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Permalink Reply by skyrefuge on August 29, 2014 at 5:10am

Hey, I was in the jury pool for that trial. Was just about to be called up for questioning when they announced that they were settling. Too bad, since it would have been a really interesting case to me. Though I'm sure I would have been dismissed from the jury pool for knowing *far* too much about bicycling!

When I taught my girlfriend how to ride a bike, those "stop blocks" were among the first of the many dangers I taught her to be wary of (referencing that case of course). We now refer to them as "death posts".

I always wonder, would drivers really take their cars down bike paths if they didn't exist? Ok, having witnessed several cars on the LFP, I guess I know the answer. But I'd be curious to hear what the risk/benefit analysis was like whenever the decision was made to not include them on the LFP (or remove them from it?), and why most other trails haven't followed suit.

h' 1.0 said:

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2005-04-15/news/0504150130_1_bik...

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Permalink Reply by Kevin C Dormant on August 29, 2014 at 5:30am

Every time I ride past one of those things, I shudder. I'm glad you weren't more seriously injured/damaged.

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Permalink Reply by Fran Kondorf on August 29, 2014 at 5:34am

 John- I hope you didn't get seriously hurt.

My story-

I caught one a long time ago on the NBT, late at night on a stealth ride. I saw it at the last second and was able to just barely grab the front brake for a slow-motion, movie-style, "Nooooo!!" over the bars.

Luckily, I only suffered a little palm rash and a slight bend in my fork.

Headlight and gloves became standard kit immediately thereafter.

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Permalink Reply by Far'arned Retrogrumpalunkus #63 on August 29, 2014 at 5:36am

it seems that the number of maintenance vehicles I see on my weekday rides far outnumbers the possible private car owners who might accidentally venture onto these trails.  Usually these workers are driving the biggest diesel dually or double rear axle heavy-duty trucks that could possibly fit on these paths that were never designed to carry such weight.  Most of the asphalt paths that were built in the past were laid directly on the dirt or on a very thin substrate of gravel compared to a regular street that is designed to carry the loads.

Usually these workers are driving these huge trucks to pick up a few garbage bags worth of refuse from the cans on the trail, or trimming one single leaf off of the dense foliage that is impeding onto the paths, making them really narrow, and blocking site lines.  They definitely aren't there to patch the huge tree-root and rock lumps that their heavy-duty trucks are pressing down around and pushing up, and making horrible nearly invisible bumps that can be annoying and even dangerous to come across when riding.  

The extensive damage that we all see on these paths is not caused by bikes or peds.  It's caused by these big trucks driven on an almost daily basis by the "maintenance" workers.   Why they can't use lighter 1/2-ton pickup trucks or greenskeeper's golf carts instead is a mystery to me.  I guess it isn't cool to drive in a little tiny unmanly compact truck.  BIG multi-axle diesel dump trucks are cool...

Last year they cut and patched sections of the GBT near the Hubbard Woods Metra stop.  Their heavy equipment used for this did more damage along that entire section of the path than they fixed, and those poorly-done patches after a year are now worse than the path was before any "fix" was attempted.   There are a set of cuts and patches on the channel trail along McCormick that was done this spring, and they are so badly executed that it is almost comical.  Again, the area nearby seems like it was also damaged with the machinery they drove in there to fix it.  

There is an 18" diameter deep pothole on the section of the path a ways South of Lincoln that has been there for at least 3 years that I can recall without any fix attempted whatsoever other than some good Samaritan has painted bright spray paint around it every once in a while.  Perhaps it was the same kind soul who painted the ICE!!! markings on each side of the underpass of the North Branch Trail and the BUMPS AHEAD!!! and highlighted and circled HUGE bumps further south of there.  

But as long as nobody gets confused and accidentally drives a car down one of these paths, I guess the dangerous stop-blocks are worth the carnage they cause, even if many of them are left down most of the time anyhow by the big maintenance trucks that drive in daily. 

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