Category: “Mount Vernon Trail”

Looking Backward 2012

In a lot of ways, 2012 was a very difficult year. My mother passed away of old age, my wife worked hard to recover from being hit by a car in 2011 only to have to endure cancer surgery, radiation treatments and a long slow recovery that is still ongoing. My son cut his leg open in an accident at work. Somehow the lightning bolts missed a direct hit on me.

Exercise is my coping mechanism. When I don’t ride (or, in the past, run) stress wears on me. It’s probably a blessing (and no coincidence) that I cranked out 7,350 miles in 2012.

Where did I go? What did I see? Who did I meet? Here’s a list:

Bike Commuting: With my daughter driving herself to school and limited school functions to deal with, I rode to work, a lot. 162 times, in fact, I figure that I did somewhere near 4,800 miles just getting to and from the office. I saved around $650 in gas. Other than family commitments, I missed only a handful of opportunities to ride.

Odometers Gone Wild: The odometers on my bikes are getting insane. I broke 32,000 miles on The Mule and 31,000 on Big Nellie. I am almost at 9,000 miles on Little Nellie. That $650 in gas savings will go toward lots of bike maintenance this winter. I do tires and brakes. I’ll leave the new drive trains for the pros.

Bike Crashes and Calamities: During the late winter, I was running errands on my bike in a fierce wind. I put my head down and, in an amazing act of stupidity, I proceeded to ride The Mule into the back of a parked car. A few weeks later I lost control of Big Nellie on a slick section of bike path and wrenched the heck out of my right knee. (I still have a big red welt just below my knee cap.) I was nearly run over three times by red light runners while riding through the Rosslyn Circle of Doom. In separate incidents, I broke the chain and had the rear tire blow out on Big Nellie. I bent the derailleur hanger on Little Nellie. I also had the usual array of flat tires but that’s pretty much it. All things considered, not a bad year.

Friday Coffee Club:  Ed is an espresso junkie. He and his stoker/spouse Mary started going to Swings coffee house near the White House on Fridays before work and invited others to join them. Word of mouth and Twitter took it from there. I started going and was welcomed into a motley crew of cycling ne’er do wells comprising journalists, economists, lawyers, graphic artists, librarians, university administrators, students, bike sellers, police officers, bike advocates, Segway tour guides turned bike rack installers, and policy wonks. We even have a naval meteorologist. We are still looking for some arc welders and lobstermen to join. Long story short, it gets my ass moving on Friday mornings, the people are impossibly nice, and the conversation is always interesting.

Rides with Friends: About 15 years ago I hired a guy to paint the house. About two years later, the paint was peeling off. I thought, “I can do better.” Over the course of the next decade I did two laps around the house. And the paint is still peeling off. Fuggit. Riding on the weekends is infinitely more enjoyable than futile house painting. Suffice it to say, my next expensive bike-related purchase will be a vinyl siding job.

So you might ask, “Where did you ride when you should have been doing something productive around the house?” Here’s a list:

  • The Utilitaire of Ignominy: The Utilitaire Challenge was the brainchild of Mary the Mad Randonista. As a willing participant, I rode trips to the store, the barbershop, the car dealer, the dry cleaner, and, as mentioned above, into the back of a parked car. Fail.
  • The Quest for Blueberry Soup: Every March WABA and the Swedish embassy collaborate on a ride that culminates in a cup of warm blueberry soup. My name is Rootchopper and I’m a soupaholic. I did a little over 30 cold miles and had 2 cups of hot soup.
  • Default Day:  Most people call it Bike to Work Day. I feel a bit like W.C. Fields on New Years Eve. Still, it was nice to see all the newbies out on the trails and roads. As a bonus, I ran into Ed, Mary, and Laura (and her buddies) at the Rosslyn pit stop.
  • Bike DC: There is something about this event that is always FUBAR. This year was no exception. I wasn’t expecting much and I got what I was expecting.
  • The Hoppy 100: Friday Coffee Clubber and craft beer lover John Roche designed a route that would traverse 100+ miles of hill and dale, a ride on a cable ferry across the Potomac, and some snorkeling through torrential rains all for a few cold glasses of craft beer. The man is brilliant. Kevin, Chris, Crystal and Lisa, Coffee Clubbers all, joined in for the day-long festivities.
  • The Indian Head 100: I did this metric century alone and it made me realize that it’s not the rides you do, it’s who you do the rides with that makes them memorable. Still, the route is an interesting one and it’s the closest rural ride to my house.
  • The 50 States Ride: I used to have a love hate relationship with this ride. I’ve grown to love it. It’s hard, but, what can I say, I am a sucker for a gimmick. There’s no better way to understand the place you live than to ride it on a bike.  This ride proves it. And, as usual, the company was excellent.
  • The Backroads Century: This was a tough one. This metric century is my favorite ride around these parts. Unfortunately it was the day after the 50 States and the 5 a.m. wake up call didn’t help. After some logistical snafus, I ended up riding with Lisa from the Coffee Club, her friend Jane and their hubbies.
  • The Tour Du Port: This is Baltimore’s intracity bike ride. I planned on doing it solo but, thanks to the SharrowsDC pin I bought from Coffee Clubber Brian, I was id’ed by Bec and Alex, two DC-based cyclists. We rode together for most of the ride, got lost, and experienced lots of underfunded bicycle infrastructure.
  • The Great Pumpkin Ride: Another early morning wake up for a ride in the exurbs. I met Veronique, an old friend who works at a bakery in Warrenton, then rode 70+ miles of the Virginia Piedmont alone. It was quite a slog, but the late autumn scenery was so pretty. After the ride I met up with Friday Coffee Clubbers Rachel and Kate, and their friend Katie Ann for vittles and grog. Suffice it to say, I enjoyed the after party as much as the ride.
  • The Coffeenuering Challenge: Not content to nearly get me killed with her Utilitaire Challenge, Mary the Mad Randonista drew up another cycling contest. I managed to survive this one intact by riding to eight coffee shops for coffee and cookies and one kick ass muffin.
  • Hubs and Pubs – DC has recently given birth to three microbreweries. My friend Crystal decided to organize a social ride that connected three of the breweries. Although I only made it to one of the breweries, it was fun to ride to DC and see areas of the NE quadrant of the city that I had never seen before. Oh, and the beer was tasty, too.
  • Chocoride – Beer isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, so to speak. So Crystal and Lisa put together a ride within DC that rode from one hot cocoa place to another. The ride took place on December 30 nearly guaranteeing cold temperatures would lead to warm liquid refreshment. It was a blast, and so was the wind. This was my fourth ride of the year with Lisa, so she wins the Rootchopper Sidekick Award for 2012. He prize is she gets to call me Kemosabe for all of 2013.

The Woodrow Wilson Bollard Farm: Bike commuters and other users of the Mount Vernon Trail endured one dangerous detour after another during the rehabilitation of Jones Point Park and the MVT underneath the Woodrow Wilson Bridge. As the project was about to be completed, it became obvious to frequent users of the trail that the final result was an incredibly dangerous design featuring an obstacle course of poorly placed black bollards, sharp turns, and high curbs. After much bitching, local advocacy groups stepped up and got some very useful last-minute modifications made. Thanks to Mark Blacknell and Shane Farthing of WABA and Jonathan Krall and the other folks at the Alexandria Bike/Ped Advisory Committee for their efforts. Ironically, the rest of the project turned out to be pretty darned awesome.  

Car Hell: I spent a week driving my daughter among six colleges in the Los Angeles area. I have seen hell on earth and it is Los Angeles. Over 30 years ago, I spent a week in Davis CA. Even back then, Davis had bike infrastructure out the wazoo. I am very happy to see DC and Arlington making major strides to support the use of bikes as transportation with bike sharing, cycle tracks, bike lanes, and, most importantly, an evolving attitude.

Be Careful Out There: One of the most experienced bike commuters/riders I know, Charmaine, was run over by a pickup truck while riding to work. If it can happen to her, it can happen to anybody. Here’s wishing Charmaine a speedy and complete recovery in the new year. As for the rest of you, may the odds be ever in your favor.

