Bullet-riddled signs, accident shrines, and other roadside attractions
Ken MacLeod
I've recently been on a fortnight's package holiday in Crete with my
wife and teenage son. Apart from what I learned while there I know
absolutely nothing about the island. It's long with an east-west
backbone ridge of mountains and a landscape that in places looks very
like the Scottish Highlands, except that it's dry, hot, populated, and
Orthodox. 'The Cretan who says all Cretans are liars' was no doubt an
old joke when the apostle Paul sternly warned that even a poet of their
own had said 'the Cretans are alway liars, evil beasts, slow bellies'.
But if that was ever true, Christianity must have had a good effect,
because the Cretans are fine people now. But I suspect they always were,
because the art of the Minoans is delightful, and their remains include
few weapons. They were a thassalocracy, an empire of the merchant
marine.
It's the site of Europe's oldest civilization, which was only confirmed
at the beginning of the 20th century, with Sir Arthur Evans' excavation
of Knossos. Knossos, partly reconstructed with concrete in place of the
original wood, and partly still being excavated, is a fantastic site,
and sight. The archaeological museum is huge and well-presented and
astonishing in that it's full of the originals of objects you'll have
seen pictures of, if you've ever flicked through a book about antiquity.
This includes the Phaistos disc, a small round piece of pottery with
tiny pictographs - Mohawks, little men, lunar excursion modules, you
know the sort of thing - stamped into a spiral on both sides.
The Cretans, ever since the Mycenean invasion undermined the Minoan
culture, have regarded themselves as part of Greece. For most of the
past two millennia they have been part of someone else's empire: Roman,
Byzantine, Venetian, Ottoman ... scarcely had they escaped the Turks
when the Germans arrived. Crete may be the oldest 'national question' in
the world; fortunately it now seems well settled that Crete is Greek.
Our apartment was in Stavromenos, a village which is a sort of straggled
shore-front suburb of Rethymno. Not entirely touristy, in that there
were lots of people who were not employed in the tourist industry: a lot
of tomato picking and olive and lime growing going on in the gaps, etc.
Even in this small place, there was a memorial park to the Greek and
Australian casualties of the Battle of Crete. The thousands of British,
Australian and New Zealand soldiers who were stranded at Souda Bay and
evacuated across the mountains and down the Imros Gorge to Hora Sfakion
are not forgotten in Crete, though sadly not much remembered in Britain.
We spent most days at the beach (only one at the pool) which was
brilliant - a shallow slope of sand into water perfect for swimming in.
Carol paddled occasionally and read in the shade, Michael and I swam
(and read in the shade). On calm days we could watch tiny fish around
our toes, and on breezy days we could play in the surf.
We went on four excursions - one to the bottom of Samaria Gorge to go up
part of it the 'easy way' by walking a couple of km in - and up. Totally
spectacular. (The hard way is to start at the top and walk 11 km to the
bottom). On the way there we travelled right over the main mountain
range, over 2000 metres up. One feature of Crete is that many road signs
have been used for target practice. Another is that there are lots and
lots of little shrines by the roadside - tin boxes with a front door and
sloping roofs, like doll's houses mounted on poles. Inside they have an
icon, sometimes a photo of the deceased, and an olive-oil lamp. They are
memorials to the person (the icon is of the saint with the same name as
the person - every Cretan has a saint's name). Usually they are the
victims of road accidents - Greece has the worst rate in Europe - and
sometimes (we were told) of vendettas. Women in the villages wear black
if they've lost a relative in the past two years, and men don't shave.
Most men in the villages are bearded, and most women wear black. Or so
the guide said, valiantly distracting us from the airy void to the left
of the coach's wheels.
On the way down the other side of the mountains, towards the little port
of Hora Sfakion, there were hairpin bends, no crash barriers, and
thousand-foot drops (I am not exaggerating) - and a shrine at every
bend.
Next an introduction to scuba diving, which Michael and I did
while Carol sunned/shaded herself at the posh hotel nearby (this was
part of the package). This too was on the south coast, but fortunately
the journey didn't involve mountain ranges and hairpin bends.
The diving itself was easy and safe - to 10 metres, one to one with an
instructor all the way - but terrific fun and a real sense of
accomplishment. On our second Thursday we went to Knossos and the
archaeological museum, and on Sunday had a boat trip to a beautiful
beach followed by a short visit to Gramvousa, an island with an old
Venetian fort on top. We'd done our 'walk around a Venetian fort's
ruined battlements above precipitous drops in the blazing afternoon sun'
thing the day before, in Rethymno.
We went into Rethymno a couple of times on our own steam for
sightseeing and shopping. The town has a Venetian fort on the harbour
headland, impressive from the seaward side and a walkover from the back.
The Turks took it after a siege of 22 days, and I'm not surprised.
Heraklion, on the other hand, held out for as many years, and was only
taken by bribing a Venetian officer (who retired to Turkey with the
proceeds and died many years later in his bed).
According to the guidebook, almost all Cretan men own a firearm. In
another part of the book, it says that crime, especially theft, is rare
on the island. Apart from the vendettas, I guess. Men still fire into
the air at weddings, which can be a little startling if the bride is
setting off from the house next door. I think they were using blanks,
that time, or maybe aiming for a road-sign.
--
Ken MacLeod
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> I think they were using blanks,
> that time, or maybe aiming for a road-sign.
Oh, maybe not. They do just the same thing in Naples at New Years's Eve
and they use live ammunition. Appartenly the idea that a bullet shot
upwards sooner or later comes down hasn't penetrated the collective
consciousness yet. There are a few casualties every year, though not as
many as from the fireworks.
Despite differences in history, religion and sociological background,
the black-clad women-surly men-lotsa firearms-unrelenting feuding-showy
religiousness meme seems to be ubiquitous in the Mediterranean islands
(and vast stretches of the mainland for that).
And the Ohgodlookatthedropthereandnobarrier roads are unnervingly common
too. Seen them both in the Eolie and Corse, and I was quaking under a
jacket for most of the way up Monte Pellegrino over Palermo.
--
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
homepage: http://www.fantascienza.net/sfpeople/elethiomel
English blog: http://annafdd.blogspot.com/
Blog in italiano: http://fulminiesaette.blogspot.com
Dorothy J Heydt
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@despammed.com> wrote:
>
>And the Ohgodlookatthedropthereandnobarrier roads are unnervingly common
>too. Seen them both in the Eolie and Corse, and I was quaking under a
>jacket for most of the way up Monte Pellegrino over Palermo.
Hal says California Highway 49, up in the Sierras, used
to be like that too. I asked if it still was, and he
said probably, but he hasn't been on it recently.
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
http://www.kithrup.com/~djheydt
Neil Belsky
--
One life furnished in early yard sale.
"Ken MacLeod" <k...@libertaria.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
news:nkn1WEAZ...@libertaria.demon.co.uk...
I must ask, was everyone there smiling?
Neil
--
One life furnished in early yard sale.
Ken MacLeod
<ursi...@msn.com> writes
>"Ken MacLeod" <k...@libertaria.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
>news:nkn1WEAZ...@libertaria.demon.co.uk...
>>
[about Crete]
>
>I must ask, was everyone there smiling?
>
Please explain.
--
Ken MacLeod
Lucy Kemnitzer
I think "smiling cretin" is a set phrase, like "grinning idiot."
I adored your account of Crete. People make road shrines here too,
especially the Mexicans, but other people do it too. And another type
of shrine they make is at the tops of the stairs leading down the
cliffs to the beaches, to dead surfers. They get really elaborate,
with flowers people change frequently, and they take routers to the
wooden railings of the stair landings and inscribe names and dates and
cryptic platitudes (surfers are really different, as a group, from the
rest of us: they use words differently, and the really dedicated ones
like my uncle have a touching kind of John Muir-like quality to them).
Bullet-ridden signs, too, in the country. Rural people the world
around seem to have some characteristics in common, like doing really
unwise things at weddings. And dying on the bends of the roads.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Nancy Lebovitz
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@despammed.com> wrote:
>
>> I think they were using blanks,
>> that time, or maybe aiming for a road-sign.
>
>Oh, maybe not. They do just the same thing in Naples at New Years's Eve
>and they use live ammunition. Appartenly the idea that a bullet shot
>upwards sooner or later comes down hasn't penetrated the collective
>consciousness yet. There are a few casualties every year, though not as
>many as from the fireworks.
>
>Despite differences in history, religion and sociological background,
>the black-clad women-surly men-lotsa firearms-unrelenting feuding-showy
>religiousness meme seems to be ubiquitous in the Mediterranean islands
>(and vast stretches of the mainland for that).
>
not to shoot into the air as celebration--a kid was badly injured by
a falling bullet a few years ago.
<http://www.americancynic.com/10181999.html>
However, in the interests of mildly fouling up your corelation,
I'd note that women here wear the usual range of colors, and the
men aren't strikingly ill-tempered. The article claims that the
custom was started by Swedish immigrants 300 years ago.
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com 100 new slogans
I want to move to theory. Everything works in theory.
Neil Belsky
--
One life furnished in early yard sale.
"Lucy Kemnitzer" <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote in message
news:3d4db9c7...@cnews.newsguy.com...
Actually it's a reference to "A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the
Forum".
Pseudolous has to bluff Likeus in to surrendering the use of his house of
courtesans to him so he starts the rumor of a plague in Crete. The worst
phase of it has everyone going around smiling all the time. Then the end is
near.
Neil
--
One life furnished in early yard sale.
.
Kate Schaefer
> <k...@libertaria.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> >In article <#zMwALAPCHA.1776@cpimsnntpa03>, Neil Belsky
> ><ursi...@msn.com> writes
> >>"Ken MacLeod" <k...@libertaria.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
> >>news:nkn1WEAZ...@libertaria.demon.co.uk...
> >>>
> >
> >[about Crete]
> >
> >>
> >>I must ask, was everyone there smiling?
> >>
> >
> >Please explain.
> >
>
>
> I think "smiling cretin" is a set phrase, like "grinning idiot."
No, it's a reference to a plot device in "A Funny Thing Happened on the
Way to the Forum." Pseudolus prevents the brothel-master next door from
presenting the enslaved virgin from Crete (with whom his master is in
love) to the triumphant general, Miles Gloriosus, by claiming that Crete
was currently wracked with plague in which the victims smiled and laughed
all day before dying. "They say it's lovely in Crete these days, people
smiling everywhere."
I read some of the Plautus on which the modern play was based, but my
Latin teacher only gave us little excerpts because most of it was
indecent. Very funny, she said, but indecent. We'd have to read it when
we were older, but I haven't done so.
Keith Thompson
> In article <1fgevh3.tgcdnh1r7ltoyN%ada...@despammed.com>,
> Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@despammed.com> wrote:
> >And the Ohgodlookatthedropthereandnobarrier roads are unnervingly common
> >too. Seen them both in the Eolie and Corse, and I was quaking under a
> >jacket for most of the way up Monte Pellegrino over Palermo.
>
> Hal says California Highway 49, up in the Sierras, used
> to be like that too. I asked if it still was, and he
> said probably, but he hasn't been on it recently.
Parts of California Highway 1, which runs along the Pacific coast, can
be pretty hair-raising. There's a railing, but in places it's a
*long* way straight down from the railing to the surf breaking over
the very sharp-looking rocks. (Not that the sharpness of the rocks
would make much difference.)
