Giant pot hole makes me crash

boytitan

100 W
Joined
Jan 7, 2017
Messages
235
Location
Buffalo Newyork
I am extremely pissed. A bus as buses usually do was hogging up the road so I go on the sidewalk so I can see whats in front of me. You know the down ramp on sidewalks yeah there is a giant pothole there in feet including length and deepness. I am talking a pothole big enough to wreck someone just running or walking this is going down hill by the way so you don't see it till you hit it.So of course i crash horribly go flying off my bike I have no helmet but I break fall well. Come up handle bars are twisted cellphones wrecked, Bike computers wrecked. Thank god I took my lights off my bike or those would be wrecked to. I am pissed is the only way I can sue for such property neglect is if I was seriously injured. It was in city limits and not someones private property Its a absurd sized hole. Soon as I put my other back upphone back online and fix up my bike I will take pictures.

And now I will be wasting the money for a new second e bike battery on a frocking new cellphone and bike computer due to stupid unkept sidewalks.

I live in buffalo ny for those wondering
 
Potholes season is arrived here too.
The worst time of the year to ride.
Streets like minefields, sand and dust from melting agents on corners, and car drivers who forgot to care about bikes in the last 3 months. :roll:

At least, you don't have to start a new riding season with a broken bone. Money comes and goes... When I crash without any injuries, I feel the euphoria of the surviver as soon as my bike is fixed. :!:
 
sorry about your accident. glad you are not hurt but having been in many crash's myself you need to be more aware and prepared for the unexpected. Do not take anything for granted and expect and plan for the worst and dress for accident's as in safety gear. Hope thing"s work out better in the future. good luck and keep riding.
 
So you're riding a motorcycle ON THE SIDEWALK, too fast to react to surface conditions, and you crash. And this is somehow not entirely your fault?
 
It's a cycle, with a motor. From previous posts, I know that the OP's bike isn't compliant with electric bicycle limitations.
 
Chalo said:
It's a cycle, with a motor. From previous posts, I know that the OP's bike isn't compliant with electric bicycle limitations.

Upon researching all e bikes are illegal in NY state. But the conditions of the pothole way so bad and since its a hill I can hit 25 mph on my road bike with 48,14 t gearing that I have to upgrade because i can probably hit 30 on 48,11 the same coulda happened on my road bike. Also I was pedaling and let go of the throttle since going down hill. Heck things woulda been worse for me on my road bike its not designed to take crashes like the mountain bike my e bike is built upon is. Mountain bikes are just built tankier.

Finally my e bike is legal in e bike terms where e bikes are legal its a 1000 watt front wheel hub motor with a top speed of 28 mph. The speeds above 28 mph are from me pedaling I did not get 30 mph on average till switching to a 11t rear cog and have room for better speed by switching my 42t front cog to a 48t or 52t. My bashing of low speed e bikes comes from the fact a cyclist or someone in great shape like me coming who actively competes in a different sport who likes bikes can almost equally or out perform the over priced low wattage e bikes. At the top of the power limit legal e bikes are fine thought the power limit should be increased to 1500 or 1200 watts.Then above that are e motorcycles. There should also be 2 classes of motorcycles for those highway capable and those that aren't highway capable but thats a whole different story.

Actually after doing math I was averaging 330 watts and improving since I was relying on muscle built from weight lifting, Running and the sport I am active in of Mix martial arts and lacked riding technique. There was room to grow. I truely believe I can get up to 400 watts by the end of next summer. Which means as a human I outperform a good amount of the junk being sold in stores.
 
Chalo said:
So you're riding a motorcycle ON THE SIDEWALK, too fast to react to surface conditions, and you crash. And this is somehow not entirely your fault?

Lol, pretty much this. It's never been legal to ride a bike on the sidewalk anywhere I've lived.
 
E-geezer said:
Chalo said:
So you're riding a motorcycle ON THE SIDEWALK, too fast to react to surface conditions, and you crash. And this is somehow not entirely your fault?

Lol, pretty much this. It's never been legal to ride a bike on the sidewalk anywhere I've lived.

It was for five seconds. On a one way street bus was in front of me robbing me of my view going slow on a street cars don't go slow on. I speed up to get in front of bus but the bus all of a sudden decides to go faster so let off my throttle and went to sidewalk and was going to immediately get off sidewalk. Can't dodge pot holes with bus in front of me....The more I think of it though the more I think I should probably not go on a street I have to actively dodge pot holes on going down hill thats one way.
 