I thought about including links to all these events in the blog but ran out of gas. It was a busy year.  You can find posts about all these things in the list on the right. Or if you’d rather look at some pix, check out the bike-related sets on my Flickr page.

See you in 2013. And thanks for reading.

Chocoride!!!

A few weeks ago I participated in a part of what came to be known as the Hubs and Pubs ride. It was a ride from one microbrewery to another in NE DC and adjacent areas of MD. The ride was organized by Crystal, a new friend who fearlessly commutes by bike from DC to Tysons Corners in VA. Tysons Corner is traffic hell so this is an amazing accomplishment in my book.

As a sort of non-alcoholic follow-up to Hubs and Pubs, Crystal and Lisa, another FOB (friend of the blog), decided to organize a ride among shops selling hot chocolate. This ride would go from Dupont Circle to Penn Quarter to a newly developed area of SE DC to the spanking new Union Market in NE DC. It came to be known as Chocoride.

I woke up to find the wind blowing pretty hard with temps in the 30s. I had planned to drive to DC, but with the fierce headwind, I decided to ride  instead, proving beyond a doubt that I have very little common sense.

As it turned out, The Mule and I had no trouble riding the first six miles. I hadn’t ridden in two days and my legs were fresh. I rode The Mule because it’s the easiest bike to lock up, being more or less conventional in design. I tried riding Washington Street through Old Town but the width of the road allowed the headwinds to slow me down. And the red lights didn’t help much, either. I bounced over to some side streets and made good progress. Just north of Old Town I rejoined the Mount Vernon Trail. In the sections near the river, the headwinds were challenging.  I was expecting this, especially in the open area just north of the airport where treeless playing fields border the river.

I put my head down and spun my legs off. I actually had to unzip my jacket to dissipate some of the body heat I was generating. I did a U-turn to get on the ramp up the 14th Street Bridge. The inclined seemed not to be there. What a tailwind! Unfortunately, on the bridge itself, the wind was a crosswind hitting me from about 10 o’clock. It was all I could do to keep moving forward and stay upright. 8 miles per hour was the best speed I could make. Runners coming from DC were leaning to stay upright. They held their right hands on the upwind sides of their faces. As each one passed, our eyes met as if to say, YEEEHAAA! (Or, maybe, I’M A MORON!)

I took 15th Street all the way to Massachusetts then Mass to Dupont Circle. The group was meeting at a hot chocolate shop but I couldn’t see them so I checked my Twitter feed and saw that the shop was on Connecticut Avenue which passes beneath the circle. Which way should I go? I picked south and didn’t see a group of chocolate obsessed cycists so I backtracked and headed north. There they were just a block or two from the circle.

Five minutes later we were underway. Our first stop was a shop in Penn Quarter near the Verizon Center. Along the way we rode the new L Street Cycletrack. It’s a little quirky but I liked it. I could imagine how useful it is at rush hour. I had a hot chocolate with milk. It was JUST PLAIN AWESOME. I hadn’t had real hot chocolate in ages. WOW.

Back on the bike, we headed via Pennsylvania Avenue to Capitol Hill then south into SE DC. We stopped at another shop near the new skating rink. Here I had an Americano which was pretty mediocre. It was, however, warm and that’s pretty much all I cared about.

Next we headed up 6th Street through Capitol Hill and the gentrifying neighborhoods of DC. This city is really on the rise. House after house had been renovated and spiffed up. After a few miles we arrived at Union Market, a newly re-purposed market space that was abuzz with activity. Speaking of buzz, I had more coffee, And an orange and cranberry scone.

We dawdled for a long time. Looking out the window I could see a U.S. flag stiff in the wind. We were heading into the teeth of that to get back to our starting point. Crystal and Lisa took us on a seemingly random path that ended up purposefully at the Metropolitan Branch Trail. We took the MBT north to R Street and followed the R Street bike lanes all the way back to the start. The buildings shielded us from the worst of the headwinds so the ride back was not nearly as difficult as expected.

After hugs and thank yous, I head back home. The wind was now relentlessly pushing me. Even the ride across the river was easier since now the wind was hitting me from 4 o’clock. Once on the MVT, I cruised at 16 or 17 miles per hour with little effort. South of Old Town I left the trail earlier than usual.  This entailed riding up a big hill, but with the wind at my back the ride up was no problem.