--
Keith Thompson (The_Other_Keith) k...@cts.com <http://www.ghoti.net/~kst>
San Diego Supercomputer Center <*> <http://www.sdsc.edu/~kst>
Schroedinger does Shakespeare: "To be *and* not to be"
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> Bullet-ridden signs, too, in the country. Rural people the world
> around seem to have some characteristics in common, like doing really
> unwise things at weddings. And dying on the bends of the roads.
Stragenly enough, I have yet to see buller-riddled signs in Sicily. I'm
sure there are, I've probably just never been to right places. In the
Corse, OTOH, it was quite common.
Ken MacLeod
<rit...@cruzio.com> writes
>On Sun, 4 Aug 2002 23:55:53 +0100, Ken MacLeod
><k...@libertaria.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>In article <#zMwALAPCHA.1776@cpimsnntpa03>, Neil Belsky
>><ursi...@msn.com> writes
>>>"Ken MacLeod" <k...@libertaria.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
>>>news:nkn1WEAZ...@libertaria.demon.co.uk...
>>>>
>>
>>[about Crete]
>>
>>>
>>>I must ask, was everyone there smiling?
>>>
>>
>>Please explain.
>>
>
>
>I think "smiling cretin" is a set phrase, like "grinning idiot."
Neil and others have explained what he was alluding to. But just to be
polite, 'cretin' is not derived from 'Cretan' but from the French
'chretien' for 'Christian', which in that context meant 'peasant' and,
well, you can take it from there.
The English 'clown' originally meant peasant or rustic.
--
Ken MacLeod
grapheus
> wife and teenage son. Apart from what I learned while there I know
> absolutely nothing about the island.
> It's the site of Europe's oldest civilization, which was only confirmed
> at the beginning of the 20th century, with Sir Arthur Evans' excavation
> of Knossos. Knossos, partly reconstructed with concrete in place of the
> original wood, and partly still being excavated, is a fantastic site,
> and sight. The archaeological museum is huge and well-presented and
> astonishing in that it's full of the originals of objects you'll have
> seen pictures of, if you've ever flicked through a book about antiquity.
> This includes the Phaistos disc, a small round piece of pottery with
> tiny pictographs - Mohawks, little men, lunar excursion modules, you
> know the sort of thing - stamped into a spiral on both sides.
I love your enthousiastic description concerning your trip in Crete.
And I hope that this will lead others to do the same !..
Just a word of caution : In spite what the guide at the Herakleion
Museum is saying ("Mysteries" are always attractive !!!), the Phaistos
Disk has been recently deciphered. For a first idea of the
decipherment, see
<http://users.hol.gr/~ianlos/v002.htm>
and <http://www.robotwisdom.com/science/phaistos/>
More than 30 attempts at deciphering the Disk have been published, but
this is the ONLY ONE which has been *DEFINITELY PROVED* (with more
than 25 pieces of evidence).
Regards
grapheus
Lis Carey
news:kgj39.745$tI4.3...@monger.newsread.com:
A friend from Arkansas, when she was looking for a house in New Hampshire,
rejected several possibilities because the street signs nearby had bullet
holes in them. "Too much like home", she said, and picked a house whose
nearby street signs were bullet-hole-free.
I've always thought that this behavior is prevalent in places that think of
themselves as rural, but that doesn't account for Philadelphia.
--
Lis Carey
Keith Thompson
> Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
> > Bullet-ridden signs, too, in the country. Rural people the world
> > around seem to have some characteristics in common, like doing really
> > unwise things at weddings. And dying on the bends of the roads.
>
> Stragenly enough, I have yet to see buller-riddled signs in Sicily. I'm
> sure there are, I've probably just never been to right places.
Perhaps in Sicily the signs shoot back?
> In the Corse, OTOH, it was quite common.
FYI, the Corse is called Corsica in English. (I'm not sure why
English insists on having its own names for places that already have
perfectly good names in the local language.)
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> ada...@despammed.com (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) writes:
> > Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
> > > Bullet-ridden signs, too, in the country. Rural people the world
> > > around seem to have some characteristics in common, like doing really
> > > unwise things at weddings. And dying on the bends of the roads.
> >
> > Stragenly enough, I have yet to see buller-riddled signs in Sicily. I'm
> > sure there are, I've probably just never been to right places.
>
> Perhaps in Sicily the signs shoot back?
Wouldn't put it beyond them.
> > In the Corse, OTOH, it was quite common.
>
> FYI, the Corse is called Corsica in English. (I'm not sure why
> English insists on having its own names for places that already have
> perfectly good names in the local language.)
Especially since Corsica is the _Italian_ name. Or more precisely, the
_Corsican_ name, Corsicans speaking some sort of language that's closer
to Italian than to French. I think - I've never actually met them.
I've always wanted to go back to it. They made wonderful crepes,
astounding pasta with mussels, driving gave you this wonderful
adrenaline rush, and they had this endearing habit of trying to smoke
out the tourists by setting fire to the bush. Spent the last week with
my baggage on the beach, ready to evacuate. (This was the real locals,
not the French, undestand: the French in Corsica are a lot warmer than
on the mainland and positively _love_ foreigners.)
Arthur D. Hlavaty
<k...@libertaria.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>Neil and others have explained what he was alluding to. But just to be
>polite, 'cretin' is not derived from 'Cretan' but from the French
>'chretien' for 'Christian', which in that context meant 'peasant' and,
>well, you can take it from there.
And George W. Bush did not say, "All cretins are liars."
--
Arthur D.Hlavaty hla...@panix.com
Church of the SuperGenius in Wile E. we trust
E-zine available on request
Philip Chee
>Actually it's a reference to "A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the
>Forum".
>Pseudolous has to bluff Likeus in to surrendering the use of his house of
>courtesans to him so he starts the rumor of a plague in Crete. The worst
>phase of it has everyone going around smiling all the time. Then the end is
>near.
"Where *does* he get all those toys?"
Phil
---=====================================================================---
Philip Chee: Tasek Corporation Berhad, P.O.Box 254, 30908 Ipoh, MALAYSIA
e-mail: phi...@aleytys.pc.my Voice:+60.5.291.1011 Fax:+60.5.291.9932
Guard us from the she-wolf and the wolf, and guard us from the thief,
oh Night, and so be good for us to pass.
--
ž 20465.19 ž Sharks don't eat lawyers. Professional courtesy.
Nancy Lebovitz
I haven't seen any bullet-ridden street signs, and I live in South
Philadelphia, the neighborhood cited in the url. It wouldn't surprise
me if celebratory shooting into the air (risky, but not extremely
dangerous) and shooting at street signs (more more dangerous in the
city than in the country) are separable behaviors.
I haven't seen anyone shooting into the air here, but that may random
factors--and I'm not in town for every New Year's either. There's noise,
but I can't tell the difference by sound between a gun and a firecracker.
Joyce Reynolds-Ward
wrote:
>In article <1fgevh3.tgcdnh1r7ltoyN%ada...@despammed.com>,
>Anna Feruglio Dal Dan <ada...@despammed.com> wrote:
>>And the Ohgodlookatthedropthereandnobarrier roads are unnervingly common
>>too. Seen them both in the Eolie and Corse, and I was quaking under a
>>jacket for most of the way up Monte Pellegrino over Palermo.
>Hal says California Highway 49, up in the Sierras, used
>to be like that too. I asked if it still was, and he
>said probably, but he hasn't been on it recently.
Sounds like Powerline Road into Hells Canyon.
The kicker is that the road's rugged enough that only a fool would be
driving faster than 20 mph (if that).
jrw
Joyce Reynolds-Ward
wrote:
snip
>Bullet-ridden signs, too, in the country. Rural people the world
>around seem to have some characteristics in common, like doing really
>unwise things at weddings. And dying on the bends of the roads.
And making roadside shrines to the dead...I was going to say that the
bullet-ridden signs and roadside shrines sound like rural Oregon to
me.
jrw
Doug Berry
Thompson <k...@cts.com>, wrote thusly:
>Parts of California Highway 1, which runs along the Pacific coast, can
>be pretty hair-raising. There's a railing, but in places it's a
>*long* way straight down from the railing to the surf breaking over
>the very sharp-looking rocks. (Not that the sharpness of the rocks
>would make much difference.)
I drove 1 at night about 13 years ago through Big Sur. Only the
fact that I had just gotten engaged a few hours ago kept me from
noticing the gaping black void o'death to my left side.
--
Douglas E. Berry grid...@mindspring.com
http://gridlore.home.mindspring.com/
"Hear the voices in my head, swear to God it sounds like
they're snoring." -Harvey Danger, "Flagpole Sitta"
Doug Berry
ada...@despammed.com (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan), wrote thusly:
>Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>
>> Bullet-ridden signs, too, in the country. Rural people the world
>> around seem to have some characteristics in common, like doing really
>> unwise things at weddings. And dying on the bends of the roads.
>
>Stragenly enough, I have yet to see buller-riddled signs in Sicily. I'm
>sure there are, I've probably just never been to right places. In the
>Corse, OTOH, it was quite common.
In Sicily I would think that bullet-ridden judges would be more
common...
Doug Berry
Ken MacLeod <k...@libertaria.demon.co.uk>, wrote thusly:
>I've recently been on a fortnight's package holiday in Crete with my
>wife and teenage son.
<large snip>
It's sounds like you had a wonderful trip, and you've gotten me
to add another destination to my "places I have to see" list.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Feruglio Dal Dan) wrote:
>Keith Thompson <k...@cts.com> wrote:
>
>> ada...@despammed.com (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) writes:
>> > Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>> > > Bullet-ridden signs, too, in the country. Rural people the world
>> > > around seem to have some characteristics in common, like doing really
>> > > unwise things at weddings. And dying on the bends of the roads.
>> >
>> > Stragenly enough, I have yet to see buller-riddled signs in Sicily. I'm
>> > sure there are, I've probably just never been to right places.
>>
>> Perhaps in Sicily the signs shoot back?
>
>Wouldn't put it beyond them.
>
>> > In the Corse, OTOH, it was quite common.
>>
>> FYI, the Corse is called Corsica in English. (I'm not sure why
>> English insists on having its own names for places that already have
>> perfectly good names in the local language.)
>
>Especially since Corsica is the _Italian_ name. Or more precisely, the
>_Corsican_ name, Corsicans speaking some sort of language that's closer
>to Italian than to French. I think - I've never actually met them.
One of the several public radio stations here has a weekday afternoon
show called "The Global Village." It's actually just a fancy name for
"programming varies according to the whim of the person we can get to
cover the slot today." One of the people who covers a regular slot --
every Friday -- is Gypsy Flores. She's my favorite, because she plays
the best and weirdest music (the Tuesday? guy who is also manager of
the station and a contra dance caller and musician is my second
favorite, and I'm always a little sad about the Monday guy, who is a
gorgeous fireman with the most wondeful voice and plays Latin music,
heavily Cuban so I should adore it, but somehow his taste and mine do
not mesh). She plays dance music from Hungary that you can't get
anywhere else, for example. Lately she's been playing a lot of
Corsican music. I think she must have made a trip there recently or
something. Anyway, it's very strange and interesting. I don't know
if I can describe what makes it strange. What she plays is largely
male choral music, sometimes infused with influences from elsewhere,
sometimes very traditional (I think) with that primeval sound of slow,
complex, wall-of-sound polyphony. And what you can hear of the words
-- it sounds like a person who knows French and Spanish ought to be
able to understand it, but of course you can't.
