Back in the saddle – time to get back on (if you got off for the winter)
Back in the saddle – Inside Bay Area.
Nice to see a little press on riding in our local paper this week featuring two of our bestest – Barry Luck from Cycles of Change and Justice Baxter from Wheels of Justice (Montclair). Some good reading about safety / lighting, bike fit, locks, brakes (for some who don’t use their thighs) and rules of the road from these folks.
One critical piece that Justice covered is the importance of not riding on the sidewalk – a huge danger to pedestrians and a way to get smacked by a car when you roll off the curb and into traffic. That said – in many parts of Oakland it is HARD to stay on the street when a bike lane or route is far away and fragmented. Join us to help fix that today!
Sadly, one piece of incorrect information snuck in there about the right to “Take the Lane:”
Riders should stop at stop signs and lights and, if you want to, you are allowed full use of a lane, provided that you’re riding on a street with a speed limit below 35 mph.
There is no such restriction so it’s up to you. There are times it is the right thing to do, to be seen to be safe to get position. See a shot below:
The list of full lane use conditions is here:
http://dmv.ca.gov/pubs/vctop/d11/vc21202.htm
Happy riding