[HN Gopher] Skoda DuoBell: A bicycle bell that penetrates noise-...
___________________________________________________________________
Skoda DuoBell: A bicycle bell that penetrates noise-cancelling
headphones
Author : ra
Score : 577 points
Date : 2026-04-08 08:50 UTC (1 days ago)
HTML web link (www.skoda-storyboard.com)
TEXT w3m dump (www.skoda-storyboard.com)
| andrewshadura wrote:
| The problem with headphones is not noise cancellation. It's the
| fact they play music.
|
| My regular Widek bell penetrates ANC, but when there's music, ANC
| or not, it's hard to hear. I'm struggling to believe the claims
| this bell is going to be significantly better.
| croemer wrote:
| If this bell gets through ANC then yes it will help people with
| ANC. It's not an all or nothing situation, you hear it further
| away for each increase in loudness.
|
| Also, ANC let's you reduce your music volume for the same
| signal to noise ratio.
| 9dev wrote:
| Every single person that stops and looks due to this is a win
| in my book.
| andrewshadura wrote:
| > In real-world trials conducted on the streets of London in
| February, in cooperation with Deliveroo couriers, the bell proved
| so effective that couriers expressed a desire to keep it.
|
| Of course they would, because a lot of them either don't have any
| bell, or have a shitty ping-ping bell that doesn't produce good
| sound.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Or could sell it on eBay for an amount of money that's
| nontrivial from POV of a gig economy worker.
| yigalirani wrote:
| nice but it wont help with isolating earbuds
| criemen wrote:
| Pretty cool if true!
| eamag wrote:
| Is it available for sale?
| croemer wrote:
| Video version which has more detail than the text:
| https://youtu.be/zDaVPfpQvPI?is=sSyjXf07r9cg9r4Y
|
| Bit cringe marketing though.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| I find the "Heard five seconds earlier, the difference between
| a serious collision and stepping aside" take hilarious. As if
| there is no other way to prevent a collision in five seconds
| other than the pedestrian getting out of the way.
|
| As much as I get the urge to plow through pedestrians on bike
| paths (and stay proudly in the way of bikes on pedestrian
| paths), in real life, normal people don't do that kind of
| thing. Bikes have brakes for a reason.
| croemer wrote:
| But if you go at 40km/h the time goes down to one or two
| seconds!
| Alex_L_Wood wrote:
| Yeah, this while video I honestly couldn't stop chuckling
| because it's built on assumption that bicycles somehow either
| can't brake at all or will take five business days to brake
| like a freight train. Though looking at Berlin cyclists the
| assumption seems to be true - so many of them insist on just
| plowing headfirst into an obstacle instead of braking that I
| start to think that the video was made by one of such
| cyclists.
| laweijfmvo wrote:
| absolutely filled with misleading "science" and outright lies,
| so they can charge a premium for a bell.
| leni536 wrote:
| So it's tuned to a specific frequency at 780Hz? And that defeats
| all/most ANC?
| KeplerBoy wrote:
| That's the interesting bit. Is this a known / agreed upon
| feature of ANC headphones or just a property of a specific
| iteration of let's say airpods?
| ai_slop_hater wrote:
| How about cyclists stop cycling on sidewalks?
| Faaak wrote:
| not all of them do
| JensKnipper wrote:
| What if they are shared?
| madjam002 wrote:
| A lot of footpaths in Europe are designated paths that are
| shared with cyclists
| crooked-v wrote:
| Well, sure, as soon as infrastructure exists so the alternative
| isn't "get run over by a homicidal driver". And actual
| infrastructure, not painted lines that typically get filled up
| with double-parking cars.
| 9dev wrote:
| I don't know where you're from, but in Germany for example,
| there are countless situations where cyclists and pedestrians
| share the same space, or pedestrians can (or just do...) cross
| bicycle lanes. I'm a very law-abiding cyclist since witnessing
| a few horrible accidents, and yet I encounter situations with
| headphone-wearing pedestrians regularly. Often I'll ring my
| bell to no avail, until driving right up to them, and they
| still won't hear me. This is really frustrating; I'm definitely
| in the market for this.
| ai_slop_hater wrote:
| I am aware that most countries do not have dedicated roads
| for cyclists, but that doesn't mean that cyclists should be
| using sidewalks. When I go out and walk on the sidewalk, I
| expect to be able to just walk safely without having to think
| about potential riders of bicycles or other things that
| people ride on sidewalks.
| eru wrote:
| > I am aware that most countries do not have dedicated
| roads for cyclists, but that doesn't mean that cyclists
| should be using sidewalks.
|
| Huh? Germany has signs on same shared pavements that tell
| you that by law your bike needs to be on there, not on the
| road.
|
| Are you suggesting people break the law over your
| preferences?
| ai_slop_hater wrote:
| Then it's a stupid law. But from the image that other
| commenter gave, it does look like Germany has space that
| is clearly intended for cyclists, and I have no issue
| with that. I have issue with instances when people cycle
| on sidewalks intended for pedestrians.
| 9dev wrote:
| It's not always as clearly demarcated as on that picture;
| sometimes there's just a sign.
|
| I would also argue that a reasonably broad way for
| pedestrians and bicyclists can be shared without any
| issue, if both parties pay some modicum of attention to
| their surroundings and treat each other with mutual
| respect: Pedestrians by keeping to the right side of the
| path, and cyclists by slowing down when overtaking and
| ringing the bell to let people know they are approaching.
| eru wrote:
| Also: kids under a certain age are generally required to
| cycle on the footpath. They need bells, too.
| kuerbel wrote:
| No he meant this: https://www.fahrradstadt-
| braunschweig.de/wp-content/uploads/...
|
| Left side is for bicycles. Right side for pedestrians. It
| is a dedicated lane but a shared space.
| eru wrote:
| They have other signs, where there's no dedicated lane
| either.
| keybored wrote:
| > I'm a very law-abiding cyclist since witnessing a few
| horrible accidents, and yet I encounter situations with
| headphone-wearing pedestrians regularly. Often I'll ring my
| bell to no avail, until driving right up to them, and they
| still won't hear me. This is really frustrating; I'm
| definitely in the market for this.
|
| I'm guessing some law (law-abiding) gives you the right to
| bother people who are using their own feet instead of wheels
| because you want to pass them and they should have to
| actively watch out for you and yield to you? Okay, that part
| is fine. But I don't see how it is nice or, I dunno, ethical.
|
| In my experience (in my locale) as a cyclist you either give
| pedestrians a wide enough berth, dismount so that you can
| pass them if it is crowded and there is no passage, or use
| the vehicular road.
|
| I remember violating this one time when I belled someone that
| I wanted to pass on the sidewalk. But I was a child at the
| time. Even more self-centered than I am now.
|
| These seeming rules for yielding to cyclists are worse than
| the laws and norms when cars interact with bicycles, by the
| way. At least where I am: cars never honk cyclists. They have
| to wait for them or find a window to pass them safely. They
| can't honk them into the ditch or something.
| 9dev wrote:
| > I'm guessing some law (law-abiding) gives you the right
| to bother people who are using their own feet instead of
| wheels because you want to pass them and they should have
| to actively watch out for you and yield to you? Okay, that
| part is fine. But I don't see how it is nice or, I dunno,
| ethical.
|
| No. There are just people who will walk on a designated
| bicycle lane because they haven't seen the signage, are
| ignorant or careless about it, or will just cross it to get
| somewhere else. All while wearing ANC headphones. This
| isn't about bothering someone, but warning them. It's
| really no different from someone jaywalking without seeing
| you, and honking to make them aware of that. Or are you
| supposing you'd just break and wait until they're finished
| crossing the street?
| keybored wrote:
| I totally agree in the context of bicycle lanes.
|
| Sorry. Apparently I didn't read your comment carefully
| enough.
| egormakarov wrote:
| If just slowing down helps to prevent an accident, not sure
| what the bell would be good for - except for signaling your
| frustration to everyone around you
| bayindirh wrote:
| e.g.: In Amsterdam you _cross_ biking lanes to cross the roads
| sometimes, or bike lanes and sidewalks are so integrated, you
| can wander into them without noticing.
|
| Being tired in a crowded street in rainy weather doesn't help
| either.
| lwansbrough wrote:
| I think I'd prefer AI slop comments to comments like this.
| andrepd wrote:
| Agreed. Make bike paths and people cycle on bike paths. Crazy
| stuff I know!
| keybored wrote:
| Edit 2: I originally didn't think of the case when you want to
| warn pedestrians that you are passing (without asking them to
| give way) _in case_ they decide to switch direction without
| looking if there is any incoming entities. That seems
| legitimate to me. Although giving a wide enough berth might be
| better than doing it routinely (that could amount to a lot of
| noise eventually).
|
| Edit: Since people seem to go either way: It is my
| understanding that in my part of the world (in Scandinavia)
| cyclists do _not_ have the right of way on sidewalks (which
| means they can't bell people away). They also (and I know this
| one) do _not_ have the right of way while cycling across road
| crossings. Something that most cyclists, in my experience,
| violate all the time.
|
| Quite. It drives me up the wall when cyclists not only use the
| sidewalk close enough to me to practically graze me
| (pedestrian), but expect me to actively pay attention and yield
| to them. Use the road, dummy (there are scarce few bicycle
| lanes).
|
| I use regular headphones (not over-ear and not really noise
| canc.) on the sidewalk but take them off when I am crossing the
| street. And I of course am mindful of other pedestrians. But
| I'm not gonna take them off because some two-wheeler thinks
| they can ram into me unless I jump out of the way _on the
| sidewalk_.
| Topfi wrote:
| At least here in Austria, I honestly rarely, if ever, see them
| do that. Either roads or dedicated/mixed designated cycle
| paths. We do have enforcement even against cyclists, though
| more than anything, that catches all the "unlocked" e-bikes,
| because cycling on the sidewalks is not a thing anyone does.
|
| Even with bikes being off the sidewalk, there is need for a
| quick way of getting others pedestrians attention.
| bdavbdav wrote:
| This is always an odd one, as it's the people who look like
| they just found a bike in a skip and decided to ride around
| here that cycle on the pavements.
| thejohnconway wrote:
| As a cyclist in London, I've hit one pedestrian: they stepped
| backward(!) into a cycle lane. I had nowhere to go, as there
| was a curb on the other side. Pedestrian behaviour is just
| totally wild with respect to cycle lanes, a lot of them are
| just totally oblivious. If you cycle, you will come across
| people walking along or stepping into dedicated cycle lanes
| several times during the average commute.
| venzaspa wrote:
| I'm often a pedestrian and I've been known to walk into the
| road where there are bikes and cars also.
| Markoff wrote:
| this was not really an issue before food delivery apps came
| into fashion
|
| btw. kids up until certain age can pretty much in all countries
| ride bike legally on sidewalk, are there any countries where
| 8yo can't ride bike on sidewalk?
| gs17 wrote:
| It's a problem in the US where bicycle food delivery is
| really rare. Even in places with good bike lanes, they'll
| often prefer the sidewalk because if there is some sort of
| obstacle in the bike lane (e.g. a car that parked illegally),
| it won't jump out of the way for them like a pedestrian with
| a sense of self-preservation, which would mean they might
| have to slow down.
| dbg31415 wrote:
| Just when you thought interacting with cyclists couldn't get any
| more annoying... introducing the Skoda DuoBell! New from Mattel!
| Oras wrote:
| Over engineering in real life, solving lack of common sense by
| introducing a solution where the cyclist is paying.
|
| I think the solution is nice for sure, but solving the wrong
| problem.
| fnands wrote:
| Eh, it's pragmatic.
|
| It's replacing a problem you can't solve (human stupidity),
| with one you can (a better bell).
| paganel wrote:
| Why can't the cyclists slow down when they see that there's a
| human obstacle in front of them?
| bdavbdav wrote:
| In the roads near my office (central London), which are
| seldom used by cars, several pedestrians at a time very
| often walk down the road or diagonally cross the road head
| in phone. You can get very close and the still don't notice
| (the slower you are, the quieter you become so even less
| likely to hear you).
|
| I'm not sure arguing against a bell is helpful - people
| need to look on any road, especially with the advent of
| quiet electric cars.