>
>I've always wanted to go back to it. They made wonderful crepes,
>astounding pasta with mussels, driving gave you this wonderful
>adrenaline rush, and they had this endearing habit of trying to smoke
>out the tourists by setting fire to the bush. Spent the last week with
>my baggage on the beach, ready to evacuate. (This was the real locals,
>not the French, undestand: the French in Corsica are a lot warmer than
>on the mainland and positively _love_ foreigners.)
>
Were they really trying to drive out tourists, or was it legitimate
seasonal brush fires? Or were they practicing some Neolithic hunting
or horticultural tradition?
It's fire season now, in California. The fog has been heavy enough and
low enough on the coast to precipitate out as drizzle, but inland --
inland it's dry, it's tinder.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Lucy Kemnitzer
What I want to know is are the shrines all the same looking? Are there
interesting identifiable regional or ethnic differences in how to
build a roadside shrine?
I'm pretty sure the Mexican ones look different from the surfer ones,
at least. The Mexican ones tend to have crosses and silk flowers and
maybe a retablo or so. The surfer ones have fresh flowers -- partly
that's a practical thing, because you don't want to be getting out on
Deadman's Curve every three days to change the flowers -- and little
platitudes, sometimes a clipping about the dead person wrapped in
plastic.
When Jack O'Neill of the wetsuits dies, there'll be a shrine for him
whether he dies in the water or not, I bet.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Lucy Kemnitzer
Mark Evans
: I adored your account of Crete. People make road shrines here too,
: especially the Mexicans, but other people do it too. And another type
: of shrine they make is at the tops of the stairs leading down the
: cliffs to the beaches, to dead surfers. They get really elaborate,
: with flowers people change frequently, and they take routers to the
: wooden railings of the stair landings and inscribe names and dates and
: cryptic platitudes (surfers are really different, as a group, from the
: rest of us: they use words differently, and the really dedicated ones
: like my uncle have a touching kind of John Muir-like quality to them).
: Bullet-ridden signs, too, in the country. Rural people the world
: around seem to have some characteristics in common, like doing really
: unwise things at weddings. And dying on the bends of the roads.
The first time I took my wife to West Virginia to meet my kinfolk there,
she asked about the flowers and crosses that decorated, it seemed, every
curve of the road. I explained to her that they were memorials set up by
the famalies of people who had died on that part of the road. Lots of
curves, lots of crosses, and a very white-faced wife that trip. Later we
took my grandmother to see my great aunt atop her mountain and Grandma
told Margaret about every accident at every curve we passed. She knew the
date, the people involved, who lived and who didn't. And then we got on
the steep, one lane, no guard rail road up the hill to my great aunt's
place....
BTW, it is common in the area to shoot road signs. Why I do not know, but
it is better than the other custom of shooting at out of state cars during
a mining strike.
Mark Evans
--
Mark Evans
Established in 1951.
Nancy Lebovitz
Paul Ciszek <pci...@TheWorld.com> wrote:
>
>I've seen bullet-riddled signs in many places in Colorado, even where the real
>estate is rather pricey. (Though most likely, the people shooting the signs
>moved there when the real estate was less pricey.) Colorado Springs and its
>religious organizations notwithstanding, in Colorado the women and cats do
>as they please, and the men and dogs just have to deal with it. (Can anyone
>point me to the original source of that phrase?)
Probably Heinlein's _Glory Road_, though iirc, the version there is
"women and cats" if one is being polite, and "men and the weather"
(the weather having been controlled since time immemorial) if one
is being blunt.
Michael J. Lowrey
>
> Keith Thompson <k...@cts.com> wrote:
>
> > ada...@despammed.com (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) writes:
> > > In the Corse, OTOH, it was quite common.
> >
> > FYI, the Corse is called Corsica in English. (I'm not sure why
> > English insists on having its own names for places that already have
> > perfectly good names in the local language.)
>
> Especially since Corsica is the _Italian_ name. Or more precisely, the
> _Corsican_ name, Corsicans speaking some sort of language that's closer
> to Italian than to French.
"Corsu"; said to be akin to the Tuscan dialect; varies
enormously from town to town.
http://www.corsica-isula.com/language.htm offers this
example:
There was an Old Man of the South,
Who had an immoderate mouth;
But in swallowing a dish,
That was quite full of fish,
He was choked, that Old Man of the South.
Era un avu ´llu meziornu
A bucca com'è un fornu
Ma inguttindusi un piatu
Di pesciu appruntatu
Si sturzò, quidd'avu ´llu mexiornu.
--
Orange Mike
Lucy Kemnitzer
<grid...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>And lo, it came to pass on 05 Aug 2002 00:03:31 -0700 that Keith
>Thompson <k...@cts.com>, wrote thusly:
>
>>Parts of California Highway 1, which runs along the Pacific coast, can
>>be pretty hair-raising. There's a railing, but in places it's a
>>*long* way straight down from the railing to the surf breaking over
>>the very sharp-looking rocks. (Not that the sharpness of the rocks
>>would make much difference.)
>
>I drove 1 at night about 13 years ago through Big Sur. Only the
>fact that I had just gotten engaged a few hours ago kept me from
>noticing the gaping black void o'death to my left side.
I have a hard time with it. Everytime we go to Big Sur -- and we have
to do so again soon, there's eighteen!!! condors living there now, and
you can see them fly over Julia Pfeiffer State Park, which is
eminently accessible from the road -- I spend the whole time we're in
the car feeling like I'm going to die any minute. It's difficult --
you _must_ suppress such feelings, whether you are driving or in the
passenger seat, lest you make them true.
And to think that once, when I was much younger, I considered living
there because it is so beautiful. Nowdays I wouldn't even live in
Zayante (in the Santa Cruz Mountains).
Lucy Kemnitzer
Lucy Kemnitzer
Michael J. Lowrey
>
> Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> writes
> >I think "smiling cretin" is a set phrase, like "grinning idiot."
>
> Neil and others have explained what he was alluding to. But just to be
> polite, 'cretin' is not derived from 'Cretan' but from the French
> 'chretien' for 'Christian', which in that context meant 'peasant' and,
> well, you can take it from there.
Are you sure on that one, Ken? I believe in that (French)
context it was a euphemism meaning 'retarded person' as in
"poor soul, but a child of God like the rest of us"; n'est
ce pas?
--
Orange Mike
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> And lo, it came to pass on Mon, 5 Aug 2002 09:44:22 +0200 that
> ada...@despammed.com (Anna Feruglio Dal Dan), wrote thusly:
>
> >Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Bullet-ridden signs, too, in the country. Rural people the world
> >> around seem to have some characteristics in common, like doing really
> >> unwise things at weddings. And dying on the bends of the roads.
> >
> >Stragenly enough, I have yet to see buller-riddled signs in Sicily. I'm
> >sure there are, I've probably just never been to right places. In the
> >Corse, OTOH, it was quite common.
>
> In Sicily I would think that bullet-ridden judges would be more
> common...
No, no, they mainly use plastic explosives for that. Much safer.
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> Were they really trying to drive out tourists, or was it legitimate
> seasonal brush fires? Or were they practicing some Neolithic hunting
> or horticultural tradition?
No, it was arson. There's a separatist movement in Corsica. It's a
complicated business, it's not as vicious as either the Basque or the
Norther Irish situation IIRC, but it's had its share of bombings and
killings. The Corsican are mostly shepherds and farmers, while the
tourist industry is mainly handled by ethnic French. There is therefore
a certain hostility on the part of the separatists towards the tourist
industry (or so our cook - a Spaniard btw - told us at the time). In my
case, there was a naturist camping site near the place we (a sailing
school) were camping, and fires were repeatedly lit day after day, until
about a week after I left the camping site was burned and they had to
evacuate. Our instructors went up to fight the flames each night. it
could have been the separatists or just plain old criminality. But it
was arson all right.
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> "Corsu"; said to be akin to the Tuscan dialect; varies
> enormously from town to town.
>
> http://www.corsica-isula.com/language.htm offers this
> example:
> There was an Old Man of the South,
> Who had an immoderate mouth;
> But in swallowing a dish,
> That was quite full of fish,
> He was choked, that Old Man of the South.
>
> Era un avu ´llu meziornu
> A bucca com'è un fornu
> Ma inguttindusi un piatu
> Di pesciu appruntatu
> Si sturzò, quidd'avu ´llu mexiornu.
This sounds - not surprisingly - a lot more like Sardinian than Tuscan.
I know that a couple of the coast towns - maybe Bonifacio - were settled
by the Genoese, who speak yet another language.
Anna would be able to tell more, she knows a little Genoese I think.
Ken MacLeod
<oran...@uwm.edu> writes
Maybe. I got that derivation from my ISTR database.
--
Ken MacLeod
Dorothy J Heydt
The way "silly" used to mean "blessed," cognate with
German _selig_.
On the assumption that if you're sufficiently lacking in
wits, you haven't wits enough to sin.
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
http://www.kithrup.com/~djheydt
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
wrote:
>What I want to know is are the shrines all the same looking? Are there
>interesting identifiable regional or ethnic differences in how to
>build a roadside shrine?
Not really shrines, but the relatives of the deceased put candles and
flowers. Usually plastic flowers, because they last longer. And
sometimes they put crosses.
Roadside shrines, like the ones Ken describes, are real chapels,
consecrated and everything. In Dalmatia, they build a stone chapel
only a meter and a half or two meters high.* There's a little shelf
for candles and the painting of a saint is hung above the shelf. They
used to be completely open, but now generally have iron-bar doors.
In Slavonia, they sometimes make such chapels, out of wood, but more
often they put big wooden crucifixes. No connection to car accidents
that I know of.
* On the island my mother is from, there is such a chapel on a point
looking towards the open sea. Wives of seamen used to pray there for
the return of their husbands. BTW, there's a church for seamen here in
Sibenik, St. Nicholas, too. It has really nice models of ships as
votive gifts.
vlatko
--
_Neither Fish Nor Fowl_
http://www.webart.hr/nrnm/eng/
http://www.michaelswanwick.com/
vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
Feruglio Dal Dan) wrote:
>Despite differences in history, religion and sociological background,
>the black-clad women-surly men-lotsa firearms-unrelenting feuding-showy
>religiousness meme seems to be ubiquitous in the Mediterranean islands
>(and vast stretches of the mainland for that).
Yup. And live rounds for weddings and celebrations.
>And the Ohgodlookatthedropthereandnobarrier roads are unnervingly common
>too. Seen them both in the Eolie and Corse, and I was quaking under a
>jacket for most of the way up Monte Pellegrino over Palermo.
You've been down there towards Dubrovnik? There are barriers, but they
are usually the flimsier metal kind, not stone. Which is funny, since
the road passes through stone practically all the way.
Interestingly, Lois McMaster Bujold says that the Croatian roads don't
have barriers.
http://www.dendarii.com/croatia02.html
Michael J. Lowrey
>
>
> > "Corsu"; said to be akin to the Tuscan dialect; varies
> > enormously from town to town.
> >
> > http://www.corsica-isula.com/language.htm offers this
> > example:
> > There was an Old Man of the South,
> > Who had an immoderate mouth;
> > But in swallowing a dish,
> > That was quite full of fish,
> > He was choked, that Old Man of the South.
