#Cycling

“Peace is not absence of conflict,” Ronald Reagan once said, “it is the ability to handle conflict by peaceful means.”

And so it goes on the world’s roadways, highways, and, depending on your relationship with the neighbors, driveways. After the engineers are done gauging line of sight, measuring stopping distances, and calculating the necessary roadway width and angle for safe passage of a vehicle travelling the speed limit, we’re left to battle it out on the infrastructure laid out for us by city planners.

It’s a lot of responsibility. Maybe one day, perhaps sooner than we think, we’ll look back on such times and wonder how our betters at city hall or the legislature allowed us the ability to fend for ourselves on the road. Men and women, children and youth. Each depending on the closest person in their vicinity to not kill them.

Inevitably, conflict arises. And, increasingly (or so it seems) we’re facing conflict between motorists and a new breed of traveller: the disruptor.

If you’ve ever had the misfortune of flying across the country on Southwest, you know that Fate typically puts you next to a three-hundred pound man, a crying child, or a crying three-hundred-pound man. But last month I had the luck to share the long trip with a young woman who told me a very interesting story of cycling five hundred miles across central Florida. “It might be the liquor talking,” I said, “but you should write this up for me. I run a famous car website. And you’re very pretty.” So here you go, TTAC readers: a cycling perspective on what is perhaps the least bike-friendly state. Enjoy! — JB

Pushing off, with a slightly, only slightly, bad taste in my mouth. The last words I’d heard prior to starting this adventure ringing in my head: “That’s a terrible idea, it’s absolutely not safe for cyclists, what if I drop you off on the trail head?”

Naaah — I can do this — it’s MY home state, I know these roads better than anyone. Besides I live in New York City now. I can do anything! Not to mention, I took my first joy ride in a standard 88’ Honda Prelude with my best friend Yent at 13 years old, cruised (at least that’s what we called it in the early 90’s) these roads, back roads and interstates in all kinds of vehicles. I own this! I am that American Girl riding down 441, except this time I’m on a bicycle, making my way to all of my favorite places. I left my father’s Apopka house and proceeded in search for freedom, a place to ride with the rest of North Central Florida, experience the wind in my face, and reach a destination.

TTAC’s forays into areas like law, politics and economics are not everyone’s cup of tea, but they do matter. The dry, dense topics like regulation and financial topics have real implications for car enthusiasts, not to mention society as a whole. One subset of that is urban planning, a discipline which can have an enormous impact on our favorite hobby.

My refusal to convict Oldsmobile driver Rod Kinkade on the testimony of a cycling team had the bike riders of TTAC howling for my blood. They won’t get it; I paid for eleven units of the finest junkie-and-derelict blood the last time I was struck by a motorist. It took three long, expensive days of ICU residence to get all that blood into me while they were Hemovacing the bad stuff out of a two-inch-diameter hole in my right leg. No soup for you, roadies.

Over dinner with our beloved Editor-At-Large two weeks ago, Ed and I discussed what we felt was the coming “post-car” era; rampant consolidation, the death of beloved brands and the subsequent widespread love for classic cars, the adoption of other forms of mobility and a fierce anti-car backlash. A nugget of information buried at the end of a Ward’s Auto report instantly brought all my fears and apprehension to the forefront, a mere fortnight after Ed and I concluded that things weren’t going to be that bad after all.