Top 5 Things We All Do That Can Kill Us
Cycling With the Flow of Traffic
One thing that I remember hearing when I was growing up was that you could tell a real New Yorker by the fact that, when crossing a one-way street, they’d only look one way. This impressed upon me, at a very young age, the fact that New Yorkers weren’t idiots. We knew traffic would be coming from one direction, we looked that way, and we crossed. We weren’t fucking rubes who had to look both ways no matter what. This has all changed with the increase in cyclists in this city, and the fact that many of them practice “salmoning” (riding against traffic), an act that makes me want to throw things at their spokes (even though I don’t, I have some self-control, though not a lot.) Anyway, I’ve always taken comfort in the fact that all those cyclists who ride against traffic will probably get hit by cars and, while I never want anything seriously bad to happen to them, maybe it will teach them to follow the rules of traffic and, by extension, society. Well! As it turns out, out of all the injured city cyclists, “more than 80 percent…rode with traffic flow.” Yet another example of how following all the rules will lead to nothing more than being a hood ornament for a taxi. Depressing. Be careful out there, everybody. Or, you know, don’t. It doesn’t seem to matter either way. We’re all fucked.
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