| paganel wrote:
| Sure is helpful, because it goes like this: pedestrians
| first -> then cyclists -> then motorists.
|
| You may notice that in this worldview (one which I find
| very hard to argue against) cyclists should give priority
| to pedestrians, no questions asked. I don't care about
| fancy bells or whatever, no-one takes those into
| consideration even when we (us, pedestrians, that is) can
| hear them because, and I repeat, cyclists are not as
| important as pedestrians are.
| tpm wrote:
| You may not care about fancy bells but you will care
| about loud honking close to your ears in my very recent
| experience from the streets of Shanghai. You don't have
| absolute priority just because you are a pedestrian.
|
| > Why can't the cyclists slow down when they see that
| there's a human obstacle in front of them?
|
| Because if the space is limited and they actually want to
| get somewhere, they just don't have time for that? And
| slowing down often means stopping and causing a traffic
| jam.
|
| Note that I mostly agree with what you wrote (and I give
| priority to pedestrians when I'm riding my bike) but
| there are different situations that have to be taken into
| account.
| paganel wrote:
| > they just don't have time for that?
|
| They for sure have time for that. When I drive my car
| can't use that as an excuse.
| tpm wrote:
| There is a number of differences between a car and a
| bike, including how pedestrians react to them. Also you
| probably (hopefully) don't drive your car on narrow
| sidewalks which in some cases is unavoidable for bikes in
| cities.
| gs17 wrote:
| > and I give priority to pedestrians when I'm riding my
| bike
|
| Even when you "actually want to get somewhere"?
| fleebee wrote:
| Where I live, generally if you're allowed to use a road
| or a lane, you have equal rights to others using it. On a
| road, cyclists have equal rights to motorists; on shared
| lanes, pedestrians don't have special rights and are
| expected to walk near the edge.
|
| Your worldview (mostly) applies to pedestrian crossings
| but that's the extent of it.
| bdavbdav wrote:
| I think that's probably quite a selfish world view (and
| also quite arrogant to claim your own view is hard to
| argue against - of course you would find it hard to argue
| against, that is moot...)
|
| When there is infrastructure to support all 3 kinds of
| users, it seems a lot more equitable for everyone to use
| the space cooperatively.
|
| I absolutely agree one should give way to more vulnerable
| road users, but that all 3 can have better outcomes
| (safety, speed of journey, efficiency etc) it all use it
| cooperatively and conscientiously.
|
| To labour the point, on shared cycle and pedestrian paths
| with a line down the middle, does a bell ring combined
| with slowing down to a safe speed not seem like an
| appropriate warning?
| dairylee wrote:
| We do slow down.
|
| I've lost count of the times I've been riding at walking
| pace behind someone, on a shared path, waiting to get past
| because they're completely oblivious to the bell ringing,
| politely asking, or even flashing lights.
| djtango wrote:
| Generally I am pretty accommodating of pedestrians and give
| them a wide berth but sometimes they do some pretty
| obnoxious things like walk six abreast or cut right in
| front of you erratically without looking.
|
| I have very little time for people who freely absolve
| themselves of their personal responsibility to be aware of
| their surroundings and we shouldn't be encouraging people
| to zone out of society just so they can consume more.
|
| I am comfortable cycling slower than walking pace and if I
| am in a real rush for speed I will cycle on the road but
| sometimes pedestrians can cause serious cycling accidents
| even when you're careful or slow.
| adriand wrote:
| There are often a LOT of human obstacles, and we have
| places to be! I slow down a bit but I don't have a lot of
| patience for total unawareness. I don't find this to be an
| issue with riding in the city because I ride on the road or
| in bike lanes. But when I go trail riding, it's very
| annoying when people take up the trail and do not hear or
| react to my bell. Sometimes the situation is such that it
| is difficult to stop or evade the person, such as during a
| technical descent. If you're out on the woods, there is
| really no excuse not to be aware of your surroundings.
| throw83940449 wrote:
| There is easy excuse, people expect other people to be
| rational, and to slow down a bit. Not to ride downhill at
| full speed.
|
| I heard "human obstacle" last time in carmagedon!
| inejge wrote:
| > Why can't the cyclists slow down when they see that
| there's a human obstacle in front of them?
|
| They usually do. (The considerate and/or non-
| confrontational ones. There are always idiots, and people
| have the tendency to remember negative outliers and project
| their behavior on the group as a whole, which is
| unfortunate.) However, slowing down isn't the whole story.
| Riding a non-motorized bicycle is much easier if the rider
| can keep moving, however slowly, so it would be considerate
| in turn for the pedestrian to step aside and let the
| cyclist pass, if possible. A distracted pedestrian can be
| warned by a bell.
|
| Separately, delivery riders as a category have an incentive
| to ride as quickly as possible, which is a recipe for
| conflict. Removing that incentive means removing or
| completely reimagining the service. I don't think that
| anybody has a solution or mitigation at present.
| pandaman wrote:
| Cyclists can slow down when there is an obstacle in front
| of them. But they cannot teleport away when a pedestrian
| runs into the side of the bike.
| tossandthrow wrote:
| Human stupidity? As in allowing too much noise in the cities
| to the extend that people need to protect their minds?
| throwaway132448 wrote:
| The stupidity that makes depriving one of your senses seem
| like a sensible thing to do in a busy chaotic environment.
|
| I don't actually mind people doing that though. What is
| annoying is the entitled attitude that there should be no
| consequence for that choice, and everyone else should
| orbit/compensate around their lack of situational
| awareness.
| piva00 wrote:
| Stockholm is a very quiet city, people still wear noise-
| cancelling headphones all the time.
| yladiz wrote:
| What is the right problem that should be solved here?
| exitb wrote:
| Better segregation of cyclists and pedestrians into their own
| spaces. The bell shouldn't be something that you use
| regularly.
| eru wrote:
| Depending on how much traffic there is, combining them is
| fine.
| exitb wrote:
| Yes, but I would consider it somewhat rude to use the
| bell in a space where both bikes and pedestrians are
| allowed. If it would be required to be used regularly,
| I'd say the path is badly designed.
|
| I used to commute to work by bike in ~1M city in Europe,
| mostly on dedicated bike lanes, but some shared, and had
| just the smallest, barely audible bell, only because it
| was required by law. I don't remember using it much at
| all. I don't know what the problem is. Maybe the
| Londoners should take a good look at themselves.
| eru wrote:
| Different folks have different preferences.
|
| I agree that on a footpath pedestrians should be treated
| as having priority.
|
| A semi-common way I use my bell: when on a shared
| footpath with plenty of space to take over, I often use
| my bell when I'm still ten meters away, so that I don't
| give pedestrians are heart attack by suddenly dashing
| right past them.
|
| (I have a nice ding dong bell. They don't seem to mind.
| It also helps that I often have a cheerful five year old
| in the back.)
| Mashimo wrote:
| But some bikers probably also use anc headphones, no?
| djtango wrote:
| Seen cyclists with overear anc headphones cycling on the
| road in london. Absolutely mad.
| PunchyHamster wrote:
| I do that. This was never a problem, as the ANC ones I
| used don't cancel every sound the same way.
|
| For example, I can go into datacenter and it will cancel
| all the datacenter noise(aside for when air blows
| directly into mic, it overdrives it) but I can still hear
| what other person is saying.
|
| Also I used them to generally listen to podcast so there
| was no wall of music to go thru, so sirens and such were
| easily discernable
| djtango wrote:
| You do you but as a cyclist you are super vulnerable to
| all manner of things and I'd never want to give up that
| kind of awareness.
|
| If you listen carefully you can usually hear a cyclist
| behind you who may want to pass or is passing you, and
| having headphones probably makes that a lot harder
| tokai wrote:
| >I do that. This was never a problem
|
| The most problematic people in traffic are never aware
| that they are the problem.
| matsemann wrote:
| Do you also think drivers with windows blocking sounds
| and their stereo blasting are mad?
| tokai wrote:
| ofc they are
| staindk wrote:
| People shouldn't really be walking around in public with ANC
| on. It's not safe. Not a simple problem to solve except maybe
| to inform people better upon buying/setting up ANC-enabled
| devices.
| Xelbair wrote:
| or cyclists should have their own lanes, pedestrians
| shouldn't walk on them - and vice versa. and if you're
| stuck behind someone slow just overtake them when you can.
|
| Safe or not - it is up to individual to decide if it is
| worth the risk.
| Klaster_1 wrote:
| Should people with hearing impairment also avoid walking
| around?
| Freak_NL wrote:
| Nope. They get special treatment; and that's fine.
| gs17 wrote:
| I don't see how they can get "special treatment", the
| difference between someone who couldn't hear the bell
| because they cannot and someone who just wasn't paying
| enough attention to react in time isn't obvious without
| questioning them. Cyclists should simply learn to _share_
| shared infrastructure and be careful when passing people
| instead, because they can 't know if that person is aware
| of them in time and going to react in a predictable way.
| djtango wrote:
| People with a hearing impairment are usually not
| impairing one of their senses with content competing for
| their attention
| frereubu wrote:
| "Not a simple problem to solve" feels like a bit of an
| understatement.
| nslsm wrote:
| The sense of entitlement of cyclists knows no bounds. If
| cars are liable for running over cyclists then cyclists
| must be liable for running over pedestrians.
|
| I used to live in a city where I would walk everywhere but
| I had the constant fear of cyclists running over me because
| they would drive all over the pavements without any regard
| for pedestrians. Imagine walking and having to look around
| all the time. I find it amusing how people in websites like
| this one talk about how we have to be very afraid of cars
| when the true terror, at least for me, were cyclists.
| soco wrote:
| And when you must walk with your small dog on a section
| of road where suddenly high speed e-cyclists zoom past
| you, now that's constant terror. At times you really get
| killer ideas.
| gambiting wrote:
| On the other hand, I hate it when I'm on my bike on a
| bike path, and someone walks their dog, leash fully
| extended across the bike path, they are looking down on
| their phone and wearing headphones. Absolute selfishness.
| soco wrote:
| On bike paths, totally agree with you. On shared paths,
| nobody owes you that speed.
| gambiting wrote:
| ...what speed? No one mentioned any speed.
| gambiting wrote:
| >>If cars are liable for running over cyclists then
| cyclists must be liable for running over pedestrians.
|
| They are though(at least here in the UK) - a guy was
| convinced of manslaughter for hitting a pedestrian on a
| bike just last month. In general the rule is that the
| person in charge of a bigger/heavier vehicle is the
| responsible party in almost all collisions.
| matsemann wrote:
| Why are they walking around with ANC, you think? Maybe the
| sound of traffic (cars). They're also the ones posing the
| danger to cyclists and pedestrians. The solution is simple.
| Oras wrote:
| Fines. No one should cross roads/paths randomly, with or
| without headphones.
|
| One large fine, and people will learn.
| lopis wrote:
| That would never work. Have you never been mindlessly
| walking and stepped on a bike way without realizing? Cities
| are for people after all. There's also so many places where
| bikes and pedestrians share the way, like roads under
| construction, and shared streets. We need to stop thinking
| of cities as these perfect automated places where humans
| are not welcome.
| piva00 wrote:
| No, they won't, punishment is never better than good design
| that incentivises and directs how something ought to be
| used.
|
| Jaywalking is even a misdemeanor in some areas of the USA,
| it doesn't stop it from happening at all.
| xvedejas wrote:
| Over-engineering? It's a fully mechanical bike bell that's made
| slightly differently. It's a very established and
| straightforward technology.
| rmoriz wrote:
| The presentation looks like marketing overkill, their solution
| looks pretty simple. It's just two trills ,,Trillerwerk" bells
| combined. It was the standard in Germany until the late 1990s
| https://youtu.be/-mW7dWHDivo
| eru wrote:
| That guy should lead with the sound check. :)
| layer8 wrote:
| They are still readily available. I suspect that the only
| reason they aren't standard anymore is to save 5 Euros on a
| new bike.
| Raed667 wrote:
| when the alternative is "everyone doing the right thing" this
| solution starts to look like the pragmatic approach
| jofzar wrote:
| I completely disagree, this is just another level of safety.