> >
> > Era un avu ´llu meziornu
> > A bucca com'è un fornu
> > Ma inguttindusi un piatu
> > Di pesciu appruntatu
> > Si sturzò, quidd'avu ´llu mexiornu.
>
> This sounds - not surprisingly - a lot more like Sardinian than Tuscan.
> I know that a couple of the coast towns - maybe Bonifacio - were settled
> by the Genoese, who speak yet another language.
> Anna would be able to tell more, she knows a little Genoese I think.
I think the site I got this data from was looking for a
mainland dialect to compare to, as opposed to Sardo.
--
"Orange Mike"
(how would you render that in Italian?)
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan
> You've been down there towards Dubrovnik? There are barriers, but they
> are usually the flimsier metal kind, not stone. Which is funny, since
> the road passes through stone practically all the way.
I've only ever been in Croatia via the sea. But I did drive through
Istria once, about six years ago. No abyss anywhere but the roads were
still kinda scary. However, I have to admit that I've been known to
issue muffled moans of deep anguish from behind various items of
clothing on the mountains of Friuli and climbing to Erice. I want to go
up to the trenches and galleries on Mount Grappa next week and I don't
doubt there will be moaning there too. My partner who's from Palermo is
more of a mountaineer than I am.
Kip Williams
> And lo, it came to pass on 05 Aug 2002 00:03:31 -0700 that Keith
> Thompson <k...@cts.com>, wrote thusly:
>
>
>>Parts of California Highway 1, which runs along the Pacific coast, can
>>be pretty hair-raising. There's a railing, but in places it's a
>>*long* way straight down from the railing to the surf breaking over
>>the very sharp-looking rocks. (Not that the sharpness of the rocks
>>would make much difference.)
>
>
> I drove 1 at night about 13 years ago through Big Sur. Only the
> fact that I had just gotten engaged a few hours ago kept me from
> noticing the gaping black void o'death to my left side.
I take it that it was a couple of car-widths away to the left side.
There weren't a lot of people honking at you, were there?
(I've done a lot of driving in the mountains in Colorado, but
perhaps the addition of crashing surf would make it all seem like a
new experience. Just mumbling.)
--
--Kip (Williams) ...at members.cox.net/kipw
"Freedom! Terrible, terrible freedom!" --ants in space; "The Simpsons"
Kip Williams
It also meant "poor," interestingly enough. (Ties it right in, nasty
pass?)
Linda McAllister
>
> And lo, it came to pass on 05 Aug 2002 00:03:31 -0700 that Keith
> Thompson <k...@cts.com>, wrote thusly:
>
> >Parts of California Highway 1, which runs along the Pacific coast, can
> >be pretty hair-raising. There's a railing, but in places it's a
> >*long* way straight down from the railing to the surf breaking over
> >the very sharp-looking rocks. (Not that the sharpness of the rocks
> >would make much difference.)
>
> I drove 1 at night about 13 years ago through Big Sur. Only the
> fact that I had just gotten engaged a few hours ago kept me from
> noticing the gaping black void o'death to my left side.
>
> --
It's not the road so much - it's that everytime I've driven it I've
been behind a land yacht from Iowa driven by someone who apparantly
had never seen a mountain, an ocean or a road with a curve in it and
was challenged by having to deal with all three at once.
linda
Richard Horton
wrote:
>One of the several public radio stations here has a weekday afternoon
>show called "The Global Village." It's actually just a fancy name for
>"programming varies according to the whim of the person we can get to
>cover the slot today."
Pretty much all the programming on KDHX, one of the three public radio
stations around here, is of this nature. (There are vague tendencies
-- the afternoon drivetime slot is kinda sorta supposed to be "blues",
for example, but still.)
My favorites are the Wednesday morning guy, Steve Pick, who plays all
sorts of rock and alt country; and the Tuesday morning guy, Kip Loui,
who plays new old-fashioned country; and the Tuesday evening guy, who
plays Cajun and other music from Sout' Louisiana.
It's the best radio station I've ever heard (on an admittedly limited
sampling).
--
Rich Horton | Stable Email: mailto://richard...@sff.net
Home Page: http://www.sff.net/people/richard.horton
Also visit SF Site (http://www.sfsite.com) and Tangent Online (http://www.tangentonline.com)
Richard Horton
wrote:
>The way "silly" used to mean "blessed," cognate with
>German _selig_.
Insert only too obvious joke about Major League Baseball's management
here.
(Also, I assume, that's where Woody Allen got the name.)
Christopher K Davis
> they take routers to the
> wooden railings of the stair landings
cisco or Nortel?
> and inscribe names and dates and cryptic platitudes
Oh, woodworking tools.
(Been at this computer security conference too long. :-)
As to roadside shrines, there are currently 2.5 of them that I know of
within a reasonable walking distance of my home; the 0.5 is a hard hat
way up top of a street lamp post, commemorating an electrical utility
worker who was killed by an explosion in the manhole while working to
restore power to my neighborhood a few years back.
The other two are both "tree with flowers/balloons/pictures/candles/etc"
setups; one is where someone was shot to death, and the other remembers
a bicyclist who was fatally doored into the rear wheels of a passing bus
while riding in the bike lane. (Yes, they put a bike lane next to
parked cars on a busy street. Yes, it finally killed someone.)
--
Christopher Davis * <ckd...@ckdhr.com> * <URL:http://www.ckdhr.com/ckd/>
Put location information in your DNS! <URL:http://www.ckdhr.com/dns-loc/>
Bill, n. 2. A writing binding the signer [...] to pay [...]
Gates, n. 4. The places which command the entrances or access [...]
David Dyer-Bennet
> The other two are both "tree with flowers/balloons/pictures/candles/etc"
> setups; one is where someone was shot to death, and the other remembers
> a bicyclist who was fatally doored into the rear wheels of a passing bus
> while riding in the bike lane. (Yes, they put a bike lane next to
> parked cars on a busy street. Yes, it finally killed someone.)
While I certainly see the dangers of a bike lane between parked cars
and moving traffic, I've very rarely seen a bike lane anywhere *else*.
(Of course that could be partly because *separate* bike routes are
called "bike paths" around here.)
--
David Dyer-Bennet, dd...@dd-b.net / New TMDA anti-spam in test
John Dyer-Bennet 1915-2002 Memorial Site http://john.dyer-bennet.net
Book log: http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/Ouroboros/booknotes/
New Dragaera mailing lists, see http://dragaera.info
Keith F. Lynch
> ... the other remembers a bicyclist who was fatally doored into the
> rear wheels of a passing bus while riding in the bike lane. (Yes,
> they put a bike lane next to parked cars on a busy street. Yes, it
> finally killed someone.)
David Dyer-Bennet <dd...@dd-b.net> wrote:
> While I certainly see the dangers of a bike lane between parked cars
> and moving traffic, I've very rarely seen a bike lane anywhere *else*.
Smart cyclists avoid those things. Traffic engineers who install them
ought to be sued, if not jailed.
Not just because of doors, but because of conflicts with motorists
turning right and motorists pulling out from parking spaces, driveways,
and roads on one's right. There are also problems when the cyclist
wants to turn left. (Swap these directions in the UK, AU, etc.)
> (Of course that could be partly because *separate* bike routes are
> called "bike paths" around here.)
Those aren't much safer. Unless they are completely grade-separated
from all roads. And unless pedestrians treat them like roads, and
don't wander laterally on them without looking.
The safest place to ride is in the traffic lanes. Which are designed
for traffic. And which are where motorists expect to see traffic, and
keep an eye out for it.
--
Keith F. Lynch - k...@keithlynch.net - http://keithlynch.net/
I always welcome replies to my e-mail, postings, and web pages, but
unsolicited bulk e-mail (spam) is not acceptable. Please do not send me
HTML, "rich text," or attachments, as all such email is discarded unread.
Douglas Berry
Vicki Rosenzweig <v...@redbird.org> warmed at our fire and told this
tale:
>I have a strong feeling that "White Trailer Trash" is right up there
>with "Spic" as a name for an ethnic group. And that the distinction
>you're looking for might be "non-Hispanic white" (in the best census
>form terminology) or "white Protestant."
Except that trailer trash is a sub category. They know who they are.
We know who they are.
--
Douglas E. Berry grid...@mindspring.com
http://gridlore.home.mindspring.com/
"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as
when they do it from religious conviction."
Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), Pense'es, #894.
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
wrote:
(cyclists)
>The safest place to ride is in the traffic lanes. Which are designed
>for traffic. And which are where motorists expect to see traffic, and
>keep an eye out for it.
Especially if the said traffic goes at 20 km/h on a road where the
limit is 70 km/h.
Or if the said traffic goes through an underpass where only one car at
a time can pass, with a foot clearance on either side.
Or if the said traffic weaves along the edge of the road and is in
danger of falling on the road in the air-wake(?) of a car.*
Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a place
for them. The existence of badly designed bike paths and bike lanes is
not an excuse.
* Really. The area in the north-west of Zagreb is known for drunken
cyclists which are known to fall in front of a coming car all by
themselves. The speed of the car is practically unimportant. There's
been deaths almost every month.
Keith F. Lynch
> Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a
> place for them.
Paved roads were *built* for cyclists. Cars were later designed to
use them too. If cyclists have lost the right to safely use the
multi-trillion dollar infrastructure that they (along with everyone
else) paid for, I'd like to know when this was, and what we got in
return.
And whatever your intuition may say, statistics prove that on-road
cycling is safer than any other kind. Especially on major roads.
Especially during rush hour. See Forester's _Effective Cycling_
which is full of references.
> The existence of badly designed bike paths and bike lanes is not
> an excuse.
I don't think a well-designed bike lane is possible. Except on a road
with no driveways, no parked cars, and no cross-streets, on which all
cyclists eventually turn right and all motorists eventually turn left.
(Or vice versa.) I've never seen or heard of any such road.
A well-designed bike path is possible. But it would have to have *no*
road crossings, and have sidewalks for pedestrians. I've never seen
or heard of any such bike path.
> The area in the north-west of Zagreb is known for drunken
> cyclists which are known to fall in front of a coming car all by
> themselves. The speed of the car is practically unimportant.
> There's been deaths almost every month.
I've never suggested that cyclists should ride when drunk. In fact,
the only good thing I can say about it is it's less likely to kill
*other* people than is drunk motoring.
Kip Williams
> Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a place
> for them. The existence of badly designed bike paths and bike lanes is
> not an excuse.
There's a famous 1908 picture of my home town -- a wide panorama. I
used to see prints of it in offices, and there was a wall in the
bank that had it blown up about eight feet tall. It's possible to
study the picture minutely, and you can count dozens of bikes in it.
And no cars. Funny that they had all those roads, and no cars.
Every driver's handbook in every one of the United States that I've
lived in have stated that bicycles are legal on most roads, the
exceptions being interstate highways, and entitled to the full legal
rights enjoyed by automobiles.
Doug Wickstrom
<aj43ti$d37$1...@panix1.panix.com>
"Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> excited the ether to say:
>Vlatko Juric-Kokic <vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr> wrote:
>> Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a
>> place for them.
