I live a block from the corners Jennifer/Baldwin and Baldwin/Spaight . I love to sleep with my windows open when the weather is nice. At a little after four in the morning, a robin starts his morning song and I think how great it is to live in a city with trees and gardens and birds. But then, a little after five (in the morning!), three bus lines start screaming at us. When they first started to do this, my brain kept trying to turn it into Beethoven's Für Elise. It's really horrible when they are out of tune with each other.
Believe me. It is not just a "few malcontents" that hate this. Lots of us in the neighborhood feel this way. My feeling is that if a pedestrian or bicyclist is too clueless to notice that there is a bus within fifty feet of them, they should _never_ be allowed behind the wheel of a car. If you can't notice a truck-sized, multi-passenger, noisy, smelly bus when you're that exposed, how can you be trusted to notice a bicycle or pedestrian when you are entombed in a ton of steel, glass, and plastic? Granted, there are people who try to squeeze past a bus on its right side, through the driver's blind spot, while it is pulling up to a stop or making a turn. If you know anyone who does this, slap them on the forehead, repeatedly, until their jaw unslackens and you see the spark of reason shine under their Neanderthal brow. I've know visually impaired people and they seemed to be more aware of the busses than the sighted - possibly because they don't drive and use mass transportation more regularly. Traffic is dangerous so be aware of what is around you! Despite how it sometimes appears, the drivers are not trying to run us over, but their levels of skill and attention can't be trusted either. So everyone need to show some common sense "defensiveness." Start by putting away the damn phone when you're stepping into traffic. I've seen things like that happen way too often and no amount of beeping, screaming, or bad mufflers is going to fix that. Chris On Fri, Jun 5, 2015 at 9:29 AM, Michael Lemberger <[email protected]> wrote: > On Jun 4, Harald wrote: > > My two cents: The turn signal sound is noise pollution in an urban > environment, and I don't think there is solid scientific evidence of a > safety benefit (If somebody is aware of good studies, I'd be very > interested). > > > This, exactly. Whether one finds the sound annoying or not is immaterial. If > it only adds to the din without a demonstrable safety benefit, then why have > it? > > To me as a cyclist, it has no meaningful benefit. > > Michael Lemberger > Madison > > _______________________________________________ > Bikies mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.danenet.org/listinfo.cgi/bikies-danenet.org > _______________________________________________ Bikies mailing list [email protected] http://lists.danenet.org/listinfo.cgi/bikies-danenet.org
