farmdoc's blog post number 29

One reason I came to live in Tasmania was to ride my bike in what I believed was cycling heaven. But I haven’t ridden much at all. The reason? Log trucks. Most country roads here are infested with these monsters. They are tall, and their high loads make them inherently unstable. They are wide, and so they often overlie the centre line. They speed, because to their drivers time is money. This time pressure may explain why they are driven with intimidating hostility towards other road users – cars, other trucks even, and therefore of course bicycles. It is not one of life’s pleasures, I assure you, to be pedalling away at a brisk 30km/hour when a log truck roars up behind, slams on its exhaust brakes, and with a threatening growl drops down into a low gear. And their drivers, of whom I have seen several in my consulting room over the years, tend to be uneducated aggressive men with chips on their shoulders (pun intended). Yet despite all this, my local municipal authority, the Meander Valley Council, recently announced plans to become a world mecca for touring cyclists, with signage, podcasted touring routes, the works. I wish this initiative well, but it seems doomed to failure unless something is done to remove the log truck scourge.