>
>Paved roads were *built* for cyclists. Cars were later designed to
>use them too. If cyclists have lost the right to safely use the
>multi-trillion dollar infrastructure that they (along with everyone
>else) paid for, I'd like to know when this was, and what we got in
>return.
Around these parts, every inch of paved road was paid for by
property owners and motorists. This amounts to more than a
million miles of pavement.
_None_ of it was paid for by cyclists unless they also fell into
one of the other categories. And, what is more, I believe you'll
find that is true most places.
--
Doug Wickstrom <nims...@attbi.com>
"Although there are arguably some bad things about it, I believe it is
probably one of the most important accomplishments of the twentieth
century. The Internet has become a global medium for the free exchange
of ideas and knowledge, unlike anything the world has seen since
Gutenberg invented the printing press." --Joseph "Doc" Thompson
Rob Hansen
>Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote:
>> Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a place
>> for them. The existence of badly designed bike paths and bike lanes is
>> not an excuse.
>
>There's a famous 1908 picture of my home town -- a wide panorama. I
>used to see prints of it in offices, and there was a wall in the
>bank that had it blown up about eight feet tall. It's possible to
>study the picture minutely, and you can count dozens of bikes in it.
>And no cars. Funny that they had all those roads, and no cars.
>
>Every driver's handbook in every one of the United States that I've
>lived in have stated that bicycles are legal on most roads, the
>exceptions being interstate highways, and entitled to the full legal
>rights enjoyed by automobiles.
Exactly so. Aguments to the contrary by car drivers basically boil
down to 'might makes right'.
--
Rob Hansen
=============================================
Home Page: http://www.fiawol.demon.co.uk/rob/
RE-ELECT GORE IN 2004.
Lucy Kemnitzer
<r...@fiawol.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>On Sat, 10 Aug 2002 22:35:59 GMT, Kip Williams <ki...@cox.net> wrote:
>
>>Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote:
>>> Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a place
>>> for them. The existence of badly designed bike paths and bike lanes is
>>> not an excuse.
>>
>>There's a famous 1908 picture of my home town -- a wide panorama. I
>>used to see prints of it in offices, and there was a wall in the
>>bank that had it blown up about eight feet tall. It's possible to
>>study the picture minutely, and you can count dozens of bikes in it.
>>And no cars. Funny that they had all those roads, and no cars.
>>
>>Every driver's handbook in every one of the United States that I've
>>lived in have stated that bicycles are legal on most roads, the
>>exceptions being interstate highways, and entitled to the full legal
>>rights enjoyed by automobiles.
>
>Exactly so. Aguments to the contrary by car drivers basically boil
>down to 'might makes right'.
The thing I don't quite understand is that according to the driver's
handbook for California, there are very few exceptions to the
principle that the bicycles must follow exactly the same rules as the
cars. I think this creates a deepseated confusion, because bicycles
don't and can't behave exactly the same as cars, and I think there
would be less mutual resentment if the differences were acknowledged,
analyzed, and codified in a sensible way so that the expectations
wouldn't be so unrealistic on both sides. I have been on both sides
of the bicycle-car conflict: as a bicycle rider I have been nearly
killed by stupid car drivers, and I have made errors as a bicycle
rider: as a car driver I have actually hit a bicyclist whose
trajectory I misjudged (he was not hurt, or his bike, because I was
going about 2 miles an hour), and I have been nearly killed by a
bicyclist who was doing something stupid.
One of the most dangerous things that happened to me on a bike was
done to me by a passenger on a motorcycle, completely out of random,
cruel, and idiot malice: no amount of rule-making could have prevented
that. But most of the other awkward situations I have been in between
car and bicycle could at least have been made better by more attention
to the respective needs and rights and responsibilities, in designing
the roads and making the rules.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Adina Adler
> rit...@cruzio.com (Lucy Kemnitzer) writes:
> > they take routers to the
> > wooden railings of the stair landings
>
> cisco or Nortel?
>
> > and inscribe names and dates and cryptic platitudes
>
> Oh, woodworking tools.
>
> (Been at this computer security conference too long. :-)
>
> As to roadside shrines, there are currently 2.5 of them that I know of
> within a reasonable walking distance of my home; the 0.5 is a hard hat
> way up top of a street lamp post, commemorating an electrical utility
> worker who was killed by an explosion in the manhole while working to
> restore power to my neighborhood a few years back.
>
> The other two are both "tree with flowers/balloons/pictures/candles/etc"
> setups; one is where someone was shot to death, and the other remembers
> a bicyclist who was fatally doored into the rear wheels of a passing bus
> while riding in the bike lane. (Yes, they put a bike lane next to
> parked cars on a busy street. Yes, it finally killed someone.)
Did you see the article in the Phoenix about that?
(http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/top/features/documents/02379848.htm).
Unfortunately, it doesn't have a picture of the complete configuration
of the bike lane in Central Square, which looks utterly insane to me.
I'm just amazed that the first death there happened on the straight
part of the lane, rather than the part that twists through the traffic
lanes at the intersection of Mass. Ave. and Prospect St. (This is an
intersection that's so constantly full of cars that left turns are forbidden
at all times.)
The City of Cambridge has been adding bike lanes to a lot of roads
lately, and they're *all* configured like this one--small lanes that
run between traffic lanes and parked cars. I went to their website
(http://www.ci.cambridge.ma.us/) to find more information about the
plan, but could find no maps, and only some fairly vague articles
about the bike lane plan.
--
Adina
Jay Denebeim
Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>The thing I don't quite understand is that according to the driver's
>handbook for California, there are very few exceptions to the
>principle that the bicycles must follow exactly the same rules as the
>cars. I think this creates a deepseated confusion, because bicycles
>don't and can't behave exactly the same as cars, and I think there
>would be less mutual resentment if the differences were acknowledged,
>analyzed, and codified in a sensible way so that the expectations
>wouldn't be so unrealistic on both sides.
Oh, I definately agree with this. I think all they'd need is a simple
rule: If you can't keep up with the average speed on a particular
road use a different road. This goes for slow people in cars, people
in slow cars, and bicycleists.
Jay
--
* Jay Denebeim Moderator rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated *
* newsgroup submission address: b5...@deepthot.org *
* moderator contact address: b5mod-...@deepthot.org *
* personal contact address: dene...@deepthot.org *
Lucy Kemnitzer
wrote:
>In article <3d56801...@cnews.newsguy.com>,
>Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>
>>The thing I don't quite understand is that according to the driver's
>>handbook for California, there are very few exceptions to the
>>principle that the bicycles must follow exactly the same rules as the
>>cars. I think this creates a deepseated confusion, because bicycles
>>don't and can't behave exactly the same as cars, and I think there
>>would be less mutual resentment if the differences were acknowledged,
>>analyzed, and codified in a sensible way so that the expectations
>>wouldn't be so unrealistic on both sides.
>
>Oh, I definately agree with this. I think all they'd need is a simple
>rule: If you can't keep up with the average speed on a particular
>road use a different road. This goes for slow people in cars, people
>in slow cars, and bicycleists.
This rule doesn't make sense in any urban setting, where bikes, cars,
pedestrians, wheelchairs, strollers, walkers, joggers, skateboards,
roller skates, buses, railroad trains, and messenger bikes (a
different species tp regular bikes) all _have_ to share the same
roads, because, well, that's how you get places.
And it doesn't make sense in the rural settings I know of, where all
those same things have to do the same things, for the same reason. Of
course, the rural settings I'm familiar with are kind of urban-like.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Joyce Reynolds-Ward
wrote:
snip
>Oh, I definately agree with this. I think all they'd need is a simple
>rule: If you can't keep up with the average speed on a particular
>road use a different road. This goes for slow people in cars, people
>in slow cars, and bicycleists.
Oh yeah.
And one of my pet peeves...stop signs are for EVERYONE, and the yield
rules work the same for bicycles as they do for cars
jrw
(had too many bicycles whip through stop signs without pausing, or
assuming that cars ALWAYS must yield to bicycles at an intersection
without stopping to look)
Joyce Reynolds-Ward
wrote:
snip
>I have a strong feeling that "White Trailer Trash" is right up there
>with "Spic" as a name for an ethnic group. And that the distinction
>you're looking for might be "non-Hispanic white" (in the best census
>form terminology) or "white Protestant."
Snort. I claim relationship to such sorts as full liberty to make
said derisive comments (and yes, my family is about half and half
white trailer trash, more specifically one branch which aggressively
and proudly embraces the concept).
Since when is it not politically correct to make fun of one's own kin?
jrw
Elisabeth Riba
> And one of my pet peeves...stop signs are for EVERYONE, and the yield
> rules work the same for bicycles as they do for cars
> jrw
> (had too many bicycles whip through stop signs without pausing, or
> assuming that cars ALWAYS must yield to bicycles at an intersection
> without stopping to look)
Agreed -- somewhat.
IMO, at intersections, bicyclists should either follow the laws for
pedestrians or for motor vehicles.
If they follow the rules for pedestrians, they should walk their bike at
the crosswalk, at the walk-light (if there is one).
If they follow the rules for cars, then wait for the green light (or stop
at the stop signs), signal any turns (I know the hand signals for left &
right) and obey any signs (no turn on red, etcetera).
More and more often the last year or two, I've been seeing bicyclists in
the Boston area blithely ignoring both sets of laws; pedalling non-stop
thru red lights, and that really annoys me.
Automobile drivers do have to be cautious around cyclists, but we're not
mind-readers. A little signalling and predictability help a great deal.
--
--------------> Elisabeth Anne Riba * l...@osmond-riba.org <--------------
Looking for work in the Boston area. Dynamic professional with over
10 years experience with software interface design, library science,
documentation and end-user support. See http://www.osmond-riba.org/lis
Nancy Lebovitz
And some rural settings add farm machinery to the mix.
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com 100 new slogans
I want to move to theory. Everything works in theory.
Jay Denebeim
Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>This rule doesn't make sense in any urban setting, where bikes, cars,
>pedestrians, wheelchairs, strollers, walkers, joggers, skateboards,
>roller skates, buses, railroad trains, and messenger bikes (a
>different species tp regular bikes) all _have_ to share the same
>roads, because, well, that's how you get places.
Strange, I seem to have heard of these things called 'sidewalks' where
the pedestrian sorts of things go. Perhaps I'm mistaken. Oh, and on
my planet 'railroad trains' go on 'railroads' not streets. Obviously,
I could just be confused or something, I'm rarely correct in my view
of the universe.
Priscilla Ballou
dene...@deepthot.org (Jay Denebeim) wrote:
> In article <3d56aaa1...@cnews.newsguy.com>,
> Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>
> >This rule doesn't make sense in any urban setting, where bikes, cars,
> >pedestrians, wheelchairs, strollers, walkers, joggers, skateboards,
> >roller skates, buses, railroad trains, and messenger bikes (a
> >different species tp regular bikes) all _have_ to share the same
> >roads, because, well, that's how you get places.
>
> Strange, I seem to have heard of these things called 'sidewalks' where
> the pedestrian sorts of things go. Perhaps I'm mistaken.
Sidewalks sometimes disappear, or are blocked. Plus pedestrians have to
cross streets, even if they don't walk them lengthwise.
> Oh, and on
> my planet 'railroad trains' go on 'railroads' not streets.
In Boston, trolleys run on streets in some places.
> Obviously,
> I could just be confused or something, I'm rarely correct in my view
> of the universe.