I pulled into the driveway with 42.5 miles on the odometer. Not half bad for a cold Sunday in December. What a nice way to end a year in the saddle, riding and hanging out with my new friends from the DC biking community. Many thanks to Crystal and Lisa for organizing and leading this ride.

Nasty Commute…Not

There was a high wind advisory for tonight’s ride home.  20+ mph winds with gusts up to 50 mph. I love a challenge.

The wind was blowing in my face as I made my way north on North Lynn Street in Rosslyn. Once I cleared the highrise canyon the winds died down. I turned onto the Mount Vernon Trail and it was clear sailing. The wind was a firm hand on my back and I cruised down the trail with ease. Every so often I’d get buffeted by a cross gust but these were nothing extraordinary.

Truth be told, if I stopped I’d probably freeze my ass off, but the steady pedaling was just the right amount of exersion to keep me feeling toasty. I left earlier than usual so I for the second night in a row I didn’t have to play dodge-a-ninja. (That would make a fun video game, come to think of it.)

I have to admit that cold temps and little sleep make my normal 29-30 mile bike commute seem much longer. I hope to get in a good 8 hours of sleep tonight.

I put in a request to work from home on Monday. Assuming I ride tomorrow, that will make 163 bike commutes for the year. That’s somewhere in the neighborhood of 4,800 miles of back and forth riding.  Some day I hope to put my superpowers to good use. I’m thinking maybe I should ride toward work and not stop until I reach salt water.

That would be nasty!

Sleepless in Mount Vernon

After yesterday’s epic bike commute, I thought I’d sleep like a log. Did not happen. I was up all night. Never mess around with a new laptop with an unfamiliar operating system before going to sleep. I am sure I will enjoy using it as soon as it is set up to my liking and I have a better idea of how to do simple things (such as specify my default search engine.)

The two college boys in our family room playing video games until 3 a.m. didn’t help a whole lot either.

I finally drifted off to sleep a little after 5 a.m. only to be blasted awake by my alarm clock.  It seems this same scenario plays out about once a month so I think it’s a circadian rhthyms issue. I am pretty sure that tonight sleep will not be an issue.

I had expected ice on the pavement when I went out to get the newspaper but there was only water meaning that I could ride to work. Because the aforemention college boys were asleep in front of the TV, I skipped my morning ritual of back exercises while channel surfing and headed out the door into the pre-dawn darkness. I was expecting fierce headwinds but what I got was a rather welcome tailwind. With this assistance, I chose to bypass a portion of the Mount Vernon Trail and take the somewhat hillier Fort Hunt Road to the beltway instead. There were only a few cars using the road so it was a peaceful ride all the way to Old Town.

North of Old Town, the oddest thing happened; my tailwind was becoming a headwind. Once I was clear of the protection of buildings and trees, I had an invisible hand on my chest. I ground the ride out with my head focused on the ground in front of my bike. Opposite the Washington Monument I was startled. A bike coming from the opposite direction passed me going fast. Where did he come from?  Better look where I am going.

I made it to the office in reasonable comfort. I attribute this to the balaclava, the mittens with liner gloves, and the overboots that I chose at the start of the ride. My extremities were toasty.

The ride home promises to be a breeze. Sustanied tailwinds of over 20 miles per hours with gusts of up to 50 miles per hour are in the forecast. Little Nellie will be pleased.

Well, that was fun

The ride home was everything I hoped for and, as they used to say in those Miller Lite ads of so long ago, less.

My boss, a bike commuter himself who decided not to ride in during today’s winter storm, came around to my desk at 3:30 and told me that if I saw a break in the weather to head for home. I immediately checked weather.com and saw that they were predicting clear sailing to Mount Vernon at around 4:45.  This happens to be almost my normal quitting time so my boss’s largess went in the meteorlogical round file.

