All right, it's official: I'm making the call.

As some of you know, I have a fair amount of rush-hour commuting experience--more than 100,000 miles on three bikes by my calculations. All seasons, all [California] weather. So I'm giving myself permission to make the official call:

The inherent risk of commuting by motorcycle has increased to the point that all the control activities (strategies, skills, gear) that rational riders take to mitigate that inherent risk to an acceptable level can no longer bring the residual risk down to or below the rational rider's risk appetite.

Translation: Riding in commute traffic is now equivalent to riding on roads where a double-digit percentage of the drivers are drunk.

So, are you moving or switching to a cage?

What call did you make?? I iz confuzzled... riding during commute hours is dangerous. Riding a motorcycle is dangerous. Life is dangerous. So what are you gonna do about it?? Stop riding? Stop commuting? Stop living??

While I am also confused as to what call was made and who exactly got called this has a ring of familiarity to it. Did he not decide something similar to this a couple years ago?

Redfish Hunter said:

While I am also confused as to what call was made and who exactly got called this has a ring of familiarity to it. Did he not decide something similar to this a couple years ago?

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Are you making sense now? Pfft...

day-ja-voo all over again.

Doing what you do and where you do it is a self inflicted issue. Therefore it's yours to call it what you want. I think your risk assessment and management skills should be telling you to get the f#%k out.

I have always thought commuting in the city was nuts but I ride in deer country.

After near misses and a few hits I'm not so sure anymore but the country is better looking than the city.

Save the Feejeer for the fun stuff.

'rational rider', 'jumbo shrimp', military intelligence', 'rap music', & etc

Not talking about myself or my attitude or what I plan to do about it. I'm making an observation about the environment, similar to saying "Oakland has become more violent." The commute environment has changed, significantly. The inherent risk is now similar to riding on Saturday night after the bars close. It didn't used to be at that level of inherent danger.

Bugnatr said:

I have always thought commuting in the city was nuts but I ride in deer country.
After near misses and a few hits I'm not so sure anymore but the country is better looking than the city.

Save the Feejeer for the fun stuff.

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I believe the rural twisties can be a lot more dangerous than urban riding; well, certainly more dangerous than riding on the freeway, when everyone is going in the same direction. On the twisties there's a multitude of threats just right around the corner, like sand, falling rocks, tractors backing up, vehicles crossing the DY into us, pedestrians, animals, etc., combined with the irresistible temptation to ride way over our heads, thereby crashing into all that sh*t right around the corner, or running off the road because we "wrote a check our skills can't cash" (hopefully when a truck isn't coming round the bend).

silver spirit said:

'rational rider', 'jumbo shrimp', military intelligence', 'rap music', & etc

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I coined the term "rational rider" to indicate a rider who thinks and cares about taking measures to lower the risk of injury, not like the ass-hat who passed me coming home tonight at about 95 MPH into a sea of brake lights. It's like philosophy's "man on the street" or the Law's "reasonable person"; that's all.

James it sounds to me like you need to sell your bike and find some other form of transportation and recreation. No place left for you to comfortably ride.

bigjohnsd said:

James it sounds to me like you need to sell your bike and find some other form of transportation and recreation. No place left for you to comfortably ride.

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I didn't say I thought twisties were too dangerous for me to ride; I said I think they're more dangerous than riding the freeway. But I seldom ride for fun (recreation) anymore; haven't in about a year and a half. That's more to do with preferring to spend my time doing more productive things around the house than any perception of riskiness. I find that as soon as I get out in the country, I just want to be home working on one of my projects. So I just use the bike for cheap transportation, which I can occasionally use for a get-your-ya-yas-out ride. My decision to keep the bike is also largely a function of--I hate driving a car a lot more than I hate having to deal with cagers.

James Burleigh said:

...the official call:

The inherent risk of commuting by motorcycle has increased to the point that all the control activities (strategies, skills, gear) that rational riders take to mitigate that inherent risk to an acceptable level can no longer bring the residual risk down to or below the rational rider's risk appetite.

Translation: Riding in commute traffic is now equivalent to riding on roads where a double-digit percentage of the drivers are drunk.

Click to expand...

James Burleigh said:

...I hate driving a car a lot more than I hate having to deal with cagers.

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I thought it was going to be a case of "If you can't beat them, join them".

Tyler said:

Redfish Hunter said:

While I am also confused as to what call was made and who exactly got called this has a ring of familiarity to it. Did he not decide something similar to this a couple years ago?

Click to expand...

Are you making sense now? Pfft...

Click to expand...

I thought I was. But if it was not clear...

I was saying that while his post made no clear sense, the whining about the danger seems to be a recurring theme with this man. He did post a couple years ago about how dangerous commuting on his bike was. We talked him out of hanging up his helmet.

If the man is that uncomfortable and that frightened of riding, perhaps all concerned would be safer and better served by him selling his bike.

Redfish Hunter said:

Tyler said:

Redfish Hunter said:

While I am also confused as to what call was made and who exactly got called this has a ring of familiarity to it. Did he not decide something similar to this a couple years ago?

Click to expand...

Are you making sense now? Pfft...

Click to expand...

I thought I was. But if it was not clear...

I was saying that while his post made no clear sense, the whining about the danger seems to be a recurring theme with this man. He did post a couple years ago about how dangerous commuting on his bike was. We talked him out of hanging up his helmet.

If the man is that uncomfortable and that frightened of riding, perhaps all concerned would be safer and better served by him selling his bike.

Click to expand...

Maybe Hans is just making observations, this is a dangerous sport and we should all remember that.

James Burleigh said:

I didn't say I thought twisties were too dangerous for me to ride; I said I think they're more dangerous than riding the freeway. But I seldom ride for fun (recreation) anymore; haven't in about a year and a half. That's more to do with preferring to spend my time doing more productive things around the house than any perception of riskiness. I find that as soon as I get out in the country, I just want to be home working on one of my projects. So I just use the bike for cheap transportation, which I can occasionally use for a get-your-ya-yas-out ride. My decision to keep the bike is also largely a function of--I hate driving a car a lot more than I hate having to deal with cagers.

Click to expand...

Sounds about like me. My last ride out into the country for fun, all I wanted to do was go home and keep teaching my kiddo to ride his bicycle, so I took the first route back home and did that. I do so hate commuting in my car though.

Panman said:

Redfish Hunter said:

Tyler said:

Redfish Hunter said:

While I am also confused as to what call was made and who exactly got called this has a ring of familiarity to it. Did he not decide something similar to this a couple years ago?

Click to expand...

Are you making sense now? Pfft...

Click to expand...

I thought I was. But if it was not clear...

I was saying that while his post made no clear sense, the whining about the danger seems to be a recurring theme with this man. He did post a couple years ago about how dangerous commuting on his bike was. We talked him out of hanging up his helmet.

If the man is that uncomfortable and that frightened of riding, perhaps all concerned would be safer and better served by him selling his bike.

Click to expand...

Maybe Hans is just making observations, this is a dangerous sport and we should all remember that.

Click to expand...

The bottom line is that we have to rely more now on what I call the "luck factor"--when you can't do any more to reduce the inherent risk of an activity to within your comfort zone, then you have to rely on a greater proportion of luck that bad juju won't happen. When I was riding home last night on the freeway, I swear to god I've never seen so many people talking on phones, hitting their brakes for no reason, weaving in their lane, and randomly crossing over the lane stripes. To paraphrase a recent writer in Motorcyclist Magazine (or was it Cycle World?)--Cell phones are the most dangerous thing to happen to motorcycling ever! (That's what this thread is all about, BTW.)