|
| If everything went perfectly everytime we wouldn't need any
| safety equipment, but things aren't always perfect.
| Phemist wrote:
| The real problem is that cyclists and pedestrians apparently in
| some countries share space commonly enough that this is
| necessary?
|
| In the Netherlands, bicycle utopia, I cannot remember the last
| time I used my bell to alert a pedestrian of my existence.
| Granted, I never cycle in Amsterdam, but that is a special
| location where high-powered ship horns are probably required.
|
| Regarding ANC, I naturally turn it off while cycling on my Bose
| Quiet Comfort II, as the ANC will try (and fail) to cancel the
| noise from the wind. I don't think this is a solved problem? So
| for bicycle-to-bicycle alerting, this also seems overkill.
| djtango wrote:
| In Singapore, cyclists are generally expected to use the
| pavement and share it with pedestrians.
| Phemist wrote:
| Which, seems to me, is the actual problem that should be
| solved.
| djtango wrote:
| I've thought about it before and I think part of it is
| that the average cyclist here moves a lot slower because
| of the temperature and humidity.
|
| When I put even an ounce of effort into my cycle I become
| a sweaty mess which can be a little antisocial depending
| on the situation
| joe_mamba wrote:
| I dislike the smug condescending tone of your comment. Not
| everyone lives in the "cycle utopia" Netherlands. For some of
| those that don't live there, this could be a game changer and
| life saver since its easier to buy a bell than wait for your
| city to build you segregated cycle lanes.
|
| Personally, I see no use for this bell since in Austria
| bicycles share the road space with cars, trucks and trams
| rather than pedestrians, which could be more dangerous, and
| what I would need is a bicycle bell that could penetrate car
| enclosures so that drivers would get off their phones and pay
| attention to the stuff around them.
|
| Yes, I know, ideally there should be dedicated cycle lanes
| only for bicycles but nothing in life is ever ideal, and the
| city isn't gonna do that anytime soon since that would mean
| completely eliminating car traffic on the narrow streets,
| witch would be political suicide, so a bell would be an
| instant life saver.
| Phemist wrote:
| I don't mean to disagree that there are situations where
| this is useful. I'm just trying to offer the perspective
| from a situation where the root cause as I see it has been
| fixed (to a high degree).
|
| The OP seemed to suggest that people wearing ANC headgear
| should stop doing so, but both the bell and the ANC-wearing
| pedestrians are a non-issue in my lived experience.
|
| It would be a shame if these "cyclist-pedestrian ANC-wars"
| distract from the real issue, that cyclists are not, but
| should be, a fully emancipated participant in traffic and
| infrastructure should be designed with cars (to a degree),
| bicyclists AND pedestrians in mind.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> I 'm just trying to offer the perspective from a
| situation where the root cause as I see it has been fixed
| (to a high degree)._
|
| Your argument was not a solution. You just said, "NL fixd
| this, why haven't other countries?" which doesn't add any
| value.
|
| Have you considered that other cities/countries can't
| just add infrastructure that hasn't been designed from
| the start to accommodate bikes the same way NL has
| without taking space away from pedestrians or cars as the
| roads have stayed as narrow as back in the 1800s?
|
| And that fixing it is not a switch you can just turn on
| on a whim, but requires decades of political and societal
| change around repurposing infrastructure, plus capital,
| before consensus is achieved? Democracies are
| complicated, even moreson in times like these.
|
| What do you do until then, when a bell is an instant
| improvement?
|
| You're commenting off the sidelines without realizing why
| most countries can't flip a switch and become NL
| overnight.
|
| _> It would be a shame if these "cyclist-pedestrian ANC-
| wars" distract from the real issue, that cyclists are
| not, but should be, a fully emancipated participant in
| traffic and infrastructure should be designed with cars
| (to a degree), bicyclists AND pedestrians in mind._
|
| Yeah but what do you do if they are? There's no ANC wars
| here, Skoda just made a better bell. Are you also against
| the development of better bicycle helmets, because where
| you live you don't need them? Like yes sure,
| infrastructure is the real solution, but what do you do
| until that arrives?
| Phemist wrote:
| I was not trying to offer a solution, as this will be
| highly specific to the situation in your locality and
| pretty pointless for me to spend time on. I am merely
| identifying this as a root cause, which for some reason
| strikes a nerve.
|
| Why does Skoda, a car manufacturer, care so much about
| interactions between cyclists and pedestrians? As you
| say, a bell that penetrates the car enclosures would be
| much more useful. I suspect a similar reason why pro-
| safety helmet lobby groups in NL received a lot of
| funding from these same car manufacturers. I digress..
|
| For your information, post-WWII infrastructure
| developments in NL were initially highly car-friendly.
| This only started to change in the 70s and 80s, when the
| government started to actually create bicycle-related
| traffic policy, after collective protests (e.g. popular
| pro-bicycle protest songs were written, children refused
| to go to schools unless bicycle paths were laid, etc.)
| also helped by the oil crisis of the time.
|
| So, no it can't be fixed overnight, but it can _be_ fixed
| in reasonable time (and not an unspecified amount of
| decades, political capital and funding). We are even
| living through a repeated history right now.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> This only started to change in the 70s and 80s_
|
| Which was my entire point. City wide infrastructure
| rehauls were massively easier and cheaper back then than
| today. The amount of nimbyism and red tape has ballooned
| exponentially in that time span, let alone the cost. Even
| NL wouldn't be able to do that today if they wanted to
| had it not done that in the 70s.
| Phemist wrote:
| It's a big stretch to say that the 70s and 80s was "from
| the start", when the preceding 30-40 years had seen
| increasingly car-friendly infrastructure policy and
| development.
| lxgr wrote:
| These things take both time and massive political will.
|
| As somebody living in a city that's quite bike friendly,
| all things concerned, but still not close to Dutch or
| Danish levels of biking safety, I'll take any "technical
| solutions that try to solve social/political problems" I
| can get to make my commute safer.
|
| Also, anything that makes biking feel safer will make
| more people try commuting by bike, which in turn
| increases the political will to change traffic laws and
| space use. Nothing exists in a vacuum.
| Phemist wrote:
| I agree you need to get more people commuting by bike.
| This is in itself creates a virtuous circle of safety.
| More cyclists means everyone pays more attention to them,
| meaning it becomes safer to cycle, meaning more people
| will cycle, repeat. (And ofcourse more political will
| etc.)
|
| This is btw also why cyclist's rights organizations (e.g.
| fietsersbond in NL) should be _against_ mandatory use of
| helmets. Helmets make it less convenient to cycle and
| reduces perceived safety, in turn reducing the amount of
| cyclists and as a result _actually_ making cycling less
| safe (and the vicious circle ensues).
|
| Even only suggesting that it would be beneficial to use a
| helmet has this effect apparently, hence the
| organizations are only willing to state that they are
| "not against the use of helmets".
|
| Just an interesting second order effect I think. You want
| to always be careful to optimize for the absolute number
| of safe rides, and not solely for the relative number of
| safe rides that might significantly reduce the absolute
| number of safe rides.
| joe_mamba wrote:
| _> should be _against_ mandatory use of helmets. Helmets
| make it less convenient to cycle and reduces perceived
| safety, in turn reducing the amount of cyclists and as a
| result _actually_ making cycling less safe (and the
| vicious circle ensues)._
|
| Not mandatory and at your own risk IMO, but as a simple
| thought exercise on your argument, answer me this: if a
| car hits you on your bike or another cyclists knocks you
| off your bike and your head hits the concrete/kerb, are
| you gonna escape better off from the accident with or
| without wearing a helmet?
|
| Spoiler alert from my GFs sister who works at an ER in
| Austria: helmeted patients walk away without permanent
| brain injury which she can't say the same for those
| involved in accidents without helmets. Helmets saving
| lives isn't a lobby issue, it's a medical fact.
|
| People telling you to not wear a helmet because it
| somehow reduces safety through some convoluted spaghetti
| argument, must be off their rockers, when they clearly
| save lives at impacts. That's like saying governments
| should be against mandatory seatbelts and airbags in cars
| because their added safety encourages a cycle of unsafe
| driving leading to more accidents, and that without them
| divers would be forced to drive more carefully and lead
| to more safety.
|
| It's perfectly fine to militate for the utopia of
| building of safe cycling infrastructure everywhere for
| everyone, but please let's not unnecessarily put people's
| lives at risk by promoting this FUD that helmets don't
| increase safety, just so people can literally die on this
| hill.
|
| By all means, each individual should do of course as they
| see fit according to their desired risk profile of where
| they live and how they want to live their lives, just
| don't ask others to put their lives in danger in order to
| emulate the lifestyle where you live where the risks for
| not wearing a helmet are much smaller.
| Phemist wrote:
| > Not mandatory and at your own risk IMO
|
| In the basis we seem to agree. Note that I am not trying
| to discourage helmet wearing (nor for governments to do
| it), just arguing against making it mandatory or even
| officially advised (for healthy adults) to wear them.
| Actual cycling safety is in numbers, more than in
| individually taken measures. This is all discussed in way
| more depth on reddit btw [0].
|
| > but as a simple thought exercise on your argument
|
| I realize could have written the sentence you respond to
| better, I should have written "and [mandatory helmet
| wearing] reduces perceived safety", also I said "should"
| in the sentence preceding the one you quoted, but I
| should've said that the NL ones ARE against making
| helmets mandatory for exactly the reasons I specify (and
| that my opinion is that other rights' organizations
| SHOULD be against it). Quoted directly from tbe website
| of the, quite well-regarded and not off their rocker,
| Fietsersbond [1] (under the header "Veilig gevoel?",
| translated by kagi): The Fietsersbond
| (Cyclists' Union) isn't against wearing a bike helmet. If
| you feel confident, you cycle more safely. It can be wise
| to wear a helmet in high-risk situations, for example,
| for seniors on e-bikes. Unfortunately, it has been proven
| multiple times that forcing people to wear a helmet
| actually backfires. People start cycling less. A
| helmet mandate makes cycling feel more like a dangerous
| activity--something you should be afraid of. Getting
| around by bike also becomes more complicated. After all,
| what do you do with that helmet when you're not wearing
| it? And what happens if you forget the helmet or if it
| gets stolen? These are all factors--whether justified or
| not--that make choosing a bike less convenient.
|
| So yes, given that you got into an accident, it is very
| obviously better if you had worn a helmet (and knee,
| elbow and wrist pads). However, we don't want only to
| reduce mortality rates on accidents, we actually want to
| reduce the amount of accidents wholesale. The above point
| (and the point in my previous post) is that given
| mandatory or officially encouraged helmet wearing, you
| are more likely to get into an accident in the first
| place, further reducing the number of people willing to
| cycle, and thus safety for all those who still are
| willing.
|
| I wanted to react to your car/seatbelt point, but I
| realize now you are the same person arguing about what
| constitutes starting points in the sibling thread. I
| don't mean to spread FUD and I also disagree that this is
| indeed FUD. I'm sorry that Austria is not as nice a place
| for cyclists as you would like it to be. I hope with this
| oil crisis you will find a way to foment some change re
| the emancipation of cyclists in your locality or even
| country.
|
| [0] https://old.reddit.com/r/fuckcars/comments/ut5fcx/why
| _is_thi...
|
| [1] https://www.fietsersbond.nl/helmplicht/
| lxgr wrote:
| > People telling you to not wear a helmet because it
| somehow reduces safety through some convoluted spaghetti
| argument, must be off their rockers, when they clearly
| save lives at impacts.
|
| No, they simply have different ethical frameworks/moral
| philosophies (consequentialist vs deontologist).
|
| I'd mostly agree with you in that I find it unethical to
| _not_ promote bike helmets at all, even if this were to
| somehow increase aggregate safety, especially if that
| increase is delayed and hard to measure.
|
| But I do see the point against making them mandatory if
| that makes people take their car instead of a bike.
|
| It's not like not wearing a bike helmet is a dangerous,
| addictive substance that people are somehow defenselessly
| exposed to and that they need protection from, and it's
| ultimately their own decision if they value their hairdo
| more than their brain.