At around 4:30 I changed into my bike clothes and decided to head out. I was stunned to see daylight as I left the garage. Commuting home in daylight, even gray, fading daylight, made me a happy guy. Off I rode on Little Nellie, now freed from it’s iced over brakes. I made it through Rosslyn without encountering the slightest trouble from the automotive crowd, mostly because the streets were nearly empty.

I headed down the hill to the Mount Vernon Trail. My first sign of trouble was the enormous puddle just before the bridge that would take me from the Rosslyn side of the GW Parkway to the Potomac River side. I rode right through it but it was brown water. I couldn’t see how deep it was. I got lucky. It was only a few inches. The boardwalk under the Roosevelt Bridge was covered in a thin layer of snowy slush.  I navigated the mess without difficulty and hoped that the remaining boardwalks on my commute would not be frozen over. (They weren’t, thank god.)

From the boardwalk to the Memorial Bridge underpass was a mile of huge puddles. Despite having fenders on my bike, my feet were soaked, and there were 12 miles left to ride. These puddles were actually small scale flooding. The grass couldn’t hold all the water that had accumulated throughout the day. The spill over left the trail with some long stretches of deep puddles, impossible to ride around.

For the first couple of miles the rain was very light. Once I cleared the 14 Street Bridge it began to pick up. I had a very welcome tailwind and the few planes taking off from National Airport were heading my way. I could barely make them out in the spray and the gloom.  It reminded me of the Air Florida crash in 1981 which took place right next to the trail next to the 14th Street Bridge.

My feet stayed warm despite the wetness. I attribute this to the tailwind and the 40-ish temperatures. I slogged along, having increasing difficulty seeing through my glasses. This became a serious problem once the trail took me close to the GW Parkway and I had to deal with the headlights of the cars. Shading my eyes with one hand meant that I had to take a hand off the handlebars, not the safest thing to do in these conditions. Fortunately NOBODY else was on the trail. No ninjas tonight!

The more I rode the more the weather.com forecast proved wrong. Instead of a gap in the storm, the rain intensified. The streets of Old Town, like the MVT were deserted. I intended to take the shortest route home but by Old Town I was on autopilot. I followed my normal fair-weather route.

South of the beltway the rain kept a comin’. To kill the tedium I started thinking of songs with rain in them. Rain, Rain on the Roof, Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head, Let It Rain, and, the one I really needed, Who’ll Stop the Rain. Mind games can get you only so far. Soon I was south of the beltway slogging through puddle after puddle. Some of the trail was just flat out submerged. My feet felt like saturated sponges.

By the time I reached the stone bridge, back on suburban streets, I decided to finish the commute just as I normally do, rather than taking a short cut home. I arrived completely drenched and proceeded to walk Little Nellie to the backyard shed. The lawn in the back yard was saturated with cold water. Once in the shed, I dried my steed off as best I could. Then it was into the house. Off came my soaked shoes, socks and gloves. The rest of me was surprisingly dry.

So bike commute 161 is in the books. Tomorrow, high winds are expected. If it is below freezing, I’ll probably drive. All that standing water on the MVT will be a skating rink. I do rain, I do sleet, I even do thunder but I don’t do deep snow, ice or lightning. You think I’m crazy?

Rootchopper: Ninja Hunter

I rode Little Nellie today. The ride in was cold but quite fun owing to the fact that the Mount Vernon Trail was practically deserted. If evil doers want to invade Washington, now’s the time to do it. Car traffic on the George Washington Parkway looked like a Saturday afternoon. There are no DC natives; just immigrants from the 50 states and beyond. When important holidays approach, everyone goes home.

Except me.

I rode to work. No eagles. No possums. No Nancy Duley. Just the three step runner. (She runs three steps, then walks for a bit. Then runs three steps…) Near the Memorial Bridge I was passed by a guy on a Bike Friday. It didn’t have any racks or fenders or bags. It looked naked. And it had an AWESOME paint job. It was some sort of metallic shiny light green color that’s not listed on the Bike Friday website. I resisted the urge to whack the guy with one of my weighty panniers and steal his bike.

