Just Riding Along
So, there I was: just riding along Sunday evening a little bit north of our fine "correctional" facility. A truck pulled up beside me and when I looked over a youngish Volker/Stevin (road construction folks) employee was looking through his open window. He appeared confused as to whether he was shocked, angry or just wanted to chat.
I pulled my headphones out: ``Pretty crazy to be riding on a road like this tonight, no?''
I shrugged, ``it's the only one around''. He considered this for a few seconds.
``Well, be careful,'' he said (sincerely, I'd say) and drove off towards the darkening clouds ahead. I double-checked that my rear light was on (it was).
I've recently been on somewhat of a criticise-Calgary kick for their lack of cycling infrastructure and, apparently, awareness (although they do have improving cycling as a political goal, according to themselves, although I've yet to see much evidence of this). I found it pretty interesting that some young kid apparently had no problem identifying a shoulder-less road as dangerous for cycling; the politicians in (alleged) control of the whole apparatus pay at least lip-service-level attention to cycling; cyclists are almost certainly interested in wider (or at least some) shoulders.
However, these dangling ends never meet; the giant machine known as the City's bureaucracy doesn't "know" what its minions know: new roads are being built right now by this very kid with no shoulders and I'll probably be riding on them when they're finished.