Manhole covers in bike lanes

superkenners

Cycling along bike lane coming home yesterday and the usual occurred, a driver thought there was big enough gap to turn left in front of me before I arrived at scene. There was a gap but I was going fairly fast so needed to slam on the brakes. 99% of the time this scenario is fine. But it there just been a mini downpour, so it was wet. And there were about three large manhole covers in the bike lane directly before the turn from main road to side road.

So bike disappeared from under me, dumping me on the tarmac and sliding toward the rear bumper of said car (which then drove off). Road rash on leg shoulder and massive bruise on arse which took impact. Wearing gloves saved palms luckily!

Odd tumble like this par for the course but was a bit annoyed by the proximity of so many manhole covers right before a potentially risky area. Iut's probably normal for utilities to be clustered in such areas I guess, but they could make a bit of an effort. It cant be beyond modern technology to devise a manhole cover that doesn't turn into ice upon contact with water can it?

Rant over.

roger_merriman

It is frustrating isn’t it, one section of segregated bike lane/path has anti moped etc poles which mean your forced over a manhole cover mid corner!

This said for my self the bike isn’t bothered MTB sized tyres even ones like Marthon plus that have a compound for durability than grip, but the ether way unlike the road bikes I’ve had in the past, doesn’t remotely want to step out, it’s been a ongoing campaign for motorbikers for essentially ever.

I agree it’s solvable just lack of interest.