The ride home was windy and, as usual, dark. It’s always a challenged to ride into the headlights of the cars on the Parkway. I was doing fine, given the light traffic on the trail. As the trail runs between the airport and the Parkway, the car headlights are particularly bad. Then I saw something move and I instinctively moved left. It was a ninja. A man dress in a black watch cap, a black coat, dark blue jeans, and black boots. He was back lit by the headlights. I yelled as I swerved past him. I missed him by little more than a foot. As I passed I realized that what caused me to react was the bend in his leg as he strode forward. If he had been standing still, I would have hit him for sure.

After the adrenaline wore off, I settled into a nice rhythm, staring at the white circle painted by my helmet mounted light. I heard him before I saw him. A running coming my way on the opposite side of the path. Then I saw the white trim on his sneakers. He was dressed in dark clothing.

Onto the streets of Old Town, Little Nellie and I rolled. I was pretty happy to have the darkness and the ninjas behind me. As I cleared the commercial area, I made my way past a row of townhouses. A car was waiting, double parked on the left side of the road. Out of the shadows to my right, a man dressed in black ran straight for the car. He pulled up when I yelled and I swerved to avoid him. “Sorry!” he said. Great, dude. Little Nellie and I are practically Las Vegas on two wheels and you can’t see us coming!!!

Here’s the complete Rootchopper Vegas biking package: Front reflector on bike. Front reflective patch on handlebar bag. Front LED light on stem. Headlight on helmet. Reflective bands on ankles. Reflective tab on shoes. Reflectors on pedals. Reflective vest over my torso. Reflective fabric on the fingertips and palms of my gloves. Red light on back of helmet attached to a yellow reflective band. Red light facing rearward on my seat tube. Reflective patch on my saddlebag. Red LED light on the back of my rack. Reflective patches on my rear panniers facing both forward and rearward. Reflective sidewalls on both tires.

How could this guy have missed me?

I was beginning to think all these near misses were my fault. Then I rode into the pitch black of Belle Haven Park. Up ahead, well over 50 yards I spotted someone walking. He had an reflective band around his right forearm. It probably cost a few bucks. Why don’t more people wear them?

I made the rest of my trip home with no more incidents.

My goal for the rest of the winter is to bike commute without hitting a ninja. It’s not a very good bet, I’m afraid.

Playing Possum

I’ve been riding to work along the Mount Vernon Trail now for over ten years.  Today I saw my first possum. He was walking from some underbrush out onto the trail on the edge of Belle Haven Park. When he spotted my approach, he calmly turned and walked back to the underbrush. He was taking his time. I don’t know much about possums but I suspect this one won’t last very long. Somebody higher up the food chain is going to have him for a meal.

I occasionally see possums in my yard. Shortly after moving in I saw a big one lying in the grass in the back yard. I ran in the house to tell Mrs. Rootchopper that there was a dead possum in the back yard. She cracked up. When I went back outside it was, of course, gone. Nature’s oldest trick. My college friend Becca used to say I was the most gullible person she knew. She was right.

The rest of my commute was uneventful. I did confirm that Nancy Duley in fact reads this blog. As I rode past her this morning she said something about a bourbon flask. (She probably dropped hers on the trail and wanted me to look for it.)

If it had not been for three meetings today, I would have called in sick. My head and chest cold has returned.  I am glad that I went to the office though because the first two meetings went well, and the third was canceled. Our consultants in Wisconsin were preparing to get slammed by a blizzard and were closing their office. It’s good to see that somebody other than residents of the DMV panic at the thought of impending snow.

Ahead of the massive Midwest storm, winds were kicking up. I had a mighty tailwind on the way home. This, an a couple of hits of albuterol, made for a pleasant ride home aboard Big Nellie.

 

7000 and Climbing

This morning’s ride was uneventful except for some trail bandits. Trail bandits take up the whole trail so that no one else can get by. I came upon the first bandits as I came from under the Woodrow Wilson Bridge and headed toward Ford’s Landing along the river. Two women were walking four dogs. They were spread across the trail from left to right: dog-woman-dog-dog-woman-dog.  I rang my bell four times. They made no effort to move out of the way. I came up behind them and said “COMING THROUGH”.  I’d have added “please” but my polite was gone by the fourth ring.  My friend Reba has long said that the people who live at Ford’s Landing, which is a small development of million dollar townhouses, think they own the trail. Now I see her point.

