Thanks very much. You know, I hadn't intended to get out of my MSF course and ride right away, I thought I should practice a bit more, but after riding around the block about 20 times, I realized that I wasn't going to get anywhere unless I actually practiced riding in traffic. That every night I drove about 17 miles and have been riding pretty much every day since. And you're absolutely right - each day that I ride, I feel more comfortable.
You all are so friendly, thank you. On May 10, 3:55 pm, Joey Kelley <[email protected]> wrote: > Max, > A bit of advice - the only way to get quicker with the clutch > and more acquainted with the bike is to ride it. A few hours on a back > road will get you invaluable experience in how the bike handles. > You'll also find that engine temperature will affect the clutch > grabbing - as will the type of oil you use. (I'm not trying to turn > this into an Oil Thread - do a search through the archives for > numerous opinions on that subject) > Ride Safe! > -Joey > > > > On Tue, May 10, 2011 at 3:42 PM, Max <[email protected]> wrote: > > When I was in my motorcycle safety class, our instructor did inform us > > that North Carolina has a similar provision; you may proceed if your > > bike does not trip the light. While this information is very handy, > > as I'm learning to ride and am not always quick on the clutch, I've > > been in situations where it's simply not safe for me to run the light; > > busy, busy intersections. I really appreciate all your thoughts on > > how to handle these kinds of situations because this has been > > happening to me quite a bit these days. > > > -Max > > > On May 10, 1:55 pm, Noah Goodall <[email protected]> wrote: > >> There's federal guidance for how to set up a traffic light's timing > >> plan. This is a good > >> start:http://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/fhwahop08024/ > > >> However, different jurisdictions have different techniques. The most > >> common way I've seen in the field is to use commercial software, where > >> you enter in the the lane configuration, traffic volumes, and vehicle > >> turning movement counts, and it spits out a pretty good timing plan. > >> This one is by far the most user-friendly and > >> popular:http://www.trafficware.com/synchro.html > > >> The reason you get such poor performance at many places is because > >> timing plans aren't maintained. A good traffic engineer goes out and > >> counts vehicle volumes and turning movements at the intersection for a > >> few hours every couple years and revise the timing plan. Many > >> departments don't have the budget for this, and the timing plan is > >> quickly outdated. Also, you're supposed to have different timing plans > >> based on the volume you're seeing, so you'd have different timing > >> plans for a afternoon rush hour than you would for 2AM on a Tuesday. > >> But again, that takes more time and is not always done. > > >> Areas with a lot of congestion have much more sophisticated solutions. > >> There's a few products out that use video detection to constantly > >> measure vehicle volumes, and can therefore continuously update the > >> timing plan. The goal is to idiot-proof the whole thing, and it seems > >> to be working. We're doing a before-after analysis of this > >> one:http://rhythmtraffic.com/index.php/insync/ > > >> I'll let you know when we publish the results. > > >> -Noah > > >> On Mon, May 9, 2011 at 5:39 PM, zgotts <[email protected]> wrote: > > >> > Noah, any chance you have knowledge of light timing? > > >> > I'm no expert on this, and I'm sure there's a lot of complexities to > >> > it, but I mean.. are there not standards for this stuff? Does every > >> > town just have their own system that they just pull out of a hat? > > >> > -- > >> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google > >> > Groups "Nighthawk Motorcycle Lovers!" group. > >> > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > >> > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > >> > [email protected]. > >> > For more options, visit this group > >> > athttp://groups.google.com/group/nighthawk_lovers?hl=en. > > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > > "Nighthawk Motorcycle Lovers!" group. > > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > > [email protected]. > > For more options, visit this group > > athttp://groups.google.com/group/nighthawk_lovers?hl=en. > > -- > -Joey Kelley > JoeyKelley.com - My Life Online > JoeyFixesComputers.com - Its What I Do! > JoeyKelleyPhoto.com - Photographing Today, For Tomorrow -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Nighthawk Motorcycle Lovers!" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/nighthawk_lovers?hl=en.