| mirpa wrote:
| Yes, company Skoda is from Czech Republic where we have
| shared-use paths for cyclists and pedestrians. It is not
| "necessary". You should not be wearing noise canceling
| headphones while being in traffic - it makes you more liable
| in case of accidents.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| I don't know why, but sometimes this is done intentionally.
|
| In my (Dutch) city, there is this infuriating piece of road
| where the bicycle path suddenly gets routed onto the kerb,
| intentionally mixing bikes and pedestrians. I believe the
| theory is that bikes will go slower so pedestrians don't need
| to worry about crossing the road as much or something.
|
| Predictably, lots bikes are taken by surprise, either brake
| hard and suddenly or fly through pedestrians (who the biker
| thinks are in their bike lane, because they would be two
| meters earlier).
|
| In my experience, when bikes and pedestrians meet, one of the
| two groups is in the wrong place and should be watching
| out/slowing down and waiting.
|
| The example video shows various instances of pedestrians
| walking in bike lanes (and seemingly being surprised at the
| sudden appearance of a bike there). You can't fix stupid, but
| at least you can tell them to get off the bike path.
| Phemist wrote:
| > In my (Dutch) city, there is this infuriating piece of
| road where the bicycle path suddenly gets routed onto the
| kerb, intentionally mixing bikes and pedestrians. I believe
| the theory is that bikes will go slower so pedestrians
| don't need to worry about crossing the road as much or
| something.
|
| That is an unfortunate, probably experimental?, traffic
| design choice...
| xx_ns wrote:
| I wish my city only had a single case like that.
| Unfortunately, in Tallinn, it is extremely common that a
| bike path is suddenly routed onto the curb, and that's when
| you're lucky. For some paths, the path just... ends, and
| you suddenly find yourself right in the middle of car
| traffic. Unfortunately, the city leadership is anti-bike
| and pro-car, and it shows in the infrastructure.
|
| Paths where pedestrians and bikers (and other light
| transportation vehicles) are mixed are overwhelmingly
| common.
| lxgr wrote:
| If you know of a simple technical solution to transform the
| entire world into the Netherlands, I'm all ears!
| Phemist wrote:
| https://translate.kagi.com/nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geschieden
| i...
|
| This could serve as the blueprint I guess, skip to the part
| about the 70s and 80s protests. Collective and popular
| protests helped by an oil crisis, recognizing vested
| interests in other modes of transportation (cars) that
| might want to work against your efforts.
| lxgr wrote:
| > Collective and popular protests helped by an oil crisis
|
| Sounds neither simple nor technical.
| Phemist wrote:
| Nope, but now the worldwide geopolitical situation is
| such that it might at least be feasible?
| lxgr wrote:
| Yes, but again, what's your problem with _additionally_
| taking steps to make things safer? Unless you somehow see
| technologies such as this distracting from creating a
| safer environment. But this was developed by Skoda, so I
| doubt that if they hadn 't done this, they would have
| lobbied for more bike lanes instead.
| Phemist wrote:
| I dont have issues with taking additional steps to make
| things safer, I have an issue with this solution serving
| as a vehicle for the marketing of the inevitability of
| the problem (of cyclists and pedestrians sharing space)
| by a car manufacturer obviously interested in this
| problem continuing to exist.
| xxs wrote:
| which part would you consider overengineered?
| lxgr wrote:
| What's your easy technical solution to improve common sense,
| then? Or is it the all time classic of "just improving
| society"? I'm all ears for your ideas.
| watwut wrote:
| The problem is the cyclist trying to overtake pedestrian on
| sidewalk faster. The cyclist paying for it is correct person
| paying for it.
|
| I say it as cyclist. Pedestrians have right to be absent minded
| in parks and on public sidewalks.
| fixxation92 wrote:
| I have to agree here. The amount of cyclists I see with full
| over the ear headphones on-- if these guys are blarning tunes,
| there is no way they'll every hear the traffic around them.
| Extremely dangerous.
| Theodores wrote:
| Agreed, however, what do you think about my 'dream bicycle
| bell'?
|
| I replaced my bell recently because mine had developed a form
| of 'tourettes' after a bit of plastic fell off. So I did survey
| the marketplace for something 'more me'.
|
| This made me think about what the ideal bell should be. I
| reckon that you should be able to buy tuned bells, as in A - G
| with 440hz 'C' being in there somewhere. Maybe there could be
| different colours of the rainbow for each frequency.
|
| This would be quite tuneful if I was riding with family or
| friends, with them also having a tuned bell on their bicycles.
|
| Obviously no use for penetrating noise cancelling headphones,
| however, I don't think these are an issue. If someone is zoned
| out on headphones then it is on them if they have no spacial
| awareness. If they don't hear the bell, then that is on them.
|
| I also think big auto is patronising, to think they have
| anything to offer the cyclist apart from death and pollution.
| What would the car dependent ones know about shared path
| etiquette?
|
| Nowadays the biggest danger to me on shared paths are the Uber
| Eats delivery guys with their electric motorbikes. Early
| evenings can be quite risky with those zombies, particularly
| within half a mile of a McDonalds. They pose a true 'kinetic'
| risk that the jogger wearing headphones does not.
| rmoriz wrote:
| Reminds me of old Reich bells http://reich-cycle-bells.de and
| their ,,Trillerwerk" (trill sound)
| fnands wrote:
| For a moment I thought this was an April fools joke product.
|
| Pretty cool though!
| maartenh wrote:
| Same here, surprised that only you mentioned it here.
| cool-RR wrote:
| Begun, the noise-cancelling wars have.
| mememememememo wrote:
| I need a noise canceller canceller canceller.
| laydn wrote:
| Next challange: Place a camera in front of the bike that scans
| approaching pedestrians. Calculate their head position and
| trajectory. Use directional speakers and focused sound beams to
| focus the ~780Hz sound towards the head(s) of the pedestrian(s).
| Now that you are not bothering the environment as much, you can
| increase the volume as well.
| wateralien wrote:
| what
| mememememememo wrote:
| Sound beam aimed at person in the way.
| wateralien wrote:
| Bell costs more than the bike is ok?
| mememememememo wrote:
| Bike is optional extra
| codethief wrote:
| I would love that but not so much for pedestrians as for cars
| that don't see me on my bike. Ideally, the "bell" would
| automatically honk at them very loudly when they get too close.
| throw83940449 wrote:
| I carry air horn and stick. But I am pedestrian.
| Topfi wrote:
| It is amazing they openly shared their findings [0], but one
| thing I am missing is what this design would cost if put into
| mass production. To the biggest layman possible, it reads like
| while the design is clever and would be more expensive by virtue
| of more materials/size alone, it's not impractical, but maybe
| someone more informed on this type of manufacturing can correct
| my ignorance. If that's the case, hopefully we'll see these
| designs on the market soon as even with music+ANC, I have found
| certain sounds to be able to easily penetrate through when
| listening, though that is purely subjective and I don't have my
| music earbleedingly loud...
|
| [0] https://cdn.skoda-storyboard.com/2026/04/Skoda-DuoBell-
| Resea...
| lwansbrough wrote:
| That can't be aero.
|
| On a serious note there's a marketing problem in my view: who out
| there who chooses to buy a bell even considers that their might
| be a loudness problem? It's not immediately obvious that I need
| this and I'm sure there's a premium price attached.
| eru wrote:
| I bought a nice ding dong bell for my bike, and pedestrians
| seem to notice it a lot more than the nastier sounding bells.
| Etheryte wrote:
| A reminder that a gun [0] would also work as a bicycle bell that
| works despite noise-cancelling headphones.
|
| [0] https://xkcd.com/1217/
| tossandthrow wrote:
| People don't tend to wear anc headsets when walking the Forrest.
|
| Maybe the issue is the noise in the cities?
| eru wrote:
| Some people wear them there.
| tossandthrow wrote:
| As perfectly captured in "don't _tend_ to ..."
| gsinclair wrote:
| There's more than one issue. It's not wrong to try to solve one
| of them.
| ahmedfromtunis wrote:
| I think it's time for some sort of a safety standard for a sound
| frequency to be reserved exclusively for alarm/alert use and that
| ANC systems have to let through.
|
| It goes without saying, use of said frequency should be
| prohibited for other purposes, especially marketing.
| gozzoo wrote:
| as soon they do that all kind of companies will start abusing
| it, for example the sound of all smart phone notification will
| use exactly that frequency
| Ilikesoda112 wrote:
| this sounds like an amazing idea, the govt should introduce
| laws so that the companies do this
| zielmicha wrote:
| I think this is a really bad idea unless paired with some
| regime that penalizes inappropiate use of alarms - and most
| societies don't treat noise pollution as a real problem. For
| example, people honk all the time even when there are no safety
| issues. Or have misconfigured home/car alarms. Outlawing using
| ANC for blocking "fake alarms" only makes the problem worse.
| 47282847 wrote:
| > some regime that penalizes inappropiate use of alarms
|
| Legally, use of horns in traffic is restricted, and abuse can
| be punished. Doesn't keep people from honking all the time.
| apothegm wrote:
| It's thoroughly unenforced, which is the problem.
|
| Tho I like the proposal to require that manufacturers
| design car horns to sound as loudly inside the cabin as
| outside. Might make a dent.
| soco wrote:
| No honk in Switzerland, some honk in Romania, all honk in
| India. There's no one rule to rule them all.
| yreg wrote:
| I've recently visited the southern US (Texas, Louisiana and
| such) and I was very surprised about the lack of honking.
| When I returned to Europe I've felt like in India.
|
| I myself pretty much never honk. I understand honking makes
| sense on narrow bendy roads like in the mountains, where
| you need to alert the drivers behind the corner, but I
| don't see any other legitimate reasons to be honest.
| Tade0 wrote:
| Regular alarm sounds already do that, because above 1kHz or so
| it's the cushioning in the device that does the majority of the
| cancelling. There's a dip in effectiveness before that because
| to cancel noise effectively it's best to have a latency lower
| than a quarter of the wave's period.
|
| Also ANC works best on wide-spectrum sounds, so any kind of
| siren or the cries of a child will go through, as the spectrum
| is a series of narrow peaks.
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| However, deaf people are allowed to drive, cycle, walk etc. so
| sound won't always work anyway.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| I suspect deaf people are more aware of their lack of hearing
| than headphone wearers.
| impish9208 wrote:
| Ha, I had the same idea before I realized it'll just be used
| for ads. It would be cool for pilots' announcements on a
| flight, or approaching stations on the train etc. But CVS will
| use it to tell you to download their app and enroll in
| ExtraCare Rewards. Or "Did you know you may be due for more
| than fourteen vaccines all at no cost to you?"
| BrtByte wrote:
| In theory that sounds nice, but I suspect it would be much
| harder to make work in practice than it seems
| joquarky wrote:
| We can't even prevent radio advertisers from playing sirens.
| grvbck wrote:
| I don't know... If I'm sitting at home or at a cafe working, I
| want my headphones to block all bicycle bells and ambulances on
| the street. Those in traffic could perhaps just turn their ANC
| off?
| loco5niner wrote:
| ... and fire alarms? carbon monoxide detectors?
| grvbck wrote:
| Won't those cut right through the ANC just by volume alone?
| A domestic fire alarm is 85-120 dB, I don't think my
| airpods can mute that.
|
| And of course there will always be fringe cases. What if I
| go to sleep with regular foam earplugs, what if I take a
| sleeping pill etc. Or what if the warning sound can't be
| engineered to fit a ANC friendly frequency, like somebody
| screaming, a car tire screech behind me and so on.
| tensor wrote:
| There is no ANC that can block those, both because of
| volume and also because ANC only blocks constant noises
| like hums. It's terrible and sudden noises like alarms and
| honking.
| falsemyrmidon wrote:
| The real safety move is to not put yourself in situations where
| you're going to collide with the least dangerous class of
| commuters.
| tensor wrote:
| With all the road noise and now noise makers required even for
| silent EVs, noise cancelling headphones are the last resort for
| people to get some relief from the constant noise pollution in
| cities.
|
| And now you want to take that away too? No thanks. I get safety
| is important, but so is relief from noise pollution. Noise
| pollution is very damaging to your health. There needs to be a
| balance, and currently the safety police are weighing the
| scales inappropriately low.
