Everyday an Adventure

[St0nkingByte]

Generally I think us motorcycling types don't look forward to riding over, around, or heaven forbid making turns across those temporary steel construction plates that they put on the roads. However being the lucky guy that I am I'll be getting plenty of practice dodging the metal plate because today the city paid me a visit and put one right at the end of my driveway!



I snagged a pic with my neighbor going by so you get a sense of scale, thats a huge metal plate, the picture doesn't do it justice. On either side I also get to zip around those groovy construction barriers.

This all started a month or two ago when they finished putting in the sidewalk you can see on the other side of the street. All that heavy equipment paying us a visit caused the street to sink about six to eight inches in front of the house next door to me. The city came out and investigated and found there is an air pocket above the storm/sewer lines that runs down my side of the street. They think all the way down the street. So they've blocked off half the street and put the steel plate at end of each driveways to spread the load as we go in and out of our driveways, presumably so we don't drop our cars through the street surface! I'll be rolling the dice and riding the motorcycle on the asphalt thank you very much

All in all though I'm pretty happy with how they handle it. A guy from the city came by and explained to us in person, house by house, exactly what is wrong, what they are doing, how they are doing it and left us an official letter explaining the problem and his card. This is in stark contrast to my previous life in Maryland where once they came along and ripped out the end of my driveway where it met the street and simply left. And when I say rip out the end of the driveway I mean a two foot deep hole that no car could go through.

[Gixxerdale]

The sidewalk looks odd to me, out in the street like it is. Do it on both sides and you'll have one narrow road. Are they bringing that corner curb out to meet the sidewalk?

Here in LA they like to put down 12 inches of asphalt around the perimeter of the plate before they set it in place! The end result is the plate 6 inches higher than the road! I stand on my pegs before crossing them. They give you a big jolt if you're not ready.

[St0nkingByte]

The sidewalk is part of a traffic calming project. One of my neighbors called the city I think every day for two years to get it

Basically our street is right around the corner from an elementary school and we're one of the few streets on which you can cross from one side of our large neighborhood to the other. Walking down our street was less fun before the sidewalk because you had to walk in the street itself and since its a way to transit from one side of the neighborhood to the other all these people are blasting by at 35mph trying to kill you. I always thought it ironic because they're the same people who give you dirty looks if you pull a u-turn in their blessed cul-de-sac while their kids around, like you're a baby killer or something.

I only moved here a couple years ago myself and I knew what I was getting myself into so I never got upset about the fast traffic but everyone else does of course.

Anyway to calm traffic and make things nicer they built that new sidewalk by ripping out the old curb and putting the new sidewalk in what used to be part of the street. This narrowed the street a bit as you can imagine and results in the weird transitions at each driveway. The first week after it was done the heathens across the way parked with one wheel up on the sidewalk

The city also put four of those spiffy semi-circle curb/island things in strategic locations which forces the street down to one car lane at four points, this makes it really hard for people to just blast down the street at 40mph because they have to dodge parked cars, the curbs, oncoming cars, etc. Doesn't bother me much since I'm on the bike most of the time I can always get by

[themeatmanlandry]

Dude . . . that's one strange town ya' got there.

[c50tiger]

Originally Posted by St0nkingByte

The city also put four of those spiffy semi-circle curb/island things in strategic locations which forces the street down to one car lane at four points, this makes it really hard for people to just blast down the street at 40mph because they have to dodge parked cars, the curbs, oncoming cars, etc. Doesn't bother me much since I'm on the bike most of the time I can always get by

I noticed when I was in Seattle a few weeks ago that some of the neighborhoods in West Seattle had roundabouts, which I personally think are loads better than having stop signs every block - but it might make life a bit more hectic for pedestrians