Phillip Barron
The Herald Sun
August 25th, 2005
DURHAM — If you haven’t heard, the state of North Carolina just issued new ?Share the Road? license plates. For $30 annually, cyclists who drive can show their fondness of two wheels even while in their car.
And if talk in the local cycling community is right, these new license tags couldn’t have come at a better time.
In June, the Herald Sun reported that Durham cyclist Drew Cummings was hit and seriously injured while riding to Pittsboro. Whether it was an accidental or intentional hit and run, the driver fled the scene and has yet to be identified.
Greg Sousa reports on a local cycling listserv that he was run off the road on his way to work one morning in July. And Douglas Woolcock says that someone in a passing car threw a fast-food cup at him while he was cycling down Ninth Street.
Both are skeptical that these encounters were accidents since both incidents involved a passenger in the car raising a middle finger out the window.
What’s going on here? Are the rising temperatures interfering with our sense of compassion? Do rising gas prices make it more difficult for motorists to show patience on the road? Do the summer swarms of cyclists upset all drivers?
A reader of this column, who wishes to remain anonymous, opines that some motorists are reluctant to share the road with cyclists who defiantly disregard traffic laws. Cyclists running red lights and stop signs are just a few of the anarchic affairs he’s irritated by. And, he thinks, these small acts of rebellion may be igniting a territorial instinct in other drivers.
He may be right. I’ve listened to radicals on both sides of this issue.
To hear some motorists talk about the perceived arrogance of cyclists, you’d think that sharing lane space with a bicycle offends them deeply. To hear some cyclists talk about the perceived arrogance of drivers, you’d think every car with which they share the road puts their life as well as national security in danger.
But vigilante justice, whether it’s a motorist chasing down an errant cyclist or a cyclist brandishing a U-lock as a weapon, is also against the law. More than illegal, it’s shameful behavior.
Thinking in extremes, leaves us prone to confrontation. It locks motorists and cyclists in a turf battle over space on the road, and no one wins a battle like this.
Roadways are dangerous places simply by virtue of the fact that they are filled with independently moving machines ? each traveling with enough speed to harm the delicate human body. Cars and bikes can mingle together safely, but only if we leave our attitudes out of the mix.
Let’s not let our tempers rise as high as the temperature. Rather than polarize the road, let’s share it calmly and safely.