Priscilla
--
"Love is not something wonderful that you feel; it is something
difficult that you do." -- Elizabeth Goudge
Irina Rempt
> as a car driver I have actually hit a bicyclist whose
> trajectory I misjudged (he was not hurt, or his bike, because I was
> going about 2 miles an hour)
Latching on to this to rant a little.
In the Netherlands (I don't know where else, probably most places) if
two people are on the same road and one turns off the road and the
other one doesn't, the person going straight on has right of way. This
goes for cars, bicycles and even pedestrians.
Yesterday, I was riding my bike past a parking lot, and a woman in a car
overtook me and tried to turn into the parking lot, hitting my front
wheel. She opened the window and shouted "Can't you signal?" Me
(startled): "I don't need to signal, I'm going straight ahead." Her:
"Well, cars have right of way, you know." (abject nonsense; it used to
be that cars had right of way over bicycles on intersections, but never
in this situation, and anyway they changed it to right of way for
everybody coming from the right).
I forgot to take her number so she, or rather her insurance, can pay for
fixing my wheel which now has a noticeable bend in it; it gave me too
much of a fright for that.
Irina
--
Vesta veran, terna puran, farenin. http://www.valdyas.org/irina
Beghinnen can ick, volherden will' ick, volbringhen sal ick.
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
<r...@fiawol.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>On Sat, 10 Aug 2002 22:35:59 GMT, Kip Williams <ki...@cox.net> wrote:
>
>>Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote:
>>> Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a place
>>> for them. The existence of badly designed bike paths and bike lanes is
>>> not an excuse.
>>
>>There's a famous 1908 picture of my home town -- a wide panorama. I
>>used to see prints of it in offices, and there was a wall in the
>>bank that had it blown up about eight feet tall. It's possible to
>>study the picture minutely, and you can count dozens of bikes in it.
>>And no cars. Funny that they had all those roads, and no cars.
I don't know about your home town, but I thought that paved roads were
built for carriages. You know, the real kind with horses, not the
horseless ones.
>>Every driver's handbook in every one of the United States that I've
>>lived in have stated that bicycles are legal on most roads, the
>>exceptions being interstate highways, and entitled to the full legal
>>rights enjoyed by automobiles.
>
>Exactly so. Aguments to the contrary by car drivers basically boil
>down to 'might makes right'.
Exactly so to both of you, but that's exactly the problem with
cyclists on roads. In a crash between a cyclist and a car, it's not
the car that will get the short end of the stick. (Hm, I think I
mangled the phrase, but the Croatian equivalent is too strong at the
moment to think of the proper one.) So, yes, the might makes right. It
is fine for cyclists to insist on their right of way and right of use,
but it's dangerous. *Prudency* dictates you move your bicycle off the
road, away from all those maniacs behind the wheel. And my objection
to cyclists is that they give me another element to watch out for,
beside the aforementioned maniacs.
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
<l...@osmond-riba.org> wrote:
>IMO, at intersections, bicyclists should either follow the laws for
>pedestrians or for motor vehicles.
But they don't.
They go along the road, and then pass through the red light because
it's green for pedestrians.
David Dyer-Bennet
> Oh, I definately agree with this. I think all they'd need is a simple
> rule: If you can't keep up with the average speed on a particular
> road use a different road. This goes for slow people in cars, people
> in slow cars, and bicycleists.
So cars would be forbidden on all congested roads, because they can't
keep up with the bicycles?
(Sounds like a sinister plot to me.)
Ed Dravecky III
> Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
> > This rule doesn't make sense in any urban setting, where bikes,
> > cars, pedestrians, wheelchairs, strollers, walkers, joggers,
> > skateboards, roller skates, buses, railroad trains, and messenger
> > bikes (a different species tp regular bikes) all _have_ to share
> > the same roads, because, well, that's how you get places.
>
> Strange, I seem to have heard of these things called 'sidewalks'
> where the pedestrian sorts of things go. Perhaps I'm mistaken.
> Oh, and on my planet 'railroad trains' go on 'railroads' not
> streets. Obviously, I could just be confused or something, I'm
> rarely correct in my view of the universe.
I had to ponder this one a bit but realized that in downtown Dallas
and outlying areas that the light rail system has converted a few
streets so trains do share the roads with cars 'n such. The trolley
on McKinney in uptown also shares normal roadwys (with lots of nice
bumpy tracks to cross repeatedly). Then there are the conventional
railroad crossings that involve cars crossing tracks so the potential
for a train and your car sharing the same road are far better than
you imagine.
--
Ed Dravecky III - Addison, Texas
"The question of whether computers can think is like the question of
whether submarines can swim." --Edsger Wybe Dijkstra (1930-2002) RIP
Marilee J. Layman
>Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote:
>> Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a place
>> for them. The existence of badly designed bike paths and bike lanes is
>> not an excuse.
>
>There's a famous 1908 picture of my home town -- a wide panorama. I
>used to see prints of it in offices, and there was a wall in the
>bank that had it blown up about eight feet tall. It's possible to
>study the picture minutely, and you can count dozens of bikes in it.
>And no cars. Funny that they had all those roads, and no cars.
>
>Every driver's handbook in every one of the United States that I've
>lived in have stated that bicycles are legal on most roads, the
>exceptions being interstate highways, and entitled to the full legal
>rights enjoyed by automobiles.
*And* have to follow the same rules as automobiles. I saw a bicyclist
almost creamed yesterday at a four-way stop. When I pulled up to the
stopsign on the North side, there were already cars at the stopsigns
on the other three sides. The car on the South side started out at
the same time a bicyclist came up behind the car on the East and
without stopping behind the car, without stopping at the stopsign,
cycled right through the intersection. When I realized what was going
to happen, I honked and the East car slowed down to look around, and
that let the bicyclist through without getting hit, the idiot. He was
wearing a helmet, gloves, padded pants, the whole bit, so he should
know to follow the rules.
On the other hand, all the major Manassas stop light intersections
have now been equipped with cameras and are run by computers, so a
bicycle doesn't have to trip the magnetometer to get a green light.
(It's odd, at one intersection where people in the left turn lane
*always* got a left arrow, they may now get just the through green
because the computer has decided the left-turners will be able to
cross after the cars coming toward them thin out, and so far, the
computer's been right.)
And in more Manassas safety issues, the brick crosswalks in Old Town
(put in to remind cars and trucks to go slower) are going to get
little LED lights along the crosswalk facing oncoming traffic.
They'll either be activated by people stepping on the crosswalk, or by
the pedestrian pushing a button. There's only one stoplight in Old
Town and people do want to cross at other blocks and cars and trucks
tend to go right on over the crosswalks even if someone is standing in
them.
--
Marilee J. Layman
Bali Sterling Beads at Wholesale
http://www.basicbali.com
Marilee J. Layman
wrote:
>In article <3d56aaa1...@cnews.newsguy.com>,
>Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>
>>This rule doesn't make sense in any urban setting, where bikes, cars,
>>pedestrians, wheelchairs, strollers, walkers, joggers, skateboards,
>>roller skates, buses, railroad trains, and messenger bikes (a
>>different species tp regular bikes) all _have_ to share the same
>>roads, because, well, that's how you get places.
>
>Strange, I seem to have heard of these things called 'sidewalks' where
>the pedestrian sorts of things go. Perhaps I'm mistaken. Oh, and on
>my planet 'railroad trains' go on 'railroads' not streets. Obviously,
>I could just be confused or something, I'm rarely correct in my view
>of the universe.
There are places where light rail is on the streets, Baltimore, for
example.
Kip Williams
In Newport News, Virginia (hey, that's here!), there are designated
bike routes, consisting of occasional signs posted laughingly by the
narrowest roads with the deepest ditches 12 inches from the roadway.
Kip Williams
> On Sun, 11 Aug 2002 14:06:33 +0100, Rob Hansen
> <r...@fiawol.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>
>>On Sat, 10 Aug 2002 22:35:59 GMT, Kip Williams <ki...@cox.net> wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote:
>>>
>>>>Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a place
>>>>for them. The existence of badly designed bike paths and bike lanes is
>>>>not an excuse.
>>>
>>>There's a famous 1908 picture of my home town -- a wide panorama. I
>>>used to see prints of it in offices, and there was a wall in the
>>>bank that had it blown up about eight feet tall. It's possible to
>>>study the picture minutely, and you can count dozens of bikes in it.
>>>And no cars. Funny that they had all those roads, and no cars.
>>
>
> I don't know about your home town, but I thought that paved roads were
> built for carriages. You know, the real kind with horses, not the
> horseless ones.
I don't think horses prefer being on pavement, either barefooted or
with iron shoes, and carriages with wood and/or metal tires don't
benefit much from paved roads, either.
>>>Every driver's handbook in every one of the United States that I've
>>>lived in have stated that bicycles are legal on most roads, the
>>>exceptions being interstate highways, and entitled to the full legal
>>>rights enjoyed by automobiles.
>>
>>Exactly so. Aguments to the contrary by car drivers basically boil
>>down to 'might makes right'.
>
> Exactly so to both of you, but that's exactly the problem with
> cyclists on roads. In a crash between a cyclist and a car, it's not
> the car that will get the short end of the stick. (Hm, I think I
> mangled the phrase, but the Croatian equivalent is too strong at the
> moment to think of the proper one.) So, yes, the might makes right. It
> is fine for cyclists to insist on their right of way and right of use,
> but it's dangerous. *Prudency* dictates you move your bicycle off the
> road, away from all those maniacs behind the wheel. And my objection
> to cyclists is that they give me another element to watch out for,
> beside the aforementioned maniacs.
Well, I saw a bad driver the other day, so I think all cars should
be abolished too.
Elisabeth Riba
> <l...@osmond-riba.org> wrote:
>>IMO, at intersections, bicyclists should either follow the laws for
>>pedestrians or for motor vehicles.
> But they don't.
My point is that they *SHOULD*
> They go along the road, and then pass through the red light because
> it's green for pedestrians.
Um... where? Generally, when a particular direction is red for cars, then
it's also red for pedestrians, *except* at intersections that have
four-way-stop, all-pedestrians-go lighting.
Kip Williams
> On Sat, 10 Aug 2002 22:35:59 GMT, Kip Williams <ki...@cox.net> wrote:
>
>
>>Vlatko Juric-Kokic wrote:
>>
>>>Cyclists are an equivalent of pedestrians on roads. It's *not* a place
>>>for them. The existence of badly designed bike paths and bike lanes is
>>>not an excuse.
>>
>>There's a famous 1908 picture of my home town -- a wide panorama. I
>>used to see prints of it in offices, and there was a wall in the
>>bank that had it blown up about eight feet tall. It's possible to
>>study the picture minutely, and you can count dozens of bikes in it.
>>And no cars. Funny that they had all those roads, and no cars.
>>
>>Every driver's handbook in every one of the United States that I've
>>lived in have stated that bicycles are legal on most roads, the
>>exceptions being interstate highways, and entitled to the full legal
>>rights enjoyed by automobiles.
>
> *And* have to follow the same rules as automobiles.
No, I think they should all drive like irresponsible, life-risking
idiots, of course. None of this shilly-shallying around, by gum.
They should have so many special privileges that I might even get
out and ride more than once or twice a year.
Priscilla Ballou
> > Did you see the article in the Phoenix about that?
> > (http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/top/features/documents/02
> > 379848.htm).
