How do you feel about lane splitting motorcyclists?
 

Just curious as to what the ecomodder crowd thinks about lane splitters.

I do it while riding because it allows me to keep my momentum up, which in turn allows me to get better gas mileage in traffic.

I've notice that some drivers get really pissed off when they see me doing it, mainly a single person in a car by themselves, sitting in traffic. I've had a few motorists blatantly try to hit me with their cars :mad:, which i feel is down right assault.

The way i look at it, I am 2 feet wide on my motorcycle, motorists are 8-12 feet wide in their cars. What harm am i doing to them by lane splitting? It does not affect their commute in any way other then them throwing a temper tantrum because they have to sit in traffic. There's nothing stopping them from getting a motorcycle and doing the same thing!

When you get to that light (stop sign, tollbooth or whatever other bottleneck is holding up traffic) up ahead, all of a sudden you're a full fledged vehicle with a right to the full lane. Apparently more of a right than the people you just passed to get that spot.

Then there are times that you're not going to the real bottleneck, but are trying to get to your turn just short of it. I'm sorry, but none of the cars you're passing can tell the difference.

My state doesn't allow motorcycles to lane split, but I think that they all should, it's a better use of the road.

Here we are allowed to ride bicycles on the shoulder and if there is room to pass ride two abreast in the road, fallowing the same laws as cars, but when coming up to a stop light it's nice to be able to zip past all of the stopped cars and be the first to go when the light changes.

theycallmeebryan -

I think California allows it because the motorcycle cops do it(?). I am fine with it. I think the law is 5 MPH over the current speed of traffic.

I had a motorcycle and my POV is that you trade safety for "perks", in this case the ability to keep moving in stalled traffic. I had a friend who joked about opening his door on them and I scolded him that he might be injuring me!

CarloSW2

Not allowed in the Midwest but got to do it out in Cali- it's awesome! :thumbup:

Any cage drivers that are POd about it are simply jealous. That the bikes can cruise right on through does not affect THEIR ETA one bit.

It's illegal here and with good reason. If you are not staying in your lane it's a safety issue.

BTW, the poll choices are rather extreme, therefore showing some bias.

It doesn't "piss me off" nor do I "want to ram them". However they should not be exempt from the basic law for vehicular traffic about staying in lane.

As mentioned, CA allows it (for speeds under 10mph) and I'm glad they do. I take advantage of it when I ride, and make room for bikes when I don't.

What I don't like is the "Harley" riders with open pipes that feel they need to constantly blat their throttle as they make their way through the traffic... that's totally unnecessary.

What I also don't like is if the traffic is heavy but moving at PSL or better and the bikers decide that's a good time to lane split... at that speed, it's dangerous.

But both of those cases are not a lane splitting problem, but rather a stupidity problem.

If it's legal, I don't necessarily have a problem with it. I visited LA a while back and had several bikes ripping down between the lines of cars, I found it alarming and dangerous (for them). In Denver there are enough people not paying attention, the toll on thrill-seeking bikers would be high. I'm glad it is not legal here.

The parts that people seem to get upset about are the people who are breaking the law by having loud exhaust, going over the speed limit (5mph or 10mph faster then the other traffic) or people who are no longer in the lane or between lanes but are fully on the shoulder, then of course the people who don't use their turn signals to tell you that they are trying to get in to the lane that you are in.

Everyone else seems to be a big cry baby, because they are stuck in a car that is taking up to much space.

Air cooled bikes sitting in motionless traffic risk engines overheating or worse.
Never rode or drove in a state where lane splitting was legal.

regards
Mech

Every time one goes by I cringe. I just expect for someone to try and change lanes right in front of them and the motorcycle rider doesn't have time to stop. I just worry for their safety and think a lot of riders go too fast. I think that it's great that it's legal in some states.

Not legal in any state but CA. I wish it was. But since it is not, I do not agree with those who do it. Gotta play by the rules.

In regards to the air-cooled bike comment.... gotta get on the shoulder, turn it off, and let it cool down. Those are the breaks :(

It doesn't really bother me that many of them are breaking the law by doing it, but the other day when it happened to me it was offensively loud. Not to mention, in this case of the guy doing it, it really did not make much sense, he split lanes between me and another car, just to pace our speed in front of us. If they want to do it, it's up to them, but I think it seems pretty dangerous.

I too, would get tired of the Harley blat; but if loud pipes safes lives, a well timed blat
co
uld prevent a lane change door smash. Harley's aren't cheap!

I don't think above a walking pace speed differential would be advisable.

