Cycling to work

Since I’ve been back to work (from parental leave) I’ve been trying to cycle in as much as possible. Unfortunately I don’t get as much chance as I’d like to (I’d cycle every day if I could) since dropping Liam off at daycare necessitates me driving on those days. Better one or two days a week than none though I guess.

Here are some observations I’ve made during my commute to/from work on the bike:

A lot of drivers just don’t know how to deal with a bike on the road. Some are overly aggressive (angry that they have to share the road I guess) and some are overly ‘polite’ to the point of disregarding the rules of the road by trying to give you right-of-way when you shouldn’t have it. Both of these types of drivers drive me nuts – and I think more-so the ‘polite’ drivers! Of course I’m not that surprised, a lot of people have a hard enough time following the rules when simply sharing the road with other cars so…

The saving grace of my trip to/from work is that, if I choose to, I can travel on bike paths for nearly 100% of the ride. I have been doing that for my trips to work – but I switch it up on the ride home and end up being on the road for maybe 20-30% of the ride. The only problem I have with taking the bike path all the way to work is that there is a section of the path that is currently closed (due to railway traffic) that I need to skirt around. The skirting around involves getting off my bike and carrying it around the fence they have put up – not that big of a deal but a bit of a pain.

This morning I opted to take the alternate route to work and I ran into an unusually large number of the above mentioned ‘polite’ drivers. Unfortunately this slows me down because I absolutely refuse to take the right-of-way when it’s not mine to take. Anyways, here’s hoping that things get better.

While I’m on the subject, I’ll talk a bit about what I’m using as my ‘commuter’ bicycle. I’ve got a road bike that I bought about a year and a half ago that I use for rides in Gatineau, etc and I didn’t want to take that into work. I was a bit worried about it getting stolen and using that would mean that I’d have to use roads the entire way there – not that big a deal, but it takes away some flexibility. I’ve also got a new-to-me full suspension mountain bike that I picked up around the same time that I got the road bike. I didn’t want to use it for commuting with either because I didn’t want it to get stolen either and also with it being a full suspension bike, there would be a lot of wasted energy on the ride. I did have one other bike in my possession – an old green Norco mountain bike that was given to me a long time ago and I didn’t really use much. I decided this would be the one.

I was planning to take off the knobby tires and install ’slicks’ but after talking to another guy here at work I decided to leave the knobby tires on. He had tried slicks for a few months but after suffering an extraordinary number of flats, he switched back to his knobby tires and has been fine since. Since I wasn’t too concerned about speed – my knobby tires would be fine. So far so good. :)

As for cargo transportation – I started out using a backpack that I already had but quickly realized that it just wasn’t big enough. As a result, I decided that I’d have to buy a larger one – preferably one that had space for a hydration system. I found a couple of different bags I was going to check out at MEC but then I asked Steve what he would recommend. Steve suggested I go with a rack and panniers. I was concerned about cost – but it looks like I can get a decent set up with lots of space (more than I would have gotten in a backpack) for under $100 so that’s my current plan. The bonus is that I wont have to wear a pack which means my back will stay drier. :)

I’m glad I finally got around to taking the initiative to cycle to work. I don’t get to cycle as much as I’d like to so this helps a bit in that regard. As an added bonus I am also saving on gas and wear and tear on the new vehicle. :)