movieguru

What is your opinion on motorcyclists weaving in and out of traffic at high speeds in between the narrow spaces between two other vehicles? I personally consider it a dangerous practice. I once saw a motorcycle trying to weave between cars on a highway once and smacked right into a trucks side mirror. The motor cycle kept going for a little while. The rider didn't.

I was the first car stopped in the front at a red light today. I had a larger boxed truck stopped in the lane to my right and there were at least five cars behind each of us. Get this idiot on a motor cycle decide to cut in front of everyone at a high rate of speed by going in between all the other vehicles and pulling right in front my car. As soon as he pulls in front of me, he sticks his hand out and gives me the finger. He seems to thing it is ok for him to cut everyone off in front of him and stop his motor cycle in what was the pedestrian crosswalk. Had anyone been on the crosswalk right where the boxed truck was, the motor cyclist wouldn't have been able to see them and would have hit them. The next stop light down the road the cyclist couldn't even be bothered to stop at the red light. He just went straight through it.

GoldenJCJ

I’ll go out on a limb and say I think it’s dangerous.

Then again, motorcyclists aren’t exactly known for their smart, level-headed decisions.

lwhy?

Lane splitting is illegal in Tennessee, but motorcyclists still do it here. I was driving on a two lane interstate one day and a whole group of motorcyclists split in between me on the right lane and another driver on the left lane. It scared the heck out of me.

zyzzle

It is a dangerous, disruptive practice which should be illegal in all 50 states. I've been frightened more than once while stopped in heavy gridlock traffic by asshole motorcyclists going at very high rates of speed, passing us all, as if we were some minor obstacle course. If an accident happens with such an unenlightened person, I would probably be confronted that it was in fact *my* fault, for not seeing him. I do not wish to ever find out. In general, I make a point of driving during non-gridlock hours, which is becoming more and more of a miraculous feat in current SoCal traffic.

Deadman31

It dangerous and stupid but who is gonna stop them?

Nick Danger

Lane splitting is legal in California, through stopped traffic at a moderate rate of speed. I gather that nobody ever goes at a moderate speed.

Lane splitting at highway speeds demonstrates a childlike trust of car drivers. When I'm on my motorcycle, I don't trust car drivers not to do something stupid, careless, or violent.

Toddarino

The first time I experienced this was in Los Angeles. It blew my mind. That shit does not happen here.

movieguru

I think in most states except a select few it's illegal. When I'm driving, I expect that I have full use of the lane in the space that my vehicle occupies. So if there's a pot hole or some other obstacle on one side of that lane, I can move my vehicle slightly in the lane to avoid that obstacle. If there's a motorcycle that is speeding in between vehicles on a highway, that is going to lead to a potential problem. if I move slightly in my own lane, that may leading to the speeding motorcycle to rear end me. I'm not so much worried about getting injured from a motorcycle rear ending me as it's going to be a battle that the cyclist is going to lose 99% of the time. It just seems way to risky to me for them to attempt this type of passing.

In the other situation, cutting in front of all the cars stopped at a traffic light is not only rude but is potentially dangerous for themselves and any pedestrians that may be in the crosswalk. If they're blocking the crosswalk because they cut in front of the other vehicles, pedestrians now have to risk going out into traffic going the other way to get across the street. If there is no crosswalk, then the motorcycle will be partially sticking out into traffic that has the right of way.

GoldenJCJ

My driver’s side door opened at just the right time?

andicus

This motorcyclist wouldn't do it, even if it was legal, here.

You really want to make a generalization like that based on some bad riders?

That comment makes you sound like an idiot.

And now you've proven it.

Vibiana

My ex, SSG Honeylamb, is a cyclist and she cusses people who do this. She also thinks people who ride without helmets and/or in shorts and tank tops are morons.

John Galt

This was my experience as well. I couldn’t believe it was allowed and that people would take that kind of risk. I think I’ve really only seen it in CA and AZ, but as someone who isn’t used to motorcycles being able to do that, there’s been a lot of times that I’ve nearly wiped them out as I get ready to change lanes and they come flying through.

In general, it just seems insanely unsafe to allow. The motorcyclist is obviously more at risk and the one making the decision, but a car trying to change lanes isn’t going to be looking 100 feet back as they start to merge. If the powers that be don’t think a motorcycle should sit in traffic like normal people have to, they should allow them to use the shoulder, but not the middle lanes.

I’ve also seen it spread to other states where it’s not legal and it’s even more irritating. I had spent over an hour waiting in line to get into Yellowstone this summer and just as I’m at the front gate this motorcyclist (with CA plates of course) comes flying up in between lanes and pulls right in front of me. We got into a huge shouting match and fortunately my girlfriend helped me keep my cool or I probably would have bear sprayed the mother fucker.

movieguru

I'm surprised it's even legal in some states. I'm not worried so much if the cyclist does something stupid like this and only injures themselves. I care more when they can injure innocent bystanders like pedestrians in crosswalks.

There's so many drivers out there though that drive recklessly and put everyone at risk with their actions. Not just motor cycles but cars as well. Last month I was driving through Virginia going to Maryland and there was about six or seven cars that decided to race each other on a busy highway like it was Grand Theft Auto. They were dangerously weaving in and out of lanes of traffic at high rates of speed with very little space between cars. They cant even see what's in the lanes they're pulling in before they are half way in the other lane. They make one wrong assumption that there's nothing in the lane at the point they are pulling in it and they're going to have a multi car accident that locks up the highway for hours. That kind of behavior should be a permanent loss of their privilege to drive for the rest of their lives.

