Spring has sprung. A traffic pinch point.

K-W bike blog D: this is one other link of mine.

View Blog

D: I have 2 pics here. One is my standard bike uniform. Hunter orange raincoat. Helmet with fore and aft flashing lights. Bike with heaps of reflectors. The bike also has steady road-illuminating fore and aft lights.
I tried winter biking this winter for the first time. And for the first time I was hit by a car.
I was in a bike lane. The visibility at night was great for a block. I had right of way. He had a stop sign. If he had stopped and not looked OR not stopped and looked, I would have been fine.
I was pointing my flashing helmet light directly in his face through the window. Annoying, but that is pretty hard to ignore. He ignored it. Having made a cursory scan coming up to the stop light, he did a rolling stop. I had NO time to react.
Trouble is, I bike at 30kph. My helmet is rated for 20ish. For the record, falling off a bike will tend to make your head impact on the road at 15ish. Eating his driver side door was more dangerous than swerving in front of a 10-20kph van with a low bumper and gradual hood contour. So, choosing the lesser of the evils, I swerved in front of him.
I was fine. My bike was not. It is in the shop right now. I didn't bike the rest of winter.

Nonetheless, I was pretty shook up by being hit by a car. I had taken precautions. Steel studded tires, huge visibility, et al. And still got hit. Again, my helmet is only rated for about 20kph impact. Much above that and I get seriously hurt.

The second picture above was taken yesterday at King and University at WLU. See that bike lane? Well, traffic is using it as a turn lane. I expect we'll see some bikes get creamed there this year. If that spot needs a turn lane, then maybe building a turn lane is desirable.

The roads are gonna be a bugger this year. Those potsholes are HUGE! I heard a Cooper Mini got stuck in one in front of the Chill 'n Grill! Wow.
Our region tried to use cold fill. It lasts a day in high traffic area.
There is some new airblast/epoxy combo out there. And infrared paving is vastly superior to the usual patching method.

Like the joke goes, there are 2 seasons in Canada: winter and construction. <:
Cheers.