The more I try to get around Orlando by bicycle, the less simple riding a bike becomes.  I’ve enjoyed a great deal of freedom riding my bike–you have to love anything that makes you go “wheeeeeeee!” down a hill on a regular basis.  However, riding has also brought about a great deal of awareness.  It seems that so much, down to how and where you ride, becomes political.

I can’t say I thought anything at all about how Orlando was laid out prior to this challenge.  Sure, I was annoyed that it took me a minimum of 20 minutes to drive anywhere (including the local grocery store), but that was about the extent of my thoughts on the subject.  Of course now that I find a vast portion of the greater Orlando area inaccessible by bike or bus (practically-speaking), I think a whole lot about it.  In particular, I’ve been thinking a lot about rights to the road.

You will pretty much never find me riding in a bike lane, particularly with my children.  I understand that bike lanes vary by area, but the bike lanes I have seen in Orlando are useless to me.  They are only a few feet wide, which means cars are zipping past me only inches away.  I’m pretty sure that little white line separating us does nothing but tell them it’s okay to go on auto-pilot and zoom on by.   They also tend to end with absolutely no warning, which can be downright terrifying if you’re out in traffic and riding a road for the first time.  I’m not some hardcore dogmatic person; I’m a mother that takes the safety of her kids very seriously and, having ridden both ways, I believe claiming the lane is the safest way to ride in my area.  Well, at least until we get a better bike infrastructure but that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms.

I try to be respectful when riding the road; for example, I will wait for a gap in traffic before entering the roadway and on the rare occasion it’s necessary, I’ll pull over and let traffic pass if I’m holding up a line of cars. What never ceases to amaze me, though, is that 99% of the people that yell at me do so when I am riding on a 30-mph or lower speed road.

These people trying to intimidate me or harass me off what I would consider residential roads have really brought out the mama bear in me.  These are the streets that should be filled with kids out playing and riding their bikes, but we have become so focused on “getting there as fast as possible” that we’ve driven them right out of the streets.  It wasn’t all that long ago that I was a kid and I’m shocked by how different things are around here; I rarely see kids out riding, in spite of living within three miles of four different schools.  I’m taking a good look at some of the roads where I occasionally feel “in the way,” and I’m finding that many of them have driveways feeding directly into the street!

So Orlando drivers, beware.  I’m a mama bear on a mission to take back our streets and I will not feel intimidated on any street that should be safe enough for kids, even if you’ve deemed it to be a quick little shortcut.  Why don’t you slow down and really ask yourself how fast you think you ought to be able to go on a street like that?  You don’t have a right to turn every quiet street into a highway because you want to get home five minutes faster.  Please find another route or change your bad attitude because these streets belong to us and you’re impeding our quality of life.