Gone Intermodal!

Yesterday, I dragged my wonderful wife on a bike ride and picnic on White Rock Lake. I crammed a picnic blanket, a couple of sandwiches and some snacks and water for our trip into a very large pannier. Unfortunately, my wife was terrified to ride in the road. I tried my best to explain that the safest place for a cyclist is in the road, preferably well into the lane and not on the gutter where cars will try to pass with minimal distance. In spite of this, we both made it in one piece (should be no surprise there, riding in Dallas is very safe, and most drivers are very respectful) at the DART station on Pearl Street and rode up to the White Rock Lake station. The SLRV makes it easier to get a bike on and off the train, and even has bike racks, but these would prove impractical at rush hour. The trains were only moderately full and we had to inconvenience passengers just to get the bikes up.

I must make an admission that we did not ride on the street to get to the pedestrian bike path. I can see now why VCs do not like riding on the side walk, they were filled with debris and broken glass, and cars passed by at 40-50 miles an hour!

We finally navigated our way to the pedestrian bike path and rode down to a nice sunny spot on a hill with a great view of the lake and the activity below. People were out walking, jogging, biking, sailing, rowing and even kayaking! Nothing like a beautiful day in Dallas to bring everyone outdoors. On the ride up to the hill, my wife made an astute observation, "Riding [on the pedestrian path] is just as annoying as riding down the Katy Trail." I grinned ear to ear and offered to ride in the street, which was an unwelcome alternative.

I noticed a lot of cyclists out there on very expensive bikes riding both the trail and the road around the lake. It's easy to tell those who ride as a commute from those who just do this sort of thing for exercise. I don't ride a fancy bike, in part because I think it would fall apart on the terrible roads of inner city Dallas, but also because I don't need a $1,000 bike to get to work. My 'hybrid' $100 bike from WalMart (with a little work and modification: brakes were terrible and the spokes were in desperate need of adjustment to balance the wheel) does the job just fine. The other thing I noticed is that several of the cyclists out there failed to 'take the lane,' which is essential to bike safety on the roads. I guess they've never been in traffic before. It's fine to get out there and pretend to be Lance Armstrong for a while, but at least be safe about it.