GoldenJCJ

You’re right. I shouldn’t have generalized like that. I was really only referring to motorcyclists who split lanes as discussed in the OP, those that don’t wear helmets, those that don’t wear proper clothing when riding, those who ride crotch rockets and ignore every driving law out there, those who ride Harleys and go out of their way to be as loud and annoying as possible through neighborhoods and towns, those who speed passed you and cut you off in a no passing lane, those who drive on the shoulder to bypass traffic to get to the off ramp, and those who thought it was a good idea to go to Sturgis the last few years. The other motorcycles are ok by me!

And I was obviously joking about the car door thing. I would never do that to a motorcycle. That would seriously damage my car.

TomOpus

Nothing 10 rolls of duct tape wouldn't fix.

eXcentris

Lane splitting can be dangerous. Lane filtering should be legal everywhere. Heck, the cops in Paris not only do both themselves but encourage it. Same thing in Italy where drivers will even move to let you drive on the median. It's common in Europe and Asia but North Americans are a little slow... I woudn't do it in the US, I don't want to get shot at.

movieguru

jfoobar

What he said was:



That isn't at all the same thing as "all motorcycle riders are idiots". It means, and here I agree with Golden 100%, that a disproportionately high number of motorcycle riders operate their vehicles in an illegal, unsafe and often reckless manner. And by "disproportionately", I mean a much higher percentage of motorcyclists are obvious moronic assholes than car drivers, and there are far too many of them behind the wheels of cars as it is. That is, in my 34 years of driving experience having lived in many locations, absolutely true. Around where I live now, I would go so far to say that it is actually very uncommon to see a motorcycle rider operating safely (driving with flow of traffic, not weaving, not lane splitting, not substantially exceeding the posted speed limit, not shooting down breakdown lanes, etc.). I was actually behind one yesterday for several minutes, a guy on a BMW, who was indeed operating safely and it occurred to me watching him just how rare that was here in the greater DC area.

Pot, meet kettle.

eXcentris

There's nothing "absolutely true" about your opinion, it's just an opinion. And as someone who has driven both cars and motorcycles for 40 years, I completely disagree. There are just as much asshole car drivers as there are motorcycle drivers.

Troy Stiffler

All I can add is that a lot of motorcycle drivers will accelerate dangerously and swerve dangerously. And they’ll be the first to go psycho when someone doesn’t see them approaching at 90 miles an hour when changing lanes. And then they get intensely defensive when someone kills their buzz they get from driving like a moron.

jfoobar

It isn't an opinion, it 34 years of observation. The difference is so remarkably glaring and obvious in my experience. On the other hand, I have never lived and only once ever even driven in Quebec so maybe all the motorcycle owners up there ride like Mother Theresa.

Actually, there are more asshole drivers than motorcycle riders, but only because there are far, far more drivers on the road. However, clearly someone in this thread (perhaps more than one someone) is extremely thin-skinned and delusional if they cannot acknowledge that motorcycle riders, as a collective, have a well-deserved reputation for operating their bikes with substantial disregard for safety and traffic laws. That doesn't mean all of them. Heck, it probably doesn't even mean most of them, but it is a heck of a lot of them.

eXcentris

I obviously meant proportionally speaking. So, one more time, your opinion is not "absolute truth" and you trying to make it sound as if it's a reflection of the majority opinion on this topic is pure bunk. You might as well have argued that "many people are saying...". I've driven both cars and motorcycles in North America, Europe and Asia, which means I've experienced both sides of the coin.

And surely, if lane splitting/filtering is common in Europe in Asia, it isn't because that practice, and motorcycle riders themselves, are such a scourge to humanity...

Your defense is just as lame as the original absurd generalization.

eXcentris

And... exactly this, every road user constantly whines about the "other" so extreme opinions are plentiful:

Opinion: Why Do Riders And Drivers Hate Each Other So Much?

zyzzle

The simple fact is, driving has become a lot *harder* in recent decades than it used to be. Paradoxically as cars have become much safer -- all those regulated bells and whistles like ABS, backup cameras, shatter-proof glass, and so on, the act of driving now requires so much more effort than it *used* to because of all the, lets us say, *entitled* drivers which share the roads among us. This includes motorcyclists, and of course all of them aren't doing risky things like splitting lanes. The very evidence presented in this thread of diametrically opposite "opinions" speaks most eloquently of this problem. Drivers never agree with each other -- never have -- but now that problem has reached epic proportions. Even back in the bad old days, my grandmother used to say of my grandfather's driving "You've never seen so many son-of-a-bitches as you have when you're driving with Grandfather!"

Everyone thinks *they* drive perfectly, while the problem is with everybody else. That's almost an axiom now. It simply isn't true.

jfoobar

Now you're just wading in the silly pool, sir. What I said was:



In my experience, it is absolutely true. We are, after all, talking about something for which no objective numbers actually exist after all so any comment on this topic is going to be inherently subjective by definition, including yours and andicus'. Your pointing that out doesn't make you insightful, it merely makes you Captain Obvious. Again, this is not an opinion, it is an accurate summation of my own personal experience and it is indeed absolutely true. You think my "opinion" is crap? Good. I think your "opinion" is crap. Yay!

Now, to your other point, it is my opinion that having lower opinions on the safe/intelligent driving habits of motorcycle riders indeed a fairly prevailing view among the general driving public.