> > Unfortunately, it doesn't have a picture of the complete configuration
> > of the bike lane in Central Square, which looks utterly insane to me.
> > I'm just amazed that the first death there happened on the straight
> > part of the lane, rather than the part that twists through the traffic
> > lanes at the intersection of Mass. Ave. and Prospect St. (This is an
> > intersection that's so constantly full of cars that left turns are
> > forbidden
> > at all times.)
Back in the mid 80s, when there was an enormous amount of construction
going on in that intersection, a friend of mine wiped out on her bicycle
because her tire got caught between two of those metal plates they put
down on the street. She slid across the pavement in front of trucks and
buses and ended up in the gutter with a broken collarbone and dislocated
shoulder. Her bones didn't get fully fixed until a couple of years and
a body cast later.
Lucy Kemnitzer
<e...@panix.com> wrote:
>Jay Denebeim <dene...@deepthot.org> wrote:
>> Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>> > This rule doesn't make sense in any urban setting, where bikes,
>> > cars, pedestrians, wheelchairs, strollers, walkers, joggers,
>> > skateboards, roller skates, buses, railroad trains, and messenger
>> > bikes (a different species tp regular bikes) all _have_ to share
>> > the same roads, because, well, that's how you get places.
>>
>> Strange, I seem to have heard of these things called 'sidewalks'
>> where the pedestrian sorts of things go. Perhaps I'm mistaken.
>> Oh, and on my planet 'railroad trains' go on 'railroads' not
>> streets. Obviously, I could just be confused or something, I'm
>> rarely correct in my view of the universe.
>
>I had to ponder this one a bit but realized that in downtown Dallas
>and outlying areas that the light rail system has converted a few
>streets so trains do share the roads with cars 'n such. The trolley
>on McKinney in uptown also shares normal roadwys (with lots of nice
>bumpy tracks to cross repeatedly). Then there are the conventional
>railroad crossings that involve cars crossing tracks so the potential
>for a train and your car sharing the same road are far better than
>you imagine.
>
>
In my town there are several streets with railroad tracks running
right down the middle of them. We don't have streetcars or Light
Rail, but in the nearby cities that do have them, they frequently go
right down the middle of them.
Many streets don't have sidewalks, and all of them must be crossed now
and then.
And lastly, thanks to Nancy for remembering the farm vehicles -- where
I go to work, I often have to share the road with tractors and things.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Vicki Rosenzweig
2002 23:26:16 +0200:
Shall we remove the private cars from roads because they're not safe
sharing them with buses and tractor-trailers, then?
--
Vicki Rosenzweig | v...@redbird.org
r.a.sf.f faq at http://www.redbird.org/rassef-faq.html
Vicki Rosenzweig
>In article <3d56aaa1...@cnews.newsguy.com>,
>Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>
>>This rule doesn't make sense in any urban setting, where bikes, cars,
>>pedestrians, wheelchairs, strollers, walkers, joggers, skateboards,
>>roller skates, buses, railroad trains, and messenger bikes (a
>>different species tp regular bikes) all _have_ to share the same
>>roads, because, well, that's how you get places.
>
>Strange, I seem to have heard of these things called 'sidewalks' where
>the pedestrian sorts of things go.
Sure, but do you have separate sidewalks for the joggers, the
wheelchairs, and the people pushing strollers? And where do you put
the people who are commuting on inline skates? (Around here, they
mostly use the streets--they're moving a lot faster than anyone who
belongs on the sidewalks.)
Avram Grumer
Vicki Rosenzweig <v...@redbird.org> wrote:
That line of argument reminds me of the desire of some (mostly
commercial) interests for redesigning the Internet to priveledge certain
kinds of packets. Contrast with the current design, where the 'Net
itself doesn't much care what kind of traffic flows over it, and
programmers are free to design all sorts of new protocols confident that
TCP/IP will handle the traffic as well as anything else.
--
Avram Grumer / "There will never be
av...@grumer.org / a technology that beats
www.PigsAndFishes.org / having lunch..."
www.livejournal.com/users/agrumer/ -- Jakob Nielsen
Kevin J. Maroney
wrote:
>Around these parts, every inch of paved road was paid for by
>property owners and motorists. This amounts to more than a
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^
Category one Category two
>million miles of pavement.
>
>_None_ of it was paid for by cyclists unless they also fell into
>one of the other categories. And, what is more, I believe you'll
>find that is true most places.
I suspect you will find that the percentage of cyclists who are
property owners is pretty comparable to the percentage of property
owners who are motorists. For that matter, everyone who pays rent pays
property taxes. And most cyclists are also motorists.
So I'm not sure what your point is. Is it that cyclists pay for roads?
Somehow, I don't think so, but it's clearly true.
--
Kevin J. Maroney | k...@panix.com
Games are my entire waking life.
Lucy Kemnitzer
wrote:
>On Sun, 11 Aug 2002 14:06:33 +0100, Rob Hansen
><r...@fiawol.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>>Every driver's handbook in every one of the United States that I've
>>>lived in have stated that bicycles are legal on most roads, the
>>>exceptions being interstate highways, and entitled to the full legal
>>>rights enjoyed by automobiles.
>>
>>Exactly so. Aguments to the contrary by car drivers basically boil
>>down to 'might makes right'.
>
>It's more like a case of "right....dead right." I bike sometimes
>myself, so I'm on both sides of this matter. I avoid trying to share
>the road with autos.
How is this possible if you're going to actual places? Do you have
subterranean or elevated bicycle paths in your town?
Lucy Kemnitzer
Chris Clayton
Rob Hansen wrote:
> Lucy Kemnitzer wrote:
> > Ken MacLeod wrote:
> >
> >>Neil Belsky writes
> >>>Ken MacLeod wrote...
> >>>>
> >>[about Crete]
> >>>
> >>>I must ask, was everyone there smiling?
> >>
> >>Please explain.
> >
> >I think "smiling cretin" is a set phrase, like "grinning idiot."
>
> This is a pronunciation thing again, isn't it? Over here, 'cretin' and
> 'Cretan' are *not* homonyms.
I'm almost certain that this is a reference to "A Funny Thing
Happened on the Way to the Forum". Sudalus trys to keep a slave
girl, born on Crete, from being claimed by her new master. He
invents a plague ravaging Crete. Someone says that they've just
returned from Crete, and everyone was happy and smiling. Sudalus
says, yes, it's the Smiling Plague. Folks walk around, smiling,
until they die horribly.
--
Chris "Unless it isn't, of course" Clayton
cla...@di.org
Jay Denebeim
David Dyer-Bennet <dd...@dd-b.net> wrote:
>dene...@deepthot.org (Jay Denebeim) writes:
>
>> Oh, I definately agree with this. I think all they'd need is a simple
>> rule: If you can't keep up with the average speed on a particular
>> road use a different road. This goes for slow people in cars, people
>> in slow cars, and bicycleists.
>
>So cars would be forbidden on all congested roads, because they can't
>keep up with the bicycles?
You mean the bicycles would be leaving the traffic lane and cutting
around the other traffic? I can't imagine this would be tolerated,
isn't that illegal?
Thomas Womack
Jay Denebeim <dene...@deepthot.org> wrote:
> You mean the bicycles would be leaving the traffic lane and cutting
> around the other traffic? I can't imagine this would be tolerated,
> isn't that illegal?
Cars don't drive all the way up to the edges of the pavement; cycles
can. So, given a long queue of stationary traffic, you can usually
safely cycle all the way to the front, on the _inside_ of all the
cars. It's part of what makes commuting by bicycle so efficient; you
stop at red lights, but you're always #1 in the queue to leave them.
If traffic is moving, the traffic lanes are wide enough to stick
cycles one-abreast on the inside of all the cars in any case; once
again, no problem.
Tom
Kris Hasson-Jones
>
> In article <aj8pl7$2ar$2...@dent.deepthot.org>,
> Jay Denebeim <dene...@deepthot.org> wrote:
>
> > You mean the bicycles would be leaving the traffic lane and cutting
> > around the other traffic? I can't imagine this would be tolerated,
> > isn't that illegal?
>
> Cars don't drive all the way up to the edges of the
> pavement; cycles can. So, given a long queue of
> stationary traffic, you can usually safely cycle all
> the way to the front, on the _inside_ of all the cars.
> It's part of what makes commuting by bicycle so
> efficient; you stop at red lights, but you're always
> #1 in the queue to leave them.
So true, and yet, this is a violation of the law in this
state (Oregon). Bikes are supposed to act like cars (where there
are no bike lanes), including keeping behind the vehicle in
front of you. This behavior of some bicyclists annoys me
no end when I'm driving. Bikes that were formerly safely
behind me can suddenly appear next to my car, making it
harder to turn safely.
> If traffic is moving, the traffic lanes are wide enough to stick
> cycles one-abreast on the inside of all the cars in any case; once
> again, no problem.
Again, a violation of law in this state.
--
Kris Hasson-Jones sni...@pacifier.com
David Dyer-Bennet
> In article <m2n0rtk...@gw.dd-b.net>,
> David Dyer-Bennet <dd...@dd-b.net> wrote:
> >dene...@deepthot.org (Jay Denebeim) writes:
> >
> >> Oh, I definately agree with this. I think all they'd need is a simple
> >> rule: If you can't keep up with the average speed on a particular
> >> road use a different road. This goes for slow people in cars, people
> >> in slow cars, and bicycleists.
> >
> >So cars would be forbidden on all congested roads, because they can't
> >keep up with the bicycles?
>
> You mean the bicycles would be leaving the traffic lane and cutting
> around the other traffic? I can't imagine this would be tolerated,
> isn't that illegal?
Varies by state. Riding between lanes is widely practiced, and
sometimes legal. It is, in fact, the basis for any argument for
bicycles as commuting vehicles (not that they're practical in most of
the US anyway).
David Bilek
>dene...@deepthot.org (Jay Denebeim) writes:
>
>> In article <m2n0rtk...@gw.dd-b.net>,
>> David Dyer-Bennet <dd...@dd-b.net> wrote:
>> >dene...@deepthot.org (Jay Denebeim) writes:
>> >
>> >> Oh, I definately agree with this. I think all they'd need is a simple
>> >> rule: If you can't keep up with the average speed on a particular
>> >> road use a different road. This goes for slow people in cars, people
>> >> in slow cars, and bicycleists.
>> >
>> >So cars would be forbidden on all congested roads, because they can't
>> >keep up with the bicycles?
>>
>> You mean the bicycles would be leaving the traffic lane and cutting
>> around the other traffic? I can't imagine this would be tolerated,
>> isn't that illegal?
>
>Varies by state. Riding between lanes is widely practiced, and
>sometimes legal. It is, in fact, the basis for any argument for
>bicycles as commuting vehicles (not that they're practical in most of
>the US anyway).
Hell, in California it's legal for *motorcycles* to split lanes.
-David
David Dyer-Bennet
> Thomas Womack wrote:
> >
> > In article <aj8pl7$2ar$2...@dent.deepthot.org>,
> > Jay Denebeim <dene...@deepthot.org> wrote:
> >
> > > You mean the bicycles would be leaving the traffic lane and cutting
> > > around the other traffic? I can't imagine this would be tolerated,
> > > isn't that illegal?
