naturalist.atheist]

Originally Posted by Qingdai

There was a widely reported incident, some years back in San Francisco, of a bicyclist foiling a "bike jacking" by pulling out a gun.
I can't imagine biking and firing, then again one of those guys on a tall bike keeps cycling through our neighborhood talking on his cell phone. I don't find that to be particularly likely either.

In my youth I spend a lot of time on the saddle of a bike. And you can do all sorts of things while riding. The only problem with the gun might be the recoil. But then again a pissed off biker in good shape on a good bike can get up to 60mph or more on flat terrain and catch up to a car in urban locations. And going down hill on a mountain pass I have gone over 70mph for many miles. In one instance I passed five cars and an oil truck. There were some very surprised drivers. And while on a ride with a friend who was also a good biker a motorist cut us off. It pissed him off so much that he caught up with the vehicle, opened the door and pulled the driver from the car and was about to pummel them before I stopped him.

So bikers do not have to be so timid. All it takes is a few good stories that spread through the culture and people will get the idea that it is not such a good idea to screw with bicyclists.

[Plant Woman]

Originally Posted by Watser?

Good luck with trying to pull that gun while getting out of the way.

Originally Posted by Qingdai

I can't imagine biking and firing...

Originally Posted by naturalist.atheist

The only problem with the gun might be the recoil. .

But first you have to pull the gun out of your sweaty, spandex pants.

[Dingfod]

Originally Posted by Smilin

It used to be, but not any more.

Tattooing was illegal in Oklahoma until about three years ago.

[Dingfod]

Nothing says you mean business like a Remington Model 7400 Semi-automatic .30-06.


Actually, that is probably a .22.

[Master Taran]

Bicyclist allegedly pointed gun at car.

[The Lone Ranger]

A lot of drivers seem to resent bicyclists and walkers with a passion. I experienced this on a fairly frequent basis while living in North Carolina.

For example, when I was in graduate school, I rode my bike to school for awhile, but soon gave it up, because I was convinced that it was very likely that I'd be seriously injured or perhaps even killed.

Even though I religiously obeyed traffic regulations and on my own side of the white line, off the main part of the road, I experienced all sorts of assaults. The guys who lean out of the passenger-side window and scream loudly at you as he passes, trying to scare you, is relatively common, but relatively easy to deal with. "Get off the road!" and "Get a car, you freakin' hippie!" were fairly commonly-yelled phrases.

On numerous occasions, a driver would deliberately crowd me, hoping to intimidate me, no doubt. On a couple of occasions, a driver would deliberately drive me off the road entirely -- once, into a deep, rock-filled ditch, resulting in some fairly extensive (but not serious, fortunately) injuries.



When walking along the road, I stay off the road entirely. Even so, some people seem to take it as a personal insult that someone might be using "their roads" without paying for the privilege. And maybe that's a source of the attitude. I can remember reading more than one "Letter to the Editor" in North Carolina newspapers from people who were ranting about how bicyclists and walkers shouldn't be allowed to use public highways, since those highways are paid for by gasoline taxes. [Even if it were true that public highways are entirely funded by taxes on gasoline, I don't see how that means that bicyclists and walkers have no right to use them.]


Once, when I was 16 or so, I was walking along a back road in North Carolina when a motorcycle came zooming around the curve. I was well off the road, and certainly not in their way. A guy was driving, and a girl was his passenger. She was holding a whiskey bottle.

When they saw me, both whooped, and he turned the motorcycle toward me. (I was on the opposite side of the road.) The girl threw the whiskey bottle in my direction (I don't knew that she was actually trying to hit me, but she definitely knew I was there, and she definitely threw it in my direction).

It hit the pavement a few feet in front of me, and immediately shattered, of course -- sending shards of glass flying toward me at 60 mph or so. I was actually lucky that it hit so close to me, because the shards hadn't had much time to disperse before they hit me. They cut up my legs pretty badly (I was wearing shorts), but I was untouched above the waist.


Some people ...


Anyway, I can tell you from bitter personal experience that there are a number of motorists who actively resent bicyclists and walkers using "their" roads. Sometimes, they're quite aggressive about it.


