[*BCM*] tonight's ride

[Jim Leonard]

Please tell me if anything seems uncorrect to you.  Most of your argument 
seems to comes down to "This road is unsafe to ride on because the drivers
on it are hostile to cyclists, therefore CM shouldn't ride on it".  But 
one of the most oft stated and (imho) reasonable goals of CM is to make 
a relatively safe space on roads like this and to make drivers aware that
cyclists have a right and a reasonable place on these roads too.

That said I've never felt the need to use Storrow Dr on bicycle since there 
are wide, relatively well maintained multiuse paths along it and, well, I
don't do much where I would generally need even that.

But you bring up McGrath Hwy.  This one I find myself on all the time and
routinely use over the full width of Somerville, either because it's the 
only reasonable route to where I'm going or in some cases it's the _ONLY_
route since where I'm going is addressed to it.  Note that there are signs
for cyclists along most of it's length (primarily where a cyclist should 
stop to trip the sensors for the traffic lights) but there are also a few
sections that are genuinely treacherous such as going under I-93 (where 
it's name changes to "Fellsway" btw).  But then that is one of the few 
roads that cross I-93 or worse, the Mystic River.  East of Medford Square 
(in Medford), cyclists have only 3 ways of crossing the Mystic River, 
(and can't cross the Boston Harbor, but must go around it by crossing 
the Mystic), all of which are about equal in their lack of friendlyness 
to cyclsts.  They are SR 16 (Mystic Valley Pkwy), SR 28 
(McGrath Hwy/Fellsway) and SR 99 (Alford St).  US 1, Sumner 
Tunnel/Callahan Tunnel and I-90 are off limits to cyclists by State
law.

--jim


On Sat, Nov 01, 2008 at 01:09:05AM -0400, Hiroyuki Yamada wrote:
> While I agree with you, Jim, that there may not have been an actual 
> legal case behind the police's stop (and possible arrest? I don't know, 
> I didn't find the mass until it passed through kenmore headed east), the 
> legality of an action and whether or not it is a good idea are generally 
> unrelated. (And if they are correlated, it still does not imply 
> causation by one or the other)
> 
> http://www.car-accidents.com/2007-auto-crash-story/4-21-07-motor.html
> 
> As a student at MIT, that alone is pretty upsetting -- and although it 
> may not be entirely related to bicycles or critical mass, it still shows 
> that Storrow Drive is not exactly a safe-haven for vehicles. And, like I 
> said -- I wasn't there tonight, but I have made the mistake of pulling 
> onto storrow (a ways back when I was new to Boston area roads) on a bike 
> and woefully regretted it. It's a very fast, very traffic-y road. 
> Neither of those factors make for a GOOD biking experience, and combined 
> I would have to say that they make a terrible one. (Same is true of 
> McGrath Highway -- I think that's what it is called -- over in 
> Somerville, maybe Rt 28? Very fast, badly lit, and full of traffic... 
> Made the mistake of getting onto that a couple times too)
> 
> That said, the rest of the ride tonight was pretty fun. It took me a 
> while to track you all down, and involved a lot of tooling through 
> chinatown and I think at least one full circle of the common, but  we 
> eventually found you. I brought two CM virgins along with me and both 
> said they had a great time. Thanks to all that came out and made it fun!
> 
> --Yuki
> 
> Jim Leonard wrote:
> >On Fri, Oct 31, 2008 at 11:33:53PM -0400, David St.Germain wrote:
> >  
> >>Riding on Storrow Drive at night was a bozo move.  Frankly, I'm  
> >>surprised the cops didn't do more than stop a few folks.  What kind of  
> >>solidarity would you have liked?  Should the entire mass have stopped  
> >>in the middle of Storrow and yelled at the cop?  We're not talking  
> >>about a human rights march here -- the idiots at the front of the mass  
> >>decided to risk endangering the rest of the riders, and if they get  
> >>tickets as a consequence, too bad.
> >>    
> >
> >Except that (assuming I'm not mistaken in my history, please correct me if 
> >I'm wrong) courts have already agreed that bicycles are allowed on 
> >Storrow.  Unless there's some other reason why you say it's a bozo move.
> >
> >--jim
> >
> >  
> >>Dave
> >>
> >>
> >>On Oct 31, 2008, at 22:59 , jennifer thomson wrote:
> >>
> >>    
> >>>hey all,
> >>>
> >>>just wanted to say that tonight's ride was awesome.  especially  
> >>>riding on storrow!
> >>>
> >>>however, it wasn't ok that the ride abandoned the people who got  
> >>>stopped by the cop on storrow.  we need a lot more solidarity in  
> >>>situations like these.
> >>>
> >>>jennifer
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