I am so tired of hearing about the "privilege & #ableism of the bike community" as an excuse for not investing in protected low-stress bike infrastructure. Those assholes buzzing you on a path (or when you're in the bike lane on streets with no sidewalks) are #drivers on bikes, not members of my bike community. I'm taking my kid to a doctor appt and #CarSupremacy is squatting on 130ft and 65ft swaths of asphalt while we share scraps of space with people walking their dogs. #BikeTooter
For those who would ask why I would switch to the crosswalk like this instead of following vehicular rules, you must have missed the last time I waited in this spot and had our ears blown out by a driver honking at another driver.
This came up in the @activetowns chat with @Nondriver at ~45min in, about people in wheelchairs using bike lanes to get past a block of missing or broken sidewalk. I've seen it, even in "bikes may use full lane" conditions in SW Portland, and never had a problem giving plenty of space and a friendly notice. The guys in lycra who won't move out of a painted bike lane or are otherwise rude in that situation don't represent me or the vast majority of people who would bike
@activetowns@Nondriver and it does happen that these guys (they're always guys) buzz your wobbly still-learning kid on a shared / off-street path, but the root of this behavior is the arrogance of space given to cars, and narrow scraps left for everyone else. We have to recognize that this is not our bike community, but just the same jerks in cars who honk at people on bikes or try to scold / educate you with "as a cyclist myself" stuff.
@activetowns@Nondriver and while there is still some general lack of awareness to the needs of those in wheelchairs, low/no vision, or various mobility impairments that prevent rolling on two wheels, many people in bike activism are more attuned to these issues than the vast majority of drivers and it does us a disservice to address tropes about ableism or rudeness to "the bike community". Many people who ride in bike-hostile car-centric cultures aren't most of us.
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