Prospect Park Suffering Biped-Bicyclist Tension
Ah, the bucolic nature of the friendly green space of Prospect Park (assuming the roaming teen gangs robbing people are under control). But, wait. Daily Slope and its message board are full of tales of the unfriendly competition between walker and biker during car-free times in an entry called "Prospect Park is not the Tour de France." To wit:Prospect Park is not the training ground for the next Lance Armstrong. I really think *some* of these over outfitted bicyclists have to get a grip on reality and share the park road. They are one group of people who need to use it and not dominate it. Today I was crossing the road with my stroller. I looked left and right before proceeding--all was clear. When I got to the center a pack of bicyclists came up over the hill (not in the bike lane) and then started cursing me for being in their way. "Watch where the f you're going." "GET OUTTA MY WAY asshole." For God's sakes it is a public park and I looked both ways and was crossing the friggin road! Ugghh.Wow. GL is as hard-bitten as the next person, but "Watch where the F you're going" and "Get outta' my way asshole" to a mom with a kid in a stroller? Dear God. Not to mention the fact that you might leave the road rage behind when you take the bike into the park. (The photo above of a bike race in Prospect Park, by the way, is from groovylab on flickr.)
And, then, there's this:
I live a block from the park and have children so I am in the park quite a bit and am familiar with the biker packs. I crossed the road with two children in a stroller. I didn't meander or stop. But I didn't sprint across in a frenzy diving for cover on the other side--uhm, the road is closed to traffic. I think they need to share the road with joggers, walkers, dog walkers, children riding bikes, parents, rollerbladers. Many of them think what they are doing is the most important activity on that road and we should all be leaping out of their way. Frankly if they are going to bike so aggressively they don't belong in a public park. If it happens again, I will make it my business to get their aggressive bicyling curtailed.And all this time, we thought the park would be a kind, gentler place if the cars were removed. We were wrong. Oh, so wrong.
posted by rsguskind at 1:00 PM
3 Comments:
to bikers' credit, a lot of people cross the jogging & bike paths against the quite visible traffic signals. they (along with the crosswalks themselves) weren't put there for nothing!
The bikers ignore the traffic signals, so it hardly matters where you try to cross.
first of all, cyclists (not bikers) are not allowed in htat lane when the park is closed to traffic. Secondly, the original poster claims that she looked both ways at the top of the hill and that the cyclists were coming so fast that she couldn't make it across. At the top of the hill, the park is one lane wide and take no more than a few seconds to cross even with a stroller and a sack of potatoes on your back. Even the fastest cyclists are not moving faster than 25 mph at the top of the hill and would have been visible of several seconds before reaching her. There was no need for such language, but the pedestrians share the responibility for safely sharing the park, and the original post that started all this is implausible.
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