| random_savv wrote:
| Where can I buy this??
| linzhangrun wrote:
| I believe devices intended to block necessary external
| environmental sounds should be prohibited while driving,
| including cycling.
|
| Remember that a horn is a safety feature.
| KeplerBoy wrote:
| It is of course prohibited in many jurisdictions. it's just not
| enforceable.
| fnands wrote:
| This is more aimed to warn pedestrians who wear ANC headphones.
| Should people be prohibited from wearing headphones while
| walking?
| BLKNSLVR wrote:
| If they're walking on a pathway that's shared with bikes and
| other wheeled transport of speeds greater than walking, then
| yes.
| distances wrote:
| In effect they are, even if not directly. There are
| requirements to stay aware of your surroundings. If you cause
| an accident by blocking all sounds, I totally can see insurance
| companies claiming this is your own responsibility and refusing
| to cover.
| ewidar wrote:
| It's not about the cyclists wearing ANC headsets (which is
| already prohibited at least in Euro countries), but about
| pedestrians wearing them. Another problem altogether.
| phantomathkg wrote:
| It is pedestrian who are wearing the ANC to remove the noise
| outside.
| bdavbdav wrote:
| I always hate having my headphones on ANC on the street. It makes
| me feel really exposed and disconnected. I tend to use
| transparency when out and about.
| codethief wrote:
| So where can I buy this thing?
| lifestyleguru wrote:
| Living in a city you cannot stand so much that you wear noise
| cancelling headphones at all times. Commuting to work that you
| hate and manoeuvring between zombies looking at their phones,
| wearing noise cancelling headphones, and occasional cars
| recklessly opening doors or joining the traffic without looking
| in the mirrors. You even forgot the original goal of saving money
| because the rent eats 50% of the net salary and work eats every
| will to live. Here it is - the fruit of your glorious education
| and mean by which your mortgage is paid is bicycle bell. Thanks
| for reminding me to stay away from this miserable mess.
| sdevonoes wrote:
| I'm more afraid of cyclists than of cars. I know exactly where
| the road starts and end, I know there are traffic lights drivers
| and pedestrians usually respect, so it's very unlikely that I can
| get hit by a car. And Im talking about myself, not about the
| average person (I know stats may say otherwise)
|
| But cyclists can ride in the pedestrian lane, bike lanes and
| pedestrians lanes are not easily distinguishable (if you are
| visiting a new city/country for example, and/or the painting of
| the lanes disappear over time) compared to roads, you typically
| can hear cars/motorbikes coming (though with electric cars that's
| less common) while bikes are very silent, and last but not least,
| typically there is certain hierarchy when it comes to cars and
| pedestrians (at least in Europe): pedestrians come first. That's
| not the case with bikes (which based on my experience, they share
| the same level of importance with pedestrians in the streets)
| lifestyleguru wrote:
| More or less at the time when electric bicycles weighing over
| 20kg and moving over 30kmh started to drive on sidewalks, I
| started to avoid living in big cities.
| mememememememo wrote:
| Intentionally deaf people hate this one trick.
| ulbu wrote:
| i'm on airpods pro 3, and it's far from producing noise-
| cancellation so powerful as to require such measures. perhaps if
| I'm listening to heavy music at ear-damaging levels. maybe my
| hearing is too sensitive.
| gib444 wrote:
| I've noticed some trains are playing extremely loud announcements
| (Elizabeth line for example) which makes me think they're trying
| to penetrate headphones and earphones
|
| Guess why I wear noise cancelling headphones on trains? Because
| of the excessive announcements!
|
| (I mean seriously excessive. Because in the UK the answer to
| everything is to create another announcement or poster)
|
| We need to stop the arms race
| patates wrote:
| Draw a line, say this is for bicycles, pedestrians and cars have
| no business here, and bikes have no business being on any other
| lane as long as these exist.
|
| When bikes have to go through areas where people walk freely,
| they need to limit their speed to a walking pace.
|
| People should not wear headphones (noise-cancelling or not) when
| going through traffic as pedestrians. Take them off when
| crossing!
|
| People should not hear loud music when driving - max is normal
| speaking voice level. Bike drivers should never hear any music,
| let alone wearing headphones. Behind-ear speakers on low could be
| a compromise.
|
| Hey, we just solved 90% of the accidents.
| jojobas wrote:
| If "shouldn't" worked we'd have no industrial accidents without
| any safety measures, no unwanted pregnancies and in general
| would more or less achieve heaven on Earth.
| soco wrote:
| This only leaves open how to enforce all of it without
| everybody shouting domestic terror.
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| How do we enforce seatbelts? (1) Assume the public aren't
| stupid. (2) Assume the public aren't murderers. (3) Explain
| the risk-benefit analysis through informative videos like
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julie_(1998_film).
|
| People can shout "domestic terror" all they like, but if it's
| not true, it's not true.
| broken-kebab wrote:
| You are answering different question. What you are saying
| is called awareness campaign or something. Enforcement of
| seatbelts is done by police with fines/tickets and is
| possible cause it's visible from outside.
|
| Other things like loudness levels inside cars cannot be
| monitored without going in full totalitarian mode.
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| Why would enforcement be necessary, given assumptions 1
| and 2 (not stupid, not murderers), and awareness? Around
| these parts, seatbelt enforcement isn't necessary because
| everyone voluntarily wears their seatbelt - except for
| children, occasionally, but the adults are generally
| capable of enforcing that. (Even teenagers / young adults
| being irresponsible in cars generally wear seatbelts
| while doing so.)
| lxgr wrote:
| Wearing a seatbelt cost next to nothing in inconvenience.
| Not being able to listen to music or have phone calls with
| noise cancellation while walking does not really compare.
|
| Of course this requires compensating for the loss in
| awareness through hearing by looking more diligently before
| crossing a bike lane, but unfortunately, some people never
| learn this, or only through a few close calls.
|
| "Annoyingly" ringing a bell and converting a potential
| accident into a close call seems pretty close to optimal to
| me.
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| "Next to nothing in inconvenience" is the perception
| _now_. It certainly wasn 't the perception when seatbelts
| were introduced. The ability to listen to personal music
| while walking is less than 50 years old: before that, you
| had the radio or nothing. Even _that_ would not be an
| intolerable inconvenience for most. But I was more
| thinking:
|
| > People should not hear loud music when driving - max is
| normal speaking voice level.
|
| which feels like a more than acceptable constraint to me.
| lxgr wrote:
| > People should not hear loud music when driving - max is
| normal speaking voice level.
|
| Oh, completely agreed on that one. In a car, you are also
| by far better protected than any cyclists you might
| encounter, so you shouldn't make it harder to hear their
| signaling. (I still wouldn't rely on any car having heard
| my bell if I don't get any other confirmation that the
| driver has noticed me, e.g. sufficiently slowing down as
| they are approaching the intersection where I have right
| of way.)
|
| But GGP also said
|
| > People should not wear headphones (noise-cancelling or
| not) when going through traffic as pedestrians. Take them
| off when crossing!
|
| and that's what I think goes too far. Why should I remove
| my headphones if I look both ways before crossing a bike
| lane or road?
|
| The ideal rule would of course be that only those
| pedestrians remove their headphones that are otherwise
| inattentive... Although I have my doubts that they'd
| remember.
| lxgr wrote:
| > Draw a line, say this is for bicycles, pedestrians and cars
| have no business here, and bikes have no business being on any
| other lane as long as these exist.
|
| This is the reality in many cities, if it weren't for the
| hopefully not surprising fact that people don't always obey
| traffic laws perfectly.
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| Unfortunately, the UK seems almost incapable of building usable
| cycle infrastructure (possibly excepting London). Your idea is
| just a recipe for magic protective paint and even more abuse of
| cyclists who don't want to be forced to use ridiculously badly
| designed infrastructure. e.g. Here in Bristol, we have an
| infamous shared cycle/pedestrian pavement along Coronation Rd
| that has a few trees completely blocking the cycle side which
| just means conflict between pedestrians and cyclists who have
| to fight over the scraps left over from motorists taking most
| of the space (https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4462522,-2.606479
| 2,3a,75y,80...).
| patates wrote:
| Sorry I didn't write "don't have trees in the middle of the
| cycling lanes", I should have been more clear.
|
| Also "don't let the restaurants cover the pavement with
| tables" follows the same logic.
|
| Perhaps, planners should travel the route three times for
| every permitted mode of transportation, including walking,
| biking, and driving.
| matsemann wrote:
| > _Hey, we just solved 90% of the accidents._
|
| No, you didn't. And restricting cyclists and pedestrians will
| not result in even small dent in the numbers of maimed or
| killed people in traffic. It's one mode of transport that's
| responsible for the vast amount of it, and that's the motorized
| one propelling several tonnes.
|
| > _and bikes have no business being on any other lane as long
| as these exist_
|
| And cars have no business being on other roads as long as
| highways exist ;)
| patates wrote:
| I meant biking accidents this product is obviously trying to
| solve.
|
| > And cars have no business being on other roads as long as
| highways exist ;)
|
| Biking lanes are not comparable to highways. Where I'm
| living, if you bike on car lanes when biking lanes exist, or
| if you bike on sidewalks at all, you get a hefty fine
| depending on the situation and if you possess one, you get
| points on your driving license.
|
| Exceptions are turning, leaving the road, the lane being
| blocked by a clueless driver etc. obviously.
|
| Cars are also not allowed on biking lanes, neither are
| pedestrians. Same exceptions apply.
|
| Highways are more comparable to railroads, maybe.
| PunchyHamster wrote:
| Oh great, cyclist gonna annoy me even in headphones
| 0x3f wrote:
| Do horns and bells really prevent accidents?
|
| In order for e.g. a horn to work you need enough time that the
| driver processes the situation and decides the horn will
| communicate something AND enough time for the pedestrian or
| whatever to process that and react to it. Generally it's a lot
| easier just to press the brake, and more importantly be
| travelling at a speed and in a manner where the brake is
| sufficient.
|
| Structurally, we'd be much better off reducing conflicts between
| the different tiers of users. I.e. properly segregated
| infrastructure for each class of vehicle.
| eigenspace wrote:
| A horn or bell is mostly for telling other people "hey I'm
| here, stay out of my way and dont suddenly cross into my path"
|
| My opinion as a cyclist is that I should basically only be
| using my bell on pedestrians when the pedestrians are wandering
| onto the bike lane. If im cycling through a shared space, I
| find it extremely rude to ring the bell, because it feels like
| I'm telling people to get out of my way, but they have just as
| much right to a shared path as I do. Some cyclists ring their
| bells because they're worried a pedestrian might suddenly turn
| into their path, but I think if one is concerned about that,
| it's a sign youre cycling too fast, and should just slow down.
|
| With cars, I will sometimes proactively ring my bell at them if
| I think they're not sufficiently aware enough of me though.
