River Trail Safety, Etiquette

* Re “Bicyclists Celebrate Completion of River Trail,” Oct. 10.

Like many avid bicyclists, I am excited about the opening of the new six-mile stretch of the Ventura River Trail linking the Ojai Valley with the coast. Presumably, now I will have a safe and comfortable ride down from my home in Oak View to the beach, right? Wrong.

As any serious bicyclist will tell you, bicycling on the Ojai Valley Trail is anything but safe and comfortable. Although I stay to the far right of the trail, use hand signals and alert upcoming pedestrians and other cyclists to my presence well in advance, I find myself in some sort of dangerous or uncomfortable situation almost every time I ride.

The most frequent problem is parents who decide to take their children out for a bike ride without teaching them proper bike path etiquette. Often I will come around a corner to find an entire family spread out across the path, sometimes at a standstill. Parents must teach their children to stay to the right in single file and to park at the far right, if they must stop at all.

But it is not only children who are guilty of this type of rude behavior. Almost every day, I come across two or three adults riding beside one another, taking up the entire path. This is fine and quite understandable; however, people must be alert to the cyclist behind them who is calling, “Passing!” or, “On your left!” and move into single file as soon as possible.

Having narrowly missed being involved in bike accidents several times, I finally gave up on the bike path altogether and took to the streets. Unfortunately, while riding up past Foster Park one day toward Lake Casitas (well to the right of the white line, I might add), I was saddened to see a woman lean out of her car window and cry, “We just built you a $4-million bike path!”

I suppose she has a point, but until the people of Ventura County learn proper bike etiquette, as well as some basic consideration for others, I and my bike will not frequent our expensive new trail.

MELISSA ROMERO

Oak View