Some people are as mean as they are asleep.

Well that's an "if" that's bigger than the Grand Canyon. :rolleyes:

I would LMAO if a biker did that blat next to somebody and it caused the cage to veer into them with grievous results. Safety schmafety!

So I was at the grocery store looking down my nose at all those idiots with their rolling cages full of food, stuck in a long line for the checkout. I looked down at the basket I was carrying and decided that there was plenty of room in the aisle for me to get past those slugs. So I smugly walked past everybody and took my rightful place at the head of the line. One lady behind me expressed some shock, but I calmly explained to her about traffic congestion and efficient use of space. She didn't seem convinced, but by then my groceries were getting rung up and I moved on with my life.

Some people just don't understand efficiency.

Haha!!

That's a whole other topic for discussion. People act wayyyyyy different while driving than they would, say, standing in line at a supermarket.

I do that, it's called the express lane at the grocery store!

The thing about lane splitting is it doesn't cause the rest of the traffic to go any slower and if everyone who didn't lane split had to sit in line as well it would mean that there is more traffic, so it would go slower, so while the other people at the grocery store might not like you walking past them so you can go to the express lane (10 items or less) I'm sure they would rather have you do that then stand in front of them with everyone else who only has a few things to ring up, causing the whole works to slow down.

I am lane splitting in France, it is not legal but most of us do it when there is traffic. Actually they are starting to work on legalizing it under certain circumstances > the People won.

Anyway some motorbike drivers are doing it stupidly and I can't blame people for being pissed off BUT acting deliberately against their motion just because the offended driver can't be hurt in his car just disgusts me ...

Express lanes are great, except in this analogy. They are the grocery store's equivalent of an HOV lane, which motorcycles should be allowed in everywhere. This thread isn't about who gets to use the HOV lane.

Right, but this thread is about getting that traffic that would otherwise be hanging out in front of you moving along, in the same way a HOV lane helps to spread the load on the roadway.
It's the same with the express lane grocery store, if I have a cart full of stuff and you have a little hand held basket and the express lane opens up, or even a 2nd check out opens up, it's much easier for the person with the basket to get out of line and move to spread the load on the system then the person with the cart full and the bottom line is that everyone gets where they are going faster, the highway is not like a single line where someone can "cut in line" and screw everyone else over, lane splitting allows that section of traffic to remove them selves as an obstruction for everyone.

The only reason I bought my 250 was so I could lane split, which cut my commute across the Oakland / San Francisco Bay Bridge in half (30min to 15).

The express lane may not be the best analogy, but cutting in line isn't either (unless everyone is going up to a stop sign) because there is no point where each car needs to "check out". The slow down is just due to lane saturation. Traffic goes faster when there are fewer cars. And, like it says on the bicycle T-Shirt, a motorcycle not taking up a lane is "one less car".

The grocery store analogy would work only if the person with the hand cart slipped into a magical checkout lane which didn't actually exist previously, and which the shopping cart couldn't practically use anyway. Like if all the carts were full to the brim, and the person with a handbasket used the self-check lane, which would be impractical for a full cart. Then they are not only not holding back anyone else, they are getting out of everyone else's way.

If every single person in a mostly one-person-per-car commute was on a motorbike, it would be equivalent to doubling the amount of lanes, and the traffic jam wouldn't even exist. Each one person who lane splits brings that slightly closer. So not only do the motorcyclists not slow down other drivers by lane splitting, they actually speed them up just a tiny bit each.

As to it being unsafe, in all the statistics I've looked up on accidents, I haven't seen any evidence of it.

All the delays over here are due to choke points- a traffic circle, bridges, tollbooths and badly placed lane reductions. We get random bottlenecks from accidents (usually in the congestion caused by the regular ones) and police activity. All of those are a big line.

I'm a big fan of motorcycles, but I'm not a fan of lane splitting. That said, I'd probably do it a lot if I were on one. Regardless of one's risk tolerance, I think "if you think you can fit" is a bad traffic policy.

Fat Charlie -

As I said I'm in favor of it but I am surprised no one has mentioned when motorcycles hit car's side view mirrors. Your post is the closest it's come. The corollary to opening the car door to hurt the motorcyclist is the motorcyclist smashing your side view mirror as it goes by ... and then it keeps going.

I had pretty wide handle bars (and I liked it that way) but it made the splitting harder for me and stopped me from splitting in places that were too tight.

CarloSW2

The maximum width of my ninja 250 is 28 inches, and that's at the handlebars. I've never hit an automobiles side mirror while lane splitting.