Cheers,

Michael

[BDS]

When cars give me any trouble, I just outrun them. Like naturalistatheist, my normal biking speed is 70 or 80 mph. I find it strange that the top time trialists in the Tour de France can only go 30 mph. Why don't n.a. and I team up and bump Lance and Alberto off the podium? N.A. may have a little trouble keeping up with me, because I ride over 90 downhill, and my normal cruising speed around town is 65 or 70.

[Joshua Adams]

Originally Posted by BDS

When cars give me any trouble, I just outrun them. Like naturalistatheist, my normal biking speed is 70 or 80 mph. I find it strange that the top time trialists in the Tour de France can only go 30 mph. Why don't n.a. and I team up and bump Lance and Alberto off the podium? N.A. may have a little trouble keeping up with me, because I ride over 90 downhill, and my normal cruising speed around town is 65 or 70.

I guess if I were in your shoes I'd just send my pet hoop snake rolling after the aggressor, and maybe tell him to clamp down on the tire until the car stops. I mean, why waste all that energy catching up?

[Dingfod]

When I was 17 and in great shape from riding a bicycle everywhere for about 10 or 11 years before that, I would ride on a four lane avenue in my hometown, one with a 40 mph speed limit, passing cars for four or five blocks of seven blocks between school and my job at the gas station. I could pass cars going either direction, it was pretty flat. Once, drafting my friend on his Honda out on the highway, I hit 55 mph, according to his speedometer. And, I pegged the speedometer I installed on my bicycle out at 60 mph going down Carbon Black Hill. It was scary as hell, no way in hell were my brakes good enough to stop me from that speed.

[Qingdai]

Most bicyclists at top speeds, downhill go about 30 here. Even then I stay way back in case they hit a rock or something.

Must be the thin air where you all are biking....

[Dingfod]

I think their helmets create too much aerodynamic drag, I never wore one.

[naturalist.atheist]

Originally Posted by Plant Woman

But first you have to pull the gun out of your sweaty, spandex pants.

Nah, I'd wear a chest holster. I would want everybody to know I was carrying.

[naturalist.atheist]

Originally Posted by Qingdai

Most bicyclists at top speeds, downhill go about 30 here. Even then I stay way back in case they hit a rock or something.

Must be the thin air where you all are biking....

Yes, it was down a mountain pass on a bike tour. But yes you are right, at fairly modest speeds it doesn't take much to take down a bike. Even dogs cans be a big hazard. I was taken down once by a dog, I was hobbling around for a few weeks.

[naturalist.atheist]

Originally Posted by BDS

When cars give me any trouble, I just outrun them. Like naturalistatheist, my normal biking speed is 70 or 80 mph. I find it strange that the top time trialists in the Tour de France can only go 30 mph. Why don't n.a. and I team up and bump Lance and Alberto off the podium? N.A. may have a little trouble keeping up with me, because I ride over 90 downhill, and my normal cruising speed around town is 65 or 70.

For a short distance you can go at a pretty good speed. And if you are in fairly fast moving traffic you can draft the larger vehicles. The trick is to get up to speed. The fastest land speed record for a drafting bike was over 127 mph.

The World’s Fastest Bike

In October 2005, a dozen or so bicyclists will haul butt down a flat two-lane state highway near Battle Mountain, Nevada, reaching speeds of more than 60 mph. That's no typo. It's par for the five-mile course at the sixth annual World Human Powered Speed Challenge.

The favorite to go the fastest is Sam Whittingham, a compact Canadian who set the world record-a staggering 81 mph-on a streamlined recumbent

And the fastest cyclist was a bike mounted on a treadmill going over 205 mph. Frankly BDS if you can't do at least 30 mph for at least 30 seconds you suck.

BDS before you poke fun at somebody maybe you should do your homework. You look stupid when you don't.

[Plant Woman]

Originally Posted by naturalist.atheist

Nah, I'd wear a chest holster. I would want everybody to know I was carrying.

1. It was joke.

2. It would be hard to hide a gun in spandex, wouldn't you say?

[Qingdai]

Depends on the physique! Some people could probably hide a bunch of bananas.

[livius drusus]

Some people hide a whole fruit bowl in there.