> >
> > Cars don't drive all the way up to the edges of the
> > pavement; cycles can. So, given a long queue of
> > stationary traffic, you can usually safely cycle all
> > the way to the front, on the _inside_ of all the cars.
> > It's part of what makes commuting by bicycle so
> > efficient; you stop at red lights, but you're always
> > #1 in the queue to leave them.
>
> So true, and yet, this is a violation of the law in this
> state (Oregon). Bikes are supposed to act like cars (where there
> are no bike lanes), including keeping behind the vehicle in
> front of you. This behavior of some bicyclists annoys me
> no end when I'm driving. Bikes that were formerly safely
> behind me can suddenly appear next to my car, making it
> harder to turn safely.
Just how explicit is the law about this? In Minnesota, cars are
expected to sort themselves into reasonable lanes even if there are no
markings. This behavior of bicyclists is just sorting into reasonable
lanes based on the width of the vehicles (at least that's one view).
So "behaving just like a car" may actually mandate this behavior.
(License examiners will take points off, sometimes enough to fail you,
for making lanechanges without signalling on stretches of road not
marked with lanes, for example.)
Michael J. Lowrey
>
> Vicki Rosenzweig <v...@redbird.org> wrote:
> >I have a strong feeling that "White Trailer Trash" is right up there
> >with "Spic" as a name for an ethnic group. And that the distinction
> >you're looking for might be "non-Hispanic white" (in the best census
> >form terminology) or "white Protestant."
>
> Snort. I claim relationship to such sorts as full liberty to make
> said derisive comments (and yes, my family is about half and half
> white trailer trash, more specifically one branch which aggressively
> and proudly embraces the concept).
>
> Since when is it not politically correct to make fun of one's own kin?
Yew ain't the only bubba/cracker/"poor white"/redneck on
this list, Joyce.
One of my little sisters was a grandma by the time she was
28. OTOH, she also just got her LPN license, in her early
40s, after being told she was too ignorant to go back to
school.
--
Michael J. Lowrey
proud of that gal
David G. Bell
<QUn*lU...@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>
two...@chiark.greenend.org.uk "Thomas Womack" wrote:
There's getting to be quite a few places, locally, where there are short
stretches of marked cycle-lane at junctions which clearly have the
purpose of letting bikes sneak up to the lights.
There's also some downright suicidal stretches, just big enough to let a
cyclist get onto the actual road and give them legal protection as they
get run down.
--
David G. Bell -- SF Fan, Filker, and Punslinger.
"Let me get this straight. You're the KGB's core AI, but you're afraid
of a copyright infringement lawsuit over your translator semiotics?"
From "Lobsters" by Charles Stross.
Elisabeth Riba
> Just how explicit is the law about this? In Minnesota, cars are
> expected to sort themselves into reasonable lanes even if there are no
> markings.
On the other hand, when I took a business trip to St. Paul, I was
incredibly impressed that the on-ramps to the freeway had two lanes and
lights forcing them to alternate into traffic at a steady pace that didn't
overwhelm the highway.
I honestly wished that I could've grabbed my camera in time to snap a few
photos of it for the folks back in Massachusetts.
Kris Hasson-Jones
>
> Kris Hasson-Jones <sni...@pacifier.com> writes:
>
> > Thomas Womack wrote:
> > > So, given a long queue of
> > > stationary traffic, you can usually safely cycle all
> > > the way to the front, on the _inside_ of all the cars.
> > > It's part of what makes commuting by bicycle so
> > > efficient; you stop at red lights, but you're always
> > > #1 in the queue to leave them.
This is what makes a lot of car drivers extremely angry, too.
Getting ahead of your place in line is quite rude in my
opinion, especially when doing so often prevents the person
at the head of the line from making a turn (until all the
bikes who were behind him, but have cheated their way up
to his position, have gone through the intersection).
> > So true, and yet, this is a violation of the law in this
> > state (Oregon). Bikes are supposed to act like cars (where there
> > are no bike lanes), including keeping behind the vehicle in
> > front of you. This behavior of some bicyclists annoys me
> > no end when I'm driving. Bikes that were formerly safely
> > behind me can suddenly appear next to my car, making it
> > harder to turn safely.
>
> Just how explicit is the law about this?
If there are marked lanes, the bicycle (like a car) must fall
into single file in one of the lanes, behind the traffic
that is ahead of it. If there are no marked lanes, the
traffic is assumed to be one lane in each direction, and
again the bicycle is supposed to fall into the single
file in order of arrival. In other words, taking advantage
of the narrow profile of a bike to scoot around the cars
that arrived at a particular spot ahead of you is illegal,
unless there is an empty lane that a car could use to do
the same thing.
The one difference marked out in the law is that bikes may
travel two at a time, side by side in one lane provided
they are not impeding traffic flow (by reason of being
slower than the traffic currently flowing).
> (License examiners will take points off, sometimes enough
> to fail you, for making lanechanges without signalling
> on stretches of road not marked with lanes, for example.)
The only roads I've ever driven on in Oregon that do not
have marked lanes are narrow enough that it is obvious that
they are one lane in each direction. (For example, the street
outside my house has parking on both sides of the street and
just enough room for two cars to pass in the remaining void.)
--
Kris Hasson-Jones sni...@pacifier.com
Kris Hasson-Jones
>
> David Dyer-Bennet <dd...@dd-b.net> wrote:
> > Just how explicit is the law about this? In Minnesota, cars are
> > expected to sort themselves into reasonable lanes even if there are no
> > markings.
>
> On the other hand, when I took a business trip to St. Paul,
> I was incredibly impressed that the on-ramps to the freeway
> had two lanes and lights forcing them to alternate into
> traffic at a steady pace that didn't overwhelm the highway.
That's standard in the Portland metro area; has been for at
least 5 years, probably longer.
--
Kris Hasson-Jones sni...@pacifier.com
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
<l...@osmond-riba.org> wrote:
>> They go along the road, and then pass through the red light because
>> it's green for pedestrians.
>
>Um... where? Generally, when a particular direction is red for cars, then
>it's also red for pedestrians, *except* at intersections that have
>four-way-stop, all-pedestrians-go lighting.
If I have a green light along a east-west street, it's also a green
light for pedestrians who cross the intersecting north-south street.
vlatko
--
_Neither Fish Nor Fowl_
http://www.webart.hr/nrnm/eng/
http://www.michaelswanwick.com/
vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
>*Prudency* dictates you move your bicycle off the
>> road, away from all those maniacs behind the wheel. And my objection
>> to cyclists is that they give me another element to watch out for,
>> beside the aforementioned maniacs.
>
>Well, I saw a bad driver the other day, so I think all cars should
>be abolished too.
It would be nice if there was just one. :-)
What I'm clearly _not_ getting across is that I'm concerned for the
safety of cyclists. Yes, I get irritated with them sometimes, but
still, they* will get hurt, not me, if I make a mistake.
The way I see it, when walking, I don't try to _enforce_ my right of
way with trucks and buses on intersections, so why should cyclists try
to enforce their way with cars. For instance, Irina definitely had
right of way over the car**, but look what happened.
BTW, Vicki, a car is not nearly as helpless and powerless in
comparison with buses and 18-wheelers as a cyclist is in comparison
with a car.
* I cycle sometimes, and always keep off the road.
** At least according to Croatian laws.
Kip Williams
> In article <m2n0rtk...@gw.dd-b.net>,
> David Dyer-Bennet <dd...@dd-b.net> wrote:
>
>>dene...@deepthot.org (Jay Denebeim) writes:
>>
>>
>>>Oh, I definately agree with this. I think all they'd need is a simple
>>>rule: If you can't keep up with the average speed on a particular
>>>road use a different road. This goes for slow people in cars, people
>>>in slow cars, and bicycleists.
>>
>>So cars would be forbidden on all congested roads, because they can't
>>keep up with the bicycles?
>
>
> You mean the bicycles would be leaving the traffic lane and cutting
> around the other traffic? I can't imagine this would be tolerated,
> isn't that illegal?
Doesn't matter. If they forbid cars on congested roads, they won't
be congested any more, so they'll allow cars back on, but then
they'll be congested, so they'll forbid cars, and if they forbid
cars on congested roads, they won't be congested any more, so
they'll allow cars back on, but then they'll be congested, so
they'll forbid cars, and if they forbid cars on congested roads,
they won't be congested any more, so they'll allow cars back on, but
then they'll be congested, so they'll forbid cars, and if they
forbid cars on congested roads, they won't be congested any more, so
they'll allow cars back on, but then they'll be congested, so
they'll forbid cars, and if
NO CARRIER
Kip Williams
> On Mon, 12 Aug 2002 00:25:24 GMT, Kip Williams <ki...@cox.net> wrote:
>
>
>>*Prudency* dictates you move your bicycle off the
>>
>>>road, away from all those maniacs behind the wheel. And my objection
>>>to cyclists is that they give me another element to watch out for,
>>>beside the aforementioned maniacs.
>>
>>Well, I saw a bad driver the other day, so I think all cars should
>>be abolished too.
>
>
> It would be nice if there was just one. :-)
Point is that you're sentencing all bicyclists for the crimes of a
few bicyclists and a lot of motorists.
> What I'm clearly _not_ getting across is that I'm concerned for the
> safety of cyclists. Yes, I get irritated with them sometimes, but
> still, they* will get hurt, not me, if I make a mistake.
And with that in their pocket, motorists keep on endangering
bicyclists and cursing them, because might makes right. Hit a bike,
and it's the crazy bicyclist's fault. Probably asking for it by
wearing that provocative reflective clothing.
I'd as soon be judged on the basis of what I do, not what I am. If I
drive badly, judge me by that -- don't throw all cars away because
someone else is a bad driver. If I'm a bad bike rider, judge me by
that -- not by that crazy guy in the shiny pants who raced by your
car while you were starting up at the light. If I'm a stupid
pedestrian, judge me by what I actually did, not by what some other
pedestrian in some other time and place did.
It seems to me any time anyone starts generalizing about "all
members of class X -- except maybe YOU fine people," it's time to
downshift, because there's steep going ahead.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Well, and I think there's a really important principle about sharing
the road that gets lost here.
Everybody makes mistakes sometimes. And every machine fails
sometimes. And you never know if the person who just cut that corner
too short, or passed you in your blind spot, or failed to stop
properly, or whatever, is usually rule-abiding, careful, perceptive,
and smart. It really doesn't matter, naturally: the other people just
have to take up the slack when somebody blows it, just like they have
to take up the slack when somebody's brakes fail (as happened to me
once: I am alive today because a freeway full of drivers reacted well
when my brakes failed and I spun out) or when a bomb goes off or a
tornado hits.
It's no good saying the roads would be better if there were only one
kind of traveller on them, because that's never going to be the case.
Lucy Kemnitzer
David Dyer-Bennet
> David Dyer-Bennet <dd...@dd-b.net> wrote:
> > Just how explicit is the law about this? In Minnesota, cars are
> > expected to sort themselves into reasonable lanes even if there are no
> > markings.
>
> On the other hand, when I took a business trip to St. Paul, I was
> incredibly impressed that the on-ramps to the freeway had two lanes and
> lights forcing them to alternate into traffic at a steady pace that didn't
> overwhelm the highway.
Boy, you should here suburbanites here bitch about those! It's the
bypass lane for buses and carpools that *really* torques them, I'm
sure, though mostly they don't admit it.