I think this is what gives lane splitters a bad rep. This is absolutely suicidal! Flying in between cars 30+mph faster than they are going is absolutely ridiculous.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHAI3ca2X8k


This is more along the lines of the type of lane splitting that i do. Slow moving/stopped cars and me traveling 10-15mph faster then them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2WgLYenN2A

Listen right at 7:30, he passes a guy stopped on a large touring motorcycle and the guy goes "Stupid!"

Not sure which demonstrated the greater stupidity... speeding, splitting lanes at speed, not wearing proper gear ... or recording those actions and then posting them publicly.

Yes, that is why motorcyclists get a bad name and also why the statistics show motorcycling is less safe than most other forms of transportation

:mad: :mad:

The 2nd video is more what I would consider reasonable as well... Cars aren't going anywhere anyway, so not much chance of anyone 'suddenly' changing lanes.

That's no analogy; that's a different situation.

I recall that when riding in Europe (Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Norway), the 'cage' drivers were particularly aware of motorcycles and made an effort to give me extra room for splitting or passing... which I thought was pretty cool... seemed like drivers were a lot more aware in general over there which was nice.

HA! And I thought Cali drivers were much more aware than the MidWesterners! :eek: Can you imagine being on a bicycle or motorcycle here?

I don't want to go there... literally and figuratively... :eek:

I can't vote because the choices are worded too extreme. I ride 18,000 miles a year to work. Lane splitting is not legal in NY but I do see applications for it. One of which is NOT splitting to move up 3 cars at every stop light. This is the same as cutting the line in the store, creates a drag race, and if 3 or more bikes split up to a light the later ones become an obstacle for cars that need to change lanes. If it is normal traffic and lights, stay in your lane. If the freeway becomes a rolling parking lot for miles on end every day, then it makes good social sense to let the bikes split at up to 10 mph speed difference and 25 mph max. If the speed of traffic goes above 25, get back in a lane.

The options are way too extreme. When done safely, I have no problem with lane splitting. In fact, when I'm in crawling traffic, I move over when I see a bike in my mirrors.

But I live in a land where there are a dozen bikes to every car, and lanes are just a smidge over seven feet wide. Everyone splits. It's chaos. Come up to an intersection and if you're first at the lights, you'll find twenty bikes slotted in line in front of you before it turns green. It turns into a bottleneck as not all bike riders have 600ccs of rip-snorting power under them.

And lastly, it's a matter of safety. As a road user, you have to ensure that people know you're there. If your vehicle is positioned where other road users don't expect it to be, and where others can't see you (that line between lanes is a blind spot in the mirrors), then you're in danger from people who don't have the presence of mind to map out where other road users are before merging or pulling out.

Best case scenario, I think, is a dedicated motorbike lane, but that might not work for you guys over there, where the bike:car ratio is more towards the car side.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIUTXIsJz3o

As long as it isn't this type of lane splitting I am fine with it... People wouldn't expect a peddle bike to sit in traffic and they are supposed to follow the same rules of the road...

That's true. The wording of it is such that there is a bias toward producing a favorable result.

How do you feel about lane splitting motorcyclists?

Doesn't bother me. Natural selection will kick in eventually :)

I rode year round in CA for several years so, naturally, I regard myself as an expert on this matter... ;)

In many cases, lane splitting is much safer than sitting, in line, in stop and go traffic. There's much less chance of being rear ended or having someone cut over into the open spot that you happen to be inhabiting. When cruising a little faster than traffic (at lower speeds), each time the motorcyclist moves up a position, they can time the move with other cars so that there's usually not an opportunity for a car to cut them off. When there is, there's also room for the bike to move w/ the car.

I've always thought that quiet bikes were more safe since cars move much less erratically when they don't know you're coming up behind them. :P It's always fun when a car notices you coming and moves over only to give someone else the pinch on the other side.

Regarding moving up three cars at an intersection... this is a pain if the rider stalls their bike and make everyone wait, but otherwise, its another safety thing. It's a lot less dangerous for a bike out in front of a pack of cars than it is riding in a big clump of cars. Out front, there are always multiple escape paths if a car does something wild.

I've heard the story about CHP being the reason why it's legal in CA. Those guys are like Samurai on two wheels, the way they can move through traffic and keep ahead of the game. I have so much respect for them.

a8ksh4 -

That's the story I'm repeating until told otherwise. Maybe the CHiPs TeeVee show passed the legislation, ;) .

CarloSW2