From A-Word-A-Day: today's word, the historically awesome bindlestiff. Reminds me of days tramping on boxcars, going 'round to the side door for a plate of warm stew, sitting down by the tracks and having a toothless cigarette. Oh yes.
Striped bicycle lanes come as a mixed blessing -- a double-edgèd vorpal, if you will -- in San Francisco. They provide an ostensible safe haven for cyclists, a path away from the door zone, in a lane clear of motor vehicles and separate from pedestrian traffic (never mind that this morning an absent-minded walker stepped off the kerb directly into me as I pedalled up to Van Ness Avenue!). However, cyclists might become inured to the hazards of cars turning right across their visible right-of-way; cars sometimes resort to using bicycle lanes when frustrated with heavy traffic, as on Guerrero before Army St. Enforcement barely addresses this violation: after all, possession, nine-tenths and all that. Cyclists must use the lanes once they become available, and must reïnforce the public perception of bicycles as having the right to a full lane.
Yesterday the City of San Francisco finally designated a continuous bicycle lane on Market St., after years of wrangling. And traffic turning right onto 10th St. was queued down the length of the new lane.
The lack of a continuous bicycle lane on Market St. has long frustrated me, because of the volume of car and bus traffic makes cycling difficult and, for the inexperienced cyclist or driver, very dangerous. Market St. is a wonderful, flat and well-paved path from the waterfront and parts east to my neighbourhood, but pedalling in perpetual paranoia of a motorist turning abruptly right, or of the 71 Noriega roaring across the bicycle lane where Haight meets Market makes for an unnverving experience. The sections of Market where the bicycle lane vanishes to make way for street parking or a turn lane result in a confusing experience (perhaps not as much for motorists, who have the right of way by dint of weight and presence); they also result in erratic behaviour by cyclists (do I move to the sidewalk? do I nervously stick close to the kerb? what do I do?).