I live in a city where sidewalk riding is legal except where posted otherwise. But it's still both inconsiderate and stupid to go faster than jogger speed on a sidewalk. Peds don't need that crap and drivers don't expect it. Not to mention there's all sorts of nonsense happening on sidewalks that would never pass muster in a traffic lane.

Anyway, the moral of the story is don't ride faster than you can make and execute Plan B. Maybe next time it's not a pothole. Maybe it's a stray dog, runaway shopping cart, retarded child, puddle of spilled lard. If you don't have time to react appropriately, bad stuff follows. If that means you have to slow down, well...?
 
I generally do not use the sidewalks in Houston for one overriding reason: As bad as the street pavements are, the sidewalks are worse. To be honest I do use them at some wide intersections ... like crossing under an interstate.
 
Chalo said:
I live in a city where sidewalk riding is legal except where posted otherwise. But it's still both inconsiderate and stupid to go faster than jogger speed on a sidewalk. Peds don't need that crap and drivers don't expect it. Not to mention there's all sorts of nonsense happening on sidewalks that would never pass muster in a traffic lane.

Anyway, the moral of the story is don't ride faster than you can make and execute Plan B. Maybe next time it's not a pothole. Maybe it's a stray dog, runaway shopping cart, retarded child, puddle of spilled lard. If you don't have time to react appropriately, bad stuff follows. If that means you have to slow down, well...?

Agreed. I'd just add that unless the whole area is covered in water, there's no such thing as an invisible pothole, so not paying good enough attention could also be the stupid root cause, with the stupidity of having a cellphone mount on anything with wheels being the likely trigger.
 
Sounds like a completely preventable thing if the rider had used caution and followed the rules of the road. Glad you're ok, but shit happens. Learn from it and move on. 8)
 
John in CR said:
Chalo said:
I live in a city where sidewalk riding is legal except where posted otherwise. But it's still both inconsiderate and stupid to go faster than jogger speed on a sidewalk. Peds don't need that crap and drivers don't expect it. Not to mention there's all sorts of nonsense happening on sidewalks that would never pass muster in a traffic lane.

Anyway, the moral of the story is don't ride faster than you can make and execute Plan B. Maybe next time it's not a pothole. Maybe it's a stray dog, runaway shopping cart, retarded child, puddle of spilled lard. If you don't have time to react appropriately, bad stuff follows. If that means you have to slow down, well...?

Agreed. I'd just add that unless the whole area is covered in water, there's no such thing as an invisible pothole, so not paying good enough attention could also be the stupid root cause, with the stupidity of having a cellphone mount on anything with wheels being the likely trigger.

My cellphone is a second speedometer or used as a camera for recording. Also taking screen shots of my speeds at the end of trips.

Anyone saying they woulda been attentive enough to avoid this is full of it. Now that I remember exactly what happened for1 I was at a stop sign I stopped early for. 2 looked both ways before crossing noticed the bus blocking my view was going fast question if it even stopped but I was relieve to see it turn in go on the other street. For 3 after making sure all is clear I actually did hit the throttle here because I was going back on the street since the bus was gone and then boom its like the ground stopped existing.

There are even tire tracks from cars in that hole. Thats just flat out neglect from the city.

Thats not even the entire lenght of the hole. Ill take another pic when my new phone gets in the mail. If I rode in the shoulder lane on that street on that particular street which is New York state law id be toast if I were to have to come to a stop there. Since its at the bottom of a decent its not noticeable even when looking till you are on the other side or already know its there. Which explains why there are tire tracks from unsuspecting drivers. Actually the sidewalks fine had I just went straight and not tried to go back on the street nothing would have happened its turning to go back into the road where its messed up. More accurately its a pot hole in the street that goes into the sidewalk somewhat.
kimg0810.jpg
 
Your crash is very much like mine. I was doing 20mph in a 25, and i had a car in front of me and a car behind me, and i was in the car lane since no bike lane was available.

There was a small hill, and after the hill there was a train track that intersected the road at about a 2-3 degree angle. I only had a few seconds to react, because i did not know of this train track in advance..

I had 3 options:
1) brake unexpectedly and hope that the car behind me notices and doesn't run me over. ( not likely, a lot of people drive and play with cell phones these days. )
2) Ditch the bike and fall on a bunch of dirt and sharp rocks to the right of me. Ouch.
3) Try to cross the train track at an angle that would prevent my wheels from being sucked in to the track.

Knowing that i had a 2.75" motorcycle tire out back and a 2.5" hookworm up front, i chose option #3.

Nope, all 250lbs of me flew onto the ground at 20mph as the 4" track gap sucked it in. Some guy peeled me off the road.. and i rode my bike home without pedaling, all bloody..

