Re: Do we belong on bike paths?

If your trike is too wide to be on a bike path, then you just answered your
own question.  My trikes, and many others are little wider than many MTB and
cruiser bars.  Mine go through 32" doorways.  There are bike paths, lanes
and rail trails.  Up here, we call them what they are, and don't slap a name
on something when there is a proper name for it.  There are always tons of
sheeple meandering all over sidewalks, bike paths, bike lanes, rail trails
and multi-use paths.  Walkers, joggers, bladers and other bike riders -
usually all oblivious to pretty much the entire universe, especially the
ones with music jammed in their ears.  I ring, shout, use the air horn, and
if they're still clued out, they'll wake up when they're passed - or not.
I've seen it on a daily basis as a problem for more than just 2 and three
wheelers of the bent variety.  While I've never hit anyone, there have been
those that have been sufficiently startled, and as I see many of them
regularly, they have learned the lesson.  I've also seen other non-cyclists
get hit by more aggressive DFers, and while that is not my style to mow
pedestrians (no matter how inconsiderate) down, I don't feel sorry for the
pedestrian.  Maybe it "knocked some sense into them" as the old addage goes.
There are idiots doing all kinds of stupid things anywhere you/I ride.  On a
day when I cross few or none, it's a great day.  When I do come across them,
I don't let it bother me because it's quite likely something I can't change.
I'm riding, not issuing life lessons.

> I don't want to sound like a heretic, but I wonder if trikes belong on
bike paths at all. And whether the term"bike path" isn't a misnomer anyway.
It is often used interchangeably with rail trail, isn't it? My beloved GTO
is 36 inches wide; my DFs, only 18. But even that understates the
difference, because you can use body English on a DF to weave around an
obstacle or walker when passing on a narrow path, something you can't do on
a trike. I read somewhere that the minimum width of a one-way "bike path" is
6 feet; two-way width is 10, but often is only 8. But walkers often walk
2-abreast, and even if they anticipate being passed by an 18" wide bike, the
idea of being passed by a trike probably never enters their minds.
Therefore, they won't be thinking that they must allow all that much room on
the path for a trike.
>
> So the very thing that protects us on the roads from cars overtaking us
[the novelty of seeing these unusual contraptions] puts walkers in danger,
because they don't have eyes in back of their heads.
>
> So I'll just keep riding the roads, and leave the paths to more
"narrow"-minded cyclists.
>
> Jules.



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