driving in the city

The first time I drove in the city was this time, last year, to buy a bed.  It was scary - bicyclists weaving in and out of traffic, pedestrians passing through any available gap - a bike-car-pedestrian free-for-all.  My roommate, who came with me and navigated, made me promise that next time I would just pay for shipping.  I was sweating the whole way home.

Then I started biking in the city.  It is true: you need a head on a swivel, and my odds of dying (at least of blunt trauma) have probably significantly increased.  But now that I can see the rhythm and pattern in the craziness, it's a lot less stressful than when I started.  I am very aggressive now about taking the outside of a turning lane to make sure cars don't turn into me - it's a safety issue, and much better than being traffic-shy and getting hit by a driver.  It's safer to be bold and decisive when in the midst of traffic. Furthermore, biking fast or as close to the speed of traffic as possible gives drivers more time to react if I do make a mistake.

 On the other hand, I am picking up bad habits from other cyclists, although I refuse to do the turn into the crosswalk / dodge through traffic at red lights.

So I rented a pickup truck by the hour for round two: picking up a bookshelf.  This time, no sweat.  I had directions even though the place was just a few blocks away, because I knew the one-way streets required a bit of planning.  But the difference this year was that I didn't think it was any big deal.  I've been a cyclist and a pedestrian so I'm better able to predict what they will do, and I also try to be ultra-respectful.  But I've learned enough about city traffic to be much more comfortable driving.  In any case, in a car, I've got a seat belt and airbag and am surrounded by several hundred pounds of metal engineered to protect me.  The worst case scenario at city speeds is probably just a dent.  If I screw up on a bike, I could get hit by a car (or bus or truck).

So driving, no problem!  It helps that I've gotten pretty thick skinned about people honking angrily...