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| > With cars, I will sometimes proactively ring my bell at
| them if I think they're not sufficiently aware enough of me
| though.
|
| There's only a few types of car that will be "aware" of
| cyclists and I don't think ringing a bell will help their
| algorithms. Getting the attention of a driver, meanwhile, is
| difficult with a bell as often they'll be in a semi-
| soundproof cage with loud music on. (Also deaf drivers are a
| thing).
|
| I've never really considered using a bell for motorised
| traffic. I did once buy a loud air-horn, but it was so loud
| and abrasive that I never used it as it seemed really rude.
| eigenspace wrote:
| > I've never really considered using a bell for motorised
| traffic.
|
| It works surprisingly well if the car isn't moving quickly.
| Cars aren't as sound isolating as you'd think. My main use-
| case is that a car is stopped at an intersection, or
| crossing my lane so they can turn, and I'm worried they'll
| pull out and hit me because they're looking the wrong way
| focused on car traffic, and in these situations they almost
| always hear my bell.
| 0x3f wrote:
| I think bells do have a communication use of course, just not
| really to be used as an emergency 'an accident is about to
| happen, immediately take action'.
|
| At least a bell sounds relatively polite if you're not
| spamming it. A horn is a bit aggressive, you have to modulate
| it.
|
| In a car I use two short tapped toots as a polite kind of
| 'excuse me' e.g. if someone hasn't noticed a light turning
| green. That seems more friendly than a sustained blast.
|
| On the bike with a bell I'll just say thank you as I pass, if
| they've moved for me. Usually seems to go down well enough.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| it's a good habit to just ring your bell when approaching
| things like merges and city intersections regardless if
| there's other people; you tend to do it earlier and might
| miss seeing someone.
| walletdrainer wrote:
| > If im cycling through a shared space, I find it extremely
| rude to ring the bell, because it feels like I'm telling
| people to get out of my way, but they have just as much right
| to a shared path as I do.
|
| It's certainly rude to ring the bell in a aggressive manner,
| but many bells are capable of producing much softer, more
| polite sounds.
|
| In super busy old European capitals I find that people
| increasingly just ride around with speakers playing a
| constant tune at a reasonable volume, a massive improvement
| on dense streets full of varyingly sober people.
| eigenspace wrote:
| I still think that ringing bells at people is a little
| rude, regardless of the tone. Like imagine if you were at
| the grocery store, blocking the isle and someone lightly
| chimed a bell at you instead of just saying "excuse me".
|
| IMO if I'm in a dense pedestrian zone and I can't go around
| people and I can't communicate by voice, it means I'm going
| too fast.
| walletdrainer wrote:
| >blocking the isle and someone lightly chimed a bell at
| you instead of just saying "excuse me".
|
| Well, at least here in Europe I'd have to spend a decent
| amount of time deciding which language to use.
| eigenspace wrote:
| I'm also in Europe, and I always just either say the
| equivalent in the local language, or just use english.
| Even in the smallest most remote villages, you'd be
| pretty hard pressed to find someone who doesn't know the
| word "sorry".
| walletdrainer wrote:
| I've found that speaking the wrong language often results
| in people freezing up as they process what I just said to
| them, that's often counterproductive.
| Heliosmaster wrote:
| I just shout "dreen dreen".. which more or less is the
| sound a bike bell makes, works anywhere
| prmoustache wrote:
| I don't agree with the former, a bell is not rude if you
| actuate it in advance from far enough. I do that if I see
| people about to cross my path but looking somewhere else
| or if there are kids wandering because I know that kids
| tend to be imprevisible, are often not very aware of
| their surrounding and have a smaller field of view. If
| you are just a handful of meters from them, it is just
| too late to ring a bell, you should have slowed down
| already anyway.
|
| There is nothing to be done against old people using
| noise so I just prepare to stop.
|
| Still agree on the second statement.
| macintux wrote:
| On shared use trails, I suspect your voice might give out
| (especially given the headphone status of most
| pedestrians) and a bicycle bell is less ambiguous than a
| voice, which could be a fast walker, a runner, or a
| bicyclist.
| tietjens wrote:
| I agree with you, but I can report that in Germany people
| ring bells constantly and it is simply considered normal.
| Big cultural difference.
| recursive wrote:
| Pedestrians still exist in non dense zones. It seems
| there's no way to win. I've been told that I should use a
| bell because vocal addresses are too startling.
|
| Now if there's not enough room to pass safely and
| silently I completely slow to the pedestrians speed and
| THEN calmly say excuse me. But I'm convinced that there
| is just no universally correct way to do it. If you pass
| people in any way whatsoever, sooner or later someone is
| going to get mad about it.
| lostlogin wrote:
| A noisy free hub is my solution.
|
| Back peddling or coasting gets people's attention. Though
| moving slowly uphill and needing to back peddle is a bit
| of a test.
| gs17 wrote:
| > Now if there's not enough room to pass safely and
| silently I completely slow to the pedestrians speed and
| THEN calmly say excuse me. But I'm convinced that there
| is just no universally correct way to do it.
|
| Anyone who is mad that you politely passed them at a safe
| speed is just too sensitive about these things. You're
| totally fine there. But "room to pass safely and
| silently" could still piss people off depending on your
| speed and distance.
| recursive wrote:
| The conclusion I came to is that being totally fine there
| is independent from whether people could get pissed off
| about a thing. I try operate in a safe and reasonable
| manner. I'm sure some people are pissed, as some people
| will always be.
| wffurr wrote:
| >> Like imagine if you were at the grocery store,
| blocking the isle and someone lightly chimed a bell at
| you
|
| That sounds delightful. We should have more bells lightly
| chimed around us.
| arjie wrote:
| It's just cultural. If there's a cultural expectation of
| the ring/honk it's not rude. e.g. in India people will
| honk as a form of active group flock behaviour but
| foreigners will interpret it as everyone saying "get out
| of my way"; but in some European countries I have seen
| that people use the bell (much less noisy than the
| typical Indian street) and it's got the same meaning. In
| Hawaii, if you ever honk at someone, you're going to have
| a fight on your hands. In San Francisco, if you honk at
| someone and you're on Bush Street it means you're trying
| to help the traffic light change (it's a team effort) but
| anywhere else you get anything from a gun drawn, to a
| brake check, to a wave in apology for missing the light
| by being on the phone.
|
| Overall, cultural expectations are everything here so
| it's best to just "when in Rome, do as Romans do".
| jonahrd wrote:
| Can you explain to me what it means to try to get the
| traffic light to change on Bush street? I tried searching
| for it but couldn't find anything.
| arjie wrote:
| It was a not-particularly-amusing joke that people honk
| because doing so helps the light change. It doesn't, of
| course, but I used to work at a building at the
| intersection of Bush and Sansome (I think), the Standard
| Oil Building, and every day at 5 PM the honking would put
| Bombay to shame.
| boomlinde wrote:
| Here the pedestrian-bicycle problems are much more likely
| to occur on dedicated bike paths than in pedestrian zones
| (where bicyclists must ride at walking speed). Usually a
| pedestrian nonchalantly crossing the bike path at an
| angle without paying the slightest attention to what
| they're doing.
|
| The same people tend to ignore the bell. They're in their
| own world. I usually shout at them to move in that case.
| A friend of mine instead bought a loud horn connected to
| a can of compressed gas, which commands attention much
| more easily than a puny little bell. Works on car
| drivers, too.
| grvbck wrote:
| > imagine if you were at the grocery store, blocking the
| isle and someone lightly chimed a bell at you instead of
| just saying "excuse me"
|
| Greetings from Sweden, where some people will verbally
| announce "honk honk" (tuut tuut) while avoiding eye
| contact - then bump into your leg with their grocery
| cart.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| If you're in a grocery store and aren't maintaining
| enough situational awareness to preemptively move out of
| somebody's way, I file that as rude. I'm sure the
| ingredients on that box of slop are very engaging, but
| you should still be able to see and hear a shopping car
| rolling up on you.
| prmoustache wrote:
| > In super busy old European capitals I find that people
| increasingly just ride around with speakers playing a
| constant tune at a reasonable volume, a massive improvement
| on dense streets full of varyingly sober people.
|
| I sometimes do that. It helps not having music that could
| be described as aggressive. I often use reggae.
|
| However it means you need a speaker charged so it is not
| something I have ready everytime I use my bicycle, nor do I
| want to carry it everyday when leaving the bike attached
| somewhere so it can't be the goto solution.
| iamthemonster wrote:
| My solution to this is that I ring my bell when I'm far from
| people, usually twice while I'm still a fair way away. It
| just gets pedestrians conscious that there's a bike around,
| while also being far enough away that it's not going to
| surprise them and I don't think they assume it's an
| aggressive bell.
|
| My least favourite is when a cyclist speeds past and shouts
| "on ya right" (I'm in Australia) but they shout it when
| they're so close that there's no chance of hearing and
| understanding in time.
| the_snooze wrote:
| That's how I do it too. I'll tap bell once (and let the
| ring sustain) when I'm about ~5 seconds from overtaking
| them so people know there's something coming up behind
| them, and the sustained sound tells them how fast it's
| coming. This is especially important with runners, who are
| prone to suddenly take a U-turn if they're at the end of
| their route.
|
| Pedestrians regularly wave acknowledgement or even say
| "thank you." Some other cyclists (especially on e-bikes)
| just blast by with no warning.
| jandrese wrote:
| The problem with bells is that they aren't very
| directional. It's hard for my brain to figure out from
| which direction the sound is coming from. Someone speaking
| "on your left" is much more directional, and it includes
| important context as to what the warning is about.
| samdixon wrote:
| Its pretty safe to assume on a trail if you hear a bell
| that a bike is coming up behind you.
| jandrese wrote:
| Or from the side or oncoming and he's just behind the
| crowd of pedestrians ahead of you.
| samdixon wrote:
| Yes haha - a bike coming from _somewhere_
| jwr wrote:
| > A horn or bell is mostly for telling other people "hey I'm
| here, stay out of my way and dont suddenly cross into my
| path"
|
| This. I only use the bell on bike paths, too. Sometimes it
| feels like a game of pac-man, where baddies will wander into
| my path from all directions and in all kinds of ways. Cars
| doing a right turn, zombies staring into phones, people
| walking backwards (!), zombies staring into phones walking
| backwards, it doesn't end.
| lostlogin wrote:
| The ultimate cyclist killer: those stupid extending dog
| leashes.
| jwr wrote:
| Back when I roller skated, the ultimate question: you see
| a person and a dog, several meters apart. Is there a
| leash between them? :-)
| lostlogin wrote:
| Oof. If yes, you might be about to get nailed. If no,
| will the dog run after me and bite me?
|
| I've had a dog on my heels doing doing 40kmh.
|
| They were at my heel, past the back of my rear tyre. I
| was briefly a competitive sprint cyclist.
| jwr wrote:
| FWIW, it's better to stop and talk to the dog. Dogs don't
| really want to bite you, most will just chase you and
| don't really even know why. If you stop and confront
| them, they are confused and don't know what to do next.
|
| Get off the bike on the side opposite of the dog and keep
| the bike between you and the dog just in case, if you are
| afraid.
| prmoustache wrote:
| That is an issue on bike paths that are build inside a
| sidewalk, the cycling path is usually build using a
| smoother surface than the one designed for pedestrians.
| Plus it sometimes has a brighter paint.
|
| I am pretty sure most people don't realize it but they are
| inconciously attracted to it. It just feels better walking
| on it.
| pandaman wrote:
| That's an issue on any bike path in the US, even if it's
| a fire road in the middle of nowhere. I bet there are
| people walking their dogs or checking Instagram on the
| single track course that is used for the Red Bull
| Rampage.
| kube-system wrote:
| Yeah, it happens on sidewalks, bike trails, mixed use
| trails, and dedicated bike lanes. If anything, dedicated
| bike lanes are the worst because they get errant
| pedestrians _and_ cars.
| jwr wrote:
| No, every bike path in a city inevitably has crossings or
| is laid out next to a sidewalk. People just do their
| random-walk thing (Brownian motion, really, sometimes)
| and wander into the bike path.
| prmoustache wrote:
| Sometimes you clearly see more people on the bike paths
| than on the regular sidewalks. And I definitely attribute
| that to its smoother nature compared to the fake cobbles
| you have in many places, amplifyied if there is a baby
| stroller in the mix.
| jwr wrote:
| It's funny, because if that is true, it should give pause
| to city planners and officials: people prefer smooth
| sidewalks :-)
| mfashby wrote:
| It's essential on narrow shared paths e.g. a canal towpath,
| when you're approaching a pedestrian from behind in order to
| avoid startling them when you pass.
|
| Most people walking the canal towpath around here know this,
| runners in particular will sometimes be give a wave or visual
| acknowledgement they've heard you without turning around.
| jmull wrote:
| Agreed.
|
| I saw one recently where the cyclist shouted out something
| like, "ON YOUR LEFT!" and all it did was startle the crap out
| of a jogger who spun around _into_ the path of the bicycle.
| Luckily just a close call. That cyclist 's "warnings", with
| no time for pedestrians to react properly, were really just a
| game of Russian roulette. (And really rude, as you say).
| empyrrhicist wrote:
| Shouting that while traveling too fast is indeed incorrect,
| but a polite "on your left" or bell while traveling an
| appropriate speed is considered good behavior to avoid
| surprising pedestrians.