About a mile later on the north side of Old Town Alexandria, two maintenance workers were walking up the path away from me.  One was pushing a dumpster of sorts. I rang my bell. He didn’t move. I rang again. Nothing. I said “PASSING.” Still nothing. I rode around him on the grass. Grrr.

The ride home was uneventful. For some reason I seem to have figured out dressing for the cold. I was completely comfortable. Now if only I can figure out how to keep from being blinded by car headlights.

When I reached the Woodrow Wilson Bridge tonight, no horns honked, no rockets exploded overhead, no bells rung. I felt shortchanged. I had just passed the 7,000 mile mark for 2012.  Can I have some more please?

 

Just Drive Your Car

Tonight’s ride home was in the dark. I typically ride a bit slower than usual and it makes for an almost effortless ride. It would have been great but for four drivers in their cars, three of whom were probably well meaning.

About seven miles into my commute the Mount Vernon Trail crosses the access road that connects Daingerfield Island to the George Washington Parkway. A car approach from the Parkway from my right. I slowed. He slowed. I slowed some more. He slowed some more. I came to a stop at the stop sign (he had none). He came to a stop.  I guess he must have been waving me through.  Word to drivers of this world: if I have come to a stop, waving me through is pointless. You aren’t doing me a favor. I waved him through. Don’t try to drive my bike. Just drive your car.

A couple of miles later the MVT meets a street at a T with the parking lot for an office building on the top of the T.  I approached the T and saw a car coming from my left. I slowed to let the car go by. The car slowed. It got within range of my headlight. I could see the driver waving me to go ahead. If I had obeyed her signal, I would have ridden directly into the path of a car coming from my right. Thanks, lady.  I stopped, put my foot down and waved her through. Don’t try to drive my bike. Just drive your car.

A quarter mile later I was on Union Street. A road intersected with Union Street from the right making a T with Union Street as the top of the T.  A car was parked at the curb, facing me on the left on the opposite side of the intersection. Next to the car was a car stopped at a stop sign. Curb car put on his left turn signal. And waited. Stop line car waited. I stopped and put my foot down. After a few more seconds, curb car does a left hand turn into the stem of the T cutting off both the stop line car and me. I think curb car wanted me to go first. Thanks, but no thanks. Just drive your car.

A mile later I was clear of Old Town, heading down the MVT from the South Washington Street deck above the Beltway. This nice, gentle downhill is complicated by an intersection with the access road to a large condominium followed by a zig zag in the trail. The access road/MVT intersection has a traffic light for MVT traffic. This was put in place after the condo people bitched up a storm about the trail users messing with their right drive onto South Washington Street unimpeded.

As I approached the bike light, I saw two white vans pulling up to the trail from the condo. The front van pulled right across the trail directly in front of me. I yelled “STOP!” three times to no avail. Despite the fact that I had the green light, I came to a near stop and shined my helmet-mounted headlight at the driver. She was looking down and texting on her Blackberry. As I rode past, I screamed at her. I am proud that I didn’t cuss. Just drive your car.

Long story short, if you wave a bike through an intersection and he doesn’t respond there may be two things going on that you are unaware of. (1) If a bicyclist can’t make eye contact with you, he is wise not to go into your path no matter how slowly you are driving. As my friend Mary says, I assume I am invisible. (2) A cyclists can see and hear things that you may not be aware of.

A State Police officer at my daughter’s driver’s license ceremony gave a scary lecture to the newly licensed drivers. His message was simple: Don’t text. Don’t fool around with the radio or your iPod. Don’t horse around with your passengers. “Just drive your car.”

Bike Commute 46: Tunnel of Green

At long last the trees are leafing and the Mount Vernon Trail south of the Beltway has become a tunnel of green.  This is so relaxing to ride through after a day in the concrete city. One drawback to all this flora is the fact that the Morningside bald eagle nest is nearly invisible.  You really have to know exactly where to stand to see it.  Small price to pay for this gorgeous sign of Spring.

Soon we’ll be seeing goslings and ducklings along the trail.  I love watching them grow through the Spring and Summer.