And that crash damaged my left side so badly that i has troubles walking and standing for 2 years.. i had to lose weight so that i could do physical therapy, because moving was too painful to even begin. I lost 80lbs doing a low carb diet within a year.. no kidding.
Then, it took a year of physical therapy, plus 2 years of doing a DIY physical therapy routine ( much cheaper ) at the gym to get my leg functionality back to 70% of what it once was. I'm still slowly eking out a percentage point or two here and there today.

It's been a 4 year healing journey.. but it was worth fighting. The image of me becoming one of those superfat people in the motorized scooters who couldn't walk was the only thing giving me determination to continue. I had a string of doctors and physical therapists that were almost useless and i had to figure this out myself by experimenting and reading.

You are very lucky that you got away with not wearing a helmet. Bless physics :lol: hope you heal up soon and don't have things as bad as i did.
 
boytitan said:

It looks like a heavily loaded truck had to cut that corner sharp and compressed the dirt. It's about 12-14 inches at the deepest part of the lip, right?
I don't want to kick you while you are down, but a skilled rider on a mountain bike should not have crashed at this scene. A large unexpected curb with a deep gutter or a small drop/ditch on a trail would have crashed you just as easily it seems.

What I would do:
1. Quit whining and blaming someone/thing else, because this terrain feature didn't make you crash. You did.
2. Go back to this scene and try to ride up and down through this rut at various speeds and master it. Next time you will not be caught off guard and will have the timing and muscle memory down to know how to stand up on the pedals, pull up on the bars, and transfer your weight to roll, hop, jump something like this at almost any speed.

You need to be mad at yourself for not having the required experience and skill for the conditions and speed you were traveling. Nothing else.
 
I've been in a couple of crashes. It hurt both times. I always wear helmet and gloves now. I also use fat tires on my street ebike, and I bail out from the street and onto the sidewalk when cars try to kill me. I've never been hassled by the cops or pedestrians for avoiding cars by going onto the sidewalk. Maybe that's just my town, and I have to trust that others will do what they have to do?...

Someday I will live in a town that has well-maintained bicycle paths, but until then...I will run tires on my commuter that are fat enough that I can ram a curb and go over it without damage to the rim.
 
ecycler said:
boytitan said:

It looks like a heavily loaded truck had to cut that corner sharp and compressed the dirt. It's about 12-14 inches at the deepest part of the lip, right?
I don't want to kick you while you are down, but a skilled rider on a mountain bike should not have crashed at this scene. A large unexpected curb with a deep gutter or a small drop/ditch on a trail would have crashed you just as easily it seems.

What I would do:
1. Quit whining and blaming someone/thing else, because this terrain feature didn't make you crash. You did.
2. Go back to this scene and try to ride up and down through this rut at various speeds and master it. Next time you will not be caught off guard and will have the timing and muscle memory down to know how to stand up on the pedals, pull up on the bars, and transfer your weight to roll, hop, jump something like this at almost any speed.

You need to be mad at yourself for not having the required experience and skill for the conditions and speed you were traveling. Nothing else.

Its like you missed the part where i said its not visible from up high. You can prepare from what you can't see. Now that I know its there can I crash again no. Clearly more pics are needed but can't be taken now since now is covering it. Its over a foot deep where it starts.
 
boytitan said:
Its like you missed the part where i said its not visible from up high. You can prepare from what you can't see. Now that I know its there can I crash again no. Clearly more pics are needed but can't be taken now since now is covering it. Its over a foot deep where it starts.

You surely saw it right before the ensuing panic and wreck or you were not practicing SIPDE! So you came from the side walk and dropped off into the rut... something like a curb or dirt curb made by a truck is reasonable to expect at a sidewalk to road transition. It was not a 2+ foot sinkhole or open manhole cover in the middle of the bike trail at night - which I would call just bad luck. The title of your post and your description clearly show that you take no responsibility for the crash. This was a fixed feature of the terrain you were riding, not someone hiding in the bushes and shoving a broom handle in your spokes, or an animal that darted in front, or a car driver ramming you from behind.

Please reread the end of my post. You were either going too fast for the conditions and/or your skillset. Please do not make yourself out to be a hapless victim of your own decisions and actions - you will learn and progress a lot quicker. I do feel for you and am sorry you got hurt and broke your stuff. That really sucks, but it is a small price to pay compared to broken bones or head trauma and a lot of hospital bills. I have had my fair share of wrecks and large associated bills and costs and they helped me considerably to change the way I approach things. The advice I am giving sounds harsh, but it will help you to consider this perspective.
 
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