| jmull wrote:
| Outside of some stage actors and drill sergeants, there
| are probably few people who can project their voices well
| enough that a vocal warning is useful.
|
| You're either traveling slow enough that it's not
| necessary (and why yell at people if you have to?), or
| are too far away for someone to understand and get a
| bearing on who isn't already looking at you.
|
| A bell is still rude in a shared space but used
| correctly, a decent one can at least be effective.
| bigblind wrote:
| If you just bell once or twice, and don't aggressively
| keep ringing, I'd never consider a bicycle bell in a
| shared space rude. I even consider it good manners,
| though as others have said, that varies between cultures.
|
| Being visually impaired, though, I'm grateful for
| cyclists who use their bell. It's immediately clear. For
| some reason, my brain takes slightly longer to process
| someone yelling "on your left!" or similar, than just a
| quick "ring ring".
| empyrrhicist wrote:
| > A bell is still rude in a shared space
|
| I just don't think that is even a little bit true, or at
| least it's something that is very culturally specific and
| thus not generally applicable.
|
| I have a friendly sounding bell I use from an appropriate
| distance (and I can modulate the volume), and I routinely
| have people give a light wave to show they heard. In
| addition, the biggest complaint about cyclists in local
| social media is about them passing without notice.
| dmurray wrote:
| Cyclists will normally do the same thing passing out
| other cyclists at a 5-10 km/h speed difference, and it's
| definitely useful there.
| BobaFloutist wrote:
| The problem is there's a good number of people that hear
| "on your _left_ " and shift left.
|
| A gentle bell mostly doesn't do that.
| empyrrhicist wrote:
| Yeah, I prefer a bell.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| also - even though the pedestrian has the obligation to
| move over - a friendly thanks! or thank you! helps all
| cyclists in the long-run.
| empyrrhicist wrote:
| Yep, a wave helps as well.
| yencabulator wrote:
| This again depends on the jurisdiction and kind of path
| you're on. Where I grew up, if it's not separated into
| bicyclist & pedestrian lanes, bikes yield to pedestrians.
|
| On US forest trails, the general rule is bikes yield to
| pedestrians and everyone yields to horses.
|
| (Obviously pedestrians walking in bicycle lanes are doing
| it wrong.)
| qwhelan wrote:
| Unfortunately in many jurisdictions it is legally required
| to do that when passing a pedestrian.
| shrx wrote:
| Can you list some examples? When I lived in Chicago it
| was quite common for cyclists to shout this on the long
| lakefront trail, I wonder if that's the case there too.
| qwhelan wrote:
| I've never ridden in Illinois, but yeah:
|
| > SS 11-1512. Bicycles on sidewalks. (a) A person
| propelling a bicycle upon and along a sidewalk, or across
| a roadway upon and along a crosswalk, shall yield the
| right of way to any pedestrian and shall give audible
| signal before overtaking and passing such pedestrian.
|
| https://codes.findlaw.com/il/chapter-625-vehicles/il-st-
| sect...
|
| No idea if the lakefront trail is classified as a
| sidewalk but there are at least some cases in Illinois
| where either a bell or a "on your left" are legally
| mandatory.
| empyrrhicist wrote:
| > Some cyclists ring their bells because they're worried a
| pedestrian might suddenly turn into their path,
|
| This is wrong - on mixed use paths, it is customary and
| proper to announce "on your left" when passing, and a bell is
| a nice alternative. Even cycling slowly pedestrians can do
| some very erratic things, and moreover are very surprised
| when cyclists suddenly appear on their left (and may do
| something dumb in surprise!).
| jandrese wrote:
| On the bike trail it is crucial to do a shoulder check when
| changing lanes. Some people get "in the zone" and ignore
| all other traffic in the singular pursuit of the shortest
| times. They will get very very angry if you get in front of
| them, if they spot you at all instead of just slamming into
| your rear tire at full speed.
| empyrrhicist wrote:
| I personally can't stand to ride without a mirror for
| situational awareness (or, if on road, a mirror and also
| radar).
| kube-system wrote:
| > This is wrong - on mixed use paths, it is customary and
| proper to announce "on your left" when passing
|
| This is neither customarily nor regulatory uniform. There
| are mixed-use trails near me where bells are required.
| There are some trails where most people use a bell, some
| trails where nobody uses a bell, and some where there is a
| mix.
|
| In my personal experience, the ratio of bikes to
| pedestrians and the purpose of the trail greatly affects
| how people tend to handle this.
| mr_mitm wrote:
| > I find it extremely rude to ring the bell, because it feels
| like I'm telling people to get out of my way,
|
| I got yelled at very rudely the other day for overtaking a
| pedestrian without ringing my bell. I thought I had plenty of
| space, rode at an appropriate speed and didn't want to be
| rude, like you said, but I guess you can never please
| everyone.
| FridgeSeal wrote:
| It sounds silly, but apart from liking the sound, this is
| why I really like wheels with loud hubs.
|
| I have a pair of Hunt wheels and they work fantastically,
| bonus points because they are "always on", pedestrians are
| aware of them, but are never surprised.
| redpola wrote:
| See how your comment has inbuilt sass? It doesn't matter
| what you consider plenty of space and an appropriate speed-
| if you startle me, I'm going to yell at you for not ringing
| a bell to let me know you were there.
|
| Note that the worst kind of canal towpath cyclist is the
| one who slows to a crawl and creeps behind me for minutes
| sometimes unnoticed, biding their time for a passing spot
| with lots of space. Just ring the frigging bell and I will
| stand out of your way for the 3 seconds it takes you to get
| by!
| stevage wrote:
| >My opinion as a cyclist is that I should basically only be
| using my bell on pedestrians when the pedestrians are
| wandering onto the bike lane. If im cycling through a shared
| space, I find it extremely rude to ring the bell, because it
| feels like I'm telling people to get out of my way, but they
| have just as much right to a shared path as I do.
|
| The culture around this varies a lot. I'm in Melbourne,
| Australia. Virtually all bike paths are "shared", and many
| have signs telling you to ring your bell when approaching
| pedestrians - you're not telling them to move out of the way,
| you're telling them that you're there.
|
| In practice, I tend to use one ding to mean "I'm here" and
| multiple dings to mean "you're on the wrong side of the path
| and need to move".
|
| But in no situation do I rely on a bike bell to avoid an
| accident.
| Waterluvian wrote:
| I've always wanted two horns in my car: one that toots with
| a smile and a tip of the hat, and one that heralds your
| pending demise. It sounds like Australia cycle bell culture
| does that with short vs. long bell ding-a-lings.
|
| Which is kind of how it has worked with cars, except I find
| that more and more cars have a style of horn that's hard to
| control with the necessary precision. Maybe this is
| Canadian culture but I get very anxious that my horn will
| honk for a millisecond too long and the poor victim will
| think I'm angry at them.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| go somewhere appropriate and do a little practice with
| the friendly multi-tap vs. the two-hand push!
|
| adding on a wave helps too; I wish more drivers waved...
| Waterluvian wrote:
| I hate how many cars I see these days with windows so
| tinted that eye contact and waves are impossible.
|
| It feels dangerous to be unable to see the driver through
| their side window (eg. 4-way stop eye contact on who
| goes)
| jkestner wrote:
| Agreed! It's a small but satisfying interaction to have
| that coordination and unspoken communication with other
| drivers at a 4-way stop.
|
| I've taught my kids when crossing the street to make eye
| contact with drivers to make sure they see you. Drivers
| with smartphones unfortunately add to the challenge.
| jkestner wrote:
| Reminds me of a mini-course I took on sound design. Lots
| of exercises in trying to squeeze expression out of a
| limited palette. Not too different from LEDs, but of
| course we have different cultural references for audio.
| Neat subject.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Some large trucks have that. A "city horn" that is like a
| normal car horn, and the traditional air horn that will
| rattle your windows.
| dingaling wrote:
| The Ineos Grenadier 4x4 has a 'toot' function for
| cyclists, largely because Ineos is a sponsor of a cycling
| team.
|
| https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PbGp24MIRDQ
| nhecker wrote:
| I can corroborate this finding -- I think the horn switch
| is just a logic-level digital switch going into one or
| more MCUs somewhere, subjected to all manner of latency
| and (probably) CANBUS jitter. It's not great. Trying to
| send Morse, or even a quick 'toot toot' results in a
| garbled mangled mess, and I find that very annoying. My
| early cars & motorbike had what felt like direct,
| switched control over power to the horn, those were great
| to use. I've debated installing a dedicated pushbutton
| rated for the amperage or at least controlling a solenoid
| somewhere that would power the horn.
|
| As an experiment, I've found that you can reliably detect
| the presence of crummy horn control by trying to pulse
| the horn for the shortest amount of time possible. The
| shorter my push on the horn button gets, the more likely
| it is that the timing will feel wrong somehow, or the
| horn doesn't even sound at all.
|
| I've definitely tried friendly beeps at friends or
| neighbors and it came out sounding like an angry honk.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| Your right and I think local culture gets the difference
| between the escalating "move over! I've rung my bell 5
| times already" vs. the light courtesy "coming up from
| behind" ring
| Fricken wrote:
| It's legally mandated in my city so I guess the polite
| thing to do is ring a bell, you know, just stick to the
| protocol, for everyone's sake. A bell however seems at
| least as likely to startle someone into behaving
| erratically as not.
|
| As far as the pedestrian's safety is concerned what matters
| is either giving them a wide berth or slowing right down
| when passing.
|
| Whether on a bike or not I'm sick of all the modern world's
| beeping and ringing and buzzing and blaring and if I'm
| wearing noise cancelling headphones that means I don't want
| to hear it. Don't tell you're being annoying for my own
| good because you aren't.
| namibj wrote:
| First reaction to warning tone should always be to
| (safely!) stop and assess.
|
| Considering that the persons involved can't be expected
| to not be deaf, or functionally so via e.g. headphones,
| and thus you always have to be able to brake anyways.
| Running onto a driving lane (be it bikes or cars doesn't
| matter) without looking especially if the direction you
| didn't look just gave an audible warning is always
| reckless.
| fusslo wrote:
| my own experience is that in the city the bell was to alert
| people that I think aren't paying attention to me and may
| be about to step into the bike lane. 100% like you said,
| I'm letting someone know I'm there
|
| Now that I moved to the country with a comprehensive rails-
| to-trail network, I thank all the cyclists that use the
| bell to let me know they're coming up behind me. What
| really irks me is the dudes going 30+mph silently coming up
| behind me, passing less than 2' from my dog (who is at my
| side) when there's PLENTY of room to give me space. No, we
| can't hear them coming all the time. Yes, it's startling,
| rude, and dangerous for all of us.
| namibj wrote:
| In Germany it's illegal to drive bikes that assist beyond
| 28km/h (about 20mph) in what are true bike paths (which
| can be built as lanes! And, notably, they can be marked
| as virtual-lane-shared (pictogram side by side with a
| vertical divider) or as true shared (pictogram above and
| below at a horizontal divider), if pedestrians are also
| allowed to use them.
|
| An ancient gas-e-bike rating is allowed on them outside
| city limits but iirc those bikes are exceedingly rare
| since even before e-bikes became truly mainstream.
| thewebguyd wrote:
| > you're telling them that you're there.
|
| Which, IMO is important. Even if they aren't in your way,
| it can help avoid an accident. If you're on any sort of
| nicer, well maintained road bike, it's going to be near
| silent. I've startled pedestrians on mine, so I now ring my
| bell every time I'm approaching someone, not as a "get out
| of my way" signal but more of a "hey! I'm coming up behind
| you, don't get startled and jump into my path"
|
| Generally though, if its a particularly crowded path, I
| just ride in the road. In stop and go city traffic I'm
| usually going as fast if not faster than traffic anyway.
| ralferoo wrote:
| I prefer to slow down and actually just say hello to them,
| they'll usually say sorry and I'm back on my way again.
| Just ringing a bell, or worse a horn, scares them and they
| need to turn round to figure out where you are and whether
| you're about to squash them. I don't feel I have the right
| to do that to someone just out enjoying a peaceful walk.
|
| On the other hand, I've been angered by dog owners when
| running who just take up the entire pavement. A couple of
| weeks ago, I had one guy coming towards me force me to come
| to a complete stop when I was running flat out, because he
| couldn't be bothered to control his dogs. He was in the
| centre of the pavement, and the 2 dogs were at the extreme
| edges with tight enough leads between him and the dogs, so
| it'd have tripped me up if I'd tried to jump them. He knew
| full well I was heading that way, but in the 10 seconds
| since we had made eye contact, he was clearly determined
| not to reign his dogs in, and it was only when I was
| stopped and so he had to reign them in to continuing
| walking past that I was able to keep using the pavement.
| stevage wrote:
| >Just ringing a bell, or worse a horn, scares them and
| they need to turn round to figure out where you are and
| whether you're about to squash them. I don't feel I have
| the right to do that to someone just out enjoying a
| peaceful walk.
|
| Yes, it's very context-dependent. I'm going to behave
| very differently in an area where there are hundreds of
| cyclists every hour compared to a place where there might
| be one or fewer.
|
| The real trick with bell ringing is to try to get the
| distance right. Too far away and they won't hear. Too
| close and it might startle them, and they won't have
| enough time to react properly.
| haritha-j wrote:
| Its a shared path yes but by two sets of people going at two
| very different speeds, so I don't feel particularly guilty
| about the bell, though I do try to avoid it if possible.
| youknownothing wrote:
| Thank you, I'm a cyclist too and I always try to respect
| pedestrians' space, and it really pisses me off when people
| don't. In many cities cycling on pavement is not allowed, yet
| some cyclists do it... which I'd be fine with, provided they
| understand that they're doing something they're not supposed
| to be doing and that they have no priority. But when they're
| invading pedestrian space like that AND ring the bell as if
| people were supposed to be making way for them, I literally
| want to throw a stick in their wheels.
| KomoD wrote:
| > But when they're invading pedestrian space like that AND
| ring the bell as if people were supposed to be making way
| for them
|
| Honestly, I prefer that over those damn electric scooters.
| Most people who ride them are complete morons. They don't
| pay attention, ride into traffic, go at high speeds and
| don't care about anyone except themselves. I've even been
| hit by one.
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| I concur. Even the best bell in the world may be utterly
| useless if the pedestrian happens to be deaf. Also, bicycle
| bells tend to polarise pedestrians - some people think that
| bells are rude and insisting that peds get out of the way and
| other people think it's dangerous and rude to not use a bell
| every time you overtake.
|
| My solution is to still have a tiny bell on my road bike, but
| instead of using it, call out something like "can I get past,
| please?" or if an immediate response is required (e.g. ped
| blindly stepping into the road ahead of me) then yelling "Oi!"
| can really surprise them and make them notice you. I'm also a
| fan of using "Beep, beep" if a ped is on cycle infrastructure
| (active travel infrastructure is probably a better term) and I
| want to pretend that I'm an impatient driver.
|
| I think the human voice is far superior to a bell as you can
| tailor the message for the situation and you don't have to move
| a hand away from the brakes to do so. (Using your voice is also
| a very good idea when approaching a horse and rider - horses
| know about humans and don't get freaked out if you call ahead
| "Morning!" or something cheery and appropriate).
| lxgr wrote:
| On my bike commute route, I'd lose my voice before the first
| meeting of the day if I had to use only my voice.
| leoedin wrote:
| I realised after a few near misses that my voice is by far
| the lowest latency signal method I have. If a situation
| suddenly seems dangerous I'll yell. Perhaps not very polite,
| but far more polite than hitting someone who stepped out in
| front of me. A bike bell probably adds a second of latency to
| find the bell. I'd rather use that time to brake.
|
| The bell can be useful as a more general "I'm here" warning.
| But if there's any actual risk of a collision, yelling and
| braking are far more effective.
| lxgr wrote:
| > Do horns and bells really prevent accidents?
|
| They absolutely do, for indirect reasons:
|
| > Generally it's a lot easier just to press the brake
|
| Maybe easier, but it hardly seems fair, nor realistic.
|
| With a bit of experience, you can tell when pedestrians are
| likely to stumble onto the bike lane without looking. Then you
| have two choices: Significantly reduce your speed, or ring your
| bell first and only reduce speed if they still haven't noticed
| the oncoming bike.
|
| If you only reduce speed, you'll be traveling at a very low
| average speed, and time is money (especially for bike delivery
| workers, but I also hate having to sharply decelerate for
| people glued to their screen or otherwise completely unaware of
| their surroundings even if I'm not in a rush), so you can take
| a guess as to whether "just reducing your speed" is
| practicable.
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| I get your point about not wanting to reduce speed, but it's
| worth considering how the law might react in a worse-case
| scenario.
|
| Here in the UK, there was an infamous case of Charlie
| Alliston who ended up getting a ridiculous 18 months prison
| sentence after colliding with a pedestrian who hit her head
| and subsequently died. He was riding a "fixie" without a
| front brake and was cycling at around 18mph through some
| green traffic lights. The pedestrian was crossing the road
| further on (i.e. not at a junction which is fairly normal)
| and wasn't paying enough attention, so Charlie shouted at her
| to get out of his way. He started to reduce speed (rear brake
| only), but then decided that he could just aim for the gap
| behind her, but she then reacted to his shouting by stepping
| backwards into his path.
|
| The point is that the judge awarded such a tough sentence
| partly due to Charlie not taking all available actions to
| avoid a collision and also because his bike was illegal to
| use on the road due to having just one brake. So, if you rely
| on a bell to clear your path, you could be held liable if
| they don't respond and you collide.
| lxgr wrote:
| To be clear, I am still reducing my speed if I don't get
| positive confirmation that I've been noticed or if there's
| not enough time for a reaction to even happen.
|
| My bell just gives me the significant improvement of
| possibly getting a reaction from the pedestrian long before
| I need to start braking.
|
| However, not everybody does cycle like that. And while
| legally and ethically dubious, the bell still helps in that
| case as well.
| stavros wrote:
| I don't know, the sentence doesn't sound ridiculous if
| you're cycliing at 18mph towards someone, without a front
| brake, and your precaution is "it's OK, I can guess which
| way they're going to go".
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| The sentence was very harsh compared to lots of drivers
| who have killed people in far worse ways. I don't want to
| excuse him as he was also a complete arsehole on social
| media after the collision and his cycling was reckless.
| The lesson is that even if you think you have priority,
| you have to do all that you can to avoid hitting someone.
| stavros wrote:
| Hm yeah, I don't know about drivers' sentences, true.
| 0x3f wrote:
| > If you only reduce speed, you'll be traveling at a very low
| average speed, and time is money
|
| Well this is a bit of an appeal to consequences. I would say
| (a) this is a very good reason to build dedicated infra, and
| (b) if something ever does happen, a court is really not
| going to take this line of reasoning very well, so be careful
| with it... even if in practice it's how you consider it.
| lxgr wrote:
| I'm completely in favor of building dedicated
| infrastructure, but I can't do that by myself. (Also, how
| do you prevent pedestrians from crossing said dedicated
| infrastructure without looking? Should it be fenced off?
| But I agree that there are better and worse implementations
| of dedicated bike lanes.)
|
| What would you suggest cyclists do until that happens?
| Never go faster than walking speed? Then I can leave my
| bike at home. Cycle on the road, where cars can hit me,
| instead of the dedicated bike lane, use of which is often
| mandatory?
|
| > a court is really not going to take this line of
| reasoning very well
|
| A court will rule in favor of the pedestrian stepping onto
| a bike lane without looking getting hit by a bike that's
| too close to do anything?
| 0x3f wrote:
| > What would you suggest cyclists do until that happens?
| Never go faster than walking speed? Then I can leave my
| bike at home. Cycle on the road, where cars can hit me,
| instead of the dedicated bike lane, use of which is often
| mandatory?
|
| I don't know where you live but it's quite unusual here
| to be cycling through areas that have a lot of
| pedestrians. If the bike lane is a dedicated one,
| pedestrians are very rarely in it. But yes if all else
| fails, the road is preferable to the pavement if you're
| unwilling to cycle slowly enough.
|
| > how do you prevent pedestrians from crossing said
| dedicated infrastructure without looking?
|
| That's a UX problem. You can also ask how to prevent cars
| driving on the cycle lane. Which we do in a multitude of
| ways. You just need to physically communicate segregation
| and danger.
|
| > A court will rule in favor of the pedestrian stepping
| onto a bike lane without looking getting hit by a bike
| that's too close to do anything?
|
| Here, absolutely, if they consider the cyclist is going
| too fast for the conditions. There's a concept of a
| hierarchy whereby the more vulnerable class is almost
| assumed not to be at fault. Same for a car hitting a
| cyclist, or a motorbike, even.
| lxgr wrote:
| > If the bike lane is a dedicated one, pedestrians are
| very rarely in it.
|
| Pedestrians step onto the dedicated bike lane I use to
| commute on average at least once per way for me.
|
| > But yes if all else fails, the road is preferable to
| the pavement if you're unwilling to cycle slowly enough.
|
| Of course I'm taking the road if there's no dedicated
| bike lane. Cycling faster than walking speed on the
| sidewalk seems reckless to me.
|
| > That's a UX problem. You can also ask how to prevent
| cars driving on the cycle lane. Which we do in a
| multitude of ways. You just need to physically
| communicate segregation.
|
| Yes, but I can only use the bike lane that already
| exists. Of course I prefer the ones with better UX.
|
| > There's a concept of a hierarchy whereby the more
| vulnerable class is almost assumed not to be at fault.
|
| Not where I live. You are allowed to e.g. trust adult
| pedestrians without any visible signs of impairment to
| not randomly step into the road. Otherwise, driving cars
| next to sidewalks or crossing intersections would only be
| possible at walking speed as well.
|
| Of course, if you already see somebody approaching the
| road, somebody walking unsteadily, visibly intoxicated
| etc. you are obliged to still brake preemptively. The
| question here is whether visible noise-cancelling
| headphones would be considered a similar visible
| impairment, I suppose.
|
| Personally, I just always assume I haven't been noticed,
| because ultimately I don't want to run somebody over even
| if I would be legally in the clear. That's a different
| story, though.
| stavros wrote:
| Our bike lanes are just a line on the sidewalk and
| pedestrians routinely walk on them, cross the sidewalk in
| them without looking, let their toddlers/pets run into
| them, etc. Also, nobody realizes that a bicycle bell
| means "someone is coming", so they just ignore it as
| background noise.
|
| I had to mount an airhorn onto my bike. At least people
| listen to that, though it's so loud I only use it in
| emergencies.
| 0x3f wrote:
| I would be worried about a horn like this because if they
| get startled and move into the path of a car on the
| actual road, or do any other stupid thing that injures
| them, you're going to have real problems.
| stavros wrote:
| Luckily the actual road is many tens of meters away from
| the bike path, but you're right otherwise.
| shermozle wrote:
| A car company wanting to divert attention away from the carnage
| cars cause. Seems a bit suspicious no?
| croemer wrote:
| In Skoda's defense, it has a long tradition of making
| bicycles as well
| tokai wrote:
| Skoda is a huge sponsor of professionel cycling.
| Theodores wrote:
| In the UK, an important market for VW group, there are two
| types of bicycle, one for the proletariat and the other for
| the bourgeoisie. Due to the k-shaped economy, the proletariat
| bicycle died a long time ago, to evolve into the 'Lime bike'
| in places such as London. In the past, companies such as
| Raleigh provided excellent proletariat bicycles, and the
| working man could afford them for his kids and himself. Of
| course, he would prefer a car, because cars are high status
| whereas a steel/aluminium bicycle with straight bars is not.
|
| The bourgeoisie bicycle is a relatively recent phenomenon,
| and anything totally impractical and made of carbon fibre
| qualifies as bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie bicycle is also too
| expensive to lock up in town, plus you need all the clobber
| to go with it (lycra).
|
| Every bourgeoisie bicycle is owned by a car dependent person.
| They don't begin their ride at their front door, and their
| journeys are not useful or with purpose beyond cycling. Their
| bicycles get strapped onto the back of their car, or placed
| in the trunk, with wheels removed. These people don't need
| locks for their bicycles