Mulger bill wrote:fatdudeonabike wrote:...none of the 4 voices I've heard calling today were of any use whatsoever.
But you did-by your own admission- hear them. QED.
You have-again, by your own admission-limited experience. Why are you so unwilling to learn from those who have so much more? Jeez, I've been into this cycle commuting lurk since 1996 and I've still got shedloads to learn. From any and everybody who has knowledge I lack.
And as I say, if I had've been talking to my friend, or if I'd actually needed to move over or anything, their voice would've been useless. If I'd been talking, I wouldnt have heard them, if I'd needed to do anything, I didn't have time.
And on your second point, I'm yet to hear a single good reason as to why having a bell on your bike is such a burden - so what am I supposed to be learning here? That I should remove my bell for the street cred when, in actuality, the only people who think this adds to street cred are douche bags? (And I thought I was doing this for fun, for exercise, and to beat the traffic - I didn't realise that image was supposed to be a consideration)
I don't need to learn that a voice is as effective as a bell, because quite simply - it's not. The road bike riders that are generally the ones that don't have a bell are travelling too fast for their voice to be of any use whatsoever.
If I'm travelling at 30km/hr and I bell someone, they can hear me from 50 metres. If they panic, I still have time to look after both of us. If I shout at them, they can hear me from maybe 10 metres, and if they panic, we're both screwed.
I may have only been riding for months rather than years, but I've ridden a lot, and I would've used my bell hundreds of times since I started - and this notion that people supposedly take offence to a bell is rubbish. People are happy that you were considerate of their safety.
There's a billion people here with cameras on their bikes - I'd love it if someone could show me a single example of a ped cracking it because they were belled.
Or if anyone can provide me a decent reason not to have one - which no one has.