Bike lanes and stupid "smart" lights.

After finally getting badge access to the gym at work, I was able to bike today for the first time. I hadn't scoped out the route previously, as I had planned, but as it turns out, I have a great route. I was able to exit surbia via a bike path which the developers put in place to allow bikers and pedestrians to go through the dead end cul-de-sacs, and have a straight exit. After that I, had less than a mile on a busy street, but the right lane had plenty of room to bike without being disturbed, or disturbing the vehicle traffic. That lead to Folsom Blvd, which runs parallel to the freeway all the way to Folsom, where Intel is. Since it's next to the freeway, there's no traffic, because everyone is on the freeway. Plus, with the exception of a stretch of a couple of hundred meters, theres a nice think bike lane the entire 8 mile section I take. This took me under the freeway, past the off ramp (where everyone was exiting) and into the town. I didn't know what to expect here, especially with the heavy traffic. As it turned out Folsom Blvd. continued with a girthy bike lane, and took me right the road I needed, which was newly paved with a nice 5ft wide bike lane. Overall, of the 10 miles, at least nine had bike lanes without much traffic.

The one annoying part was when I was exiting my neighbor hood and had to go through the busy section. (Gas stations, fast food, you know, those areas) The stop lights here are "smart" lights which sense where cars are waiting, and change lights accordingly. Unfortuneatley, these lights don't sense bikes, which requires a biker coming from a side street onto the main street to go up onto the sidewalk and hit the pedestrian crossing signal in order to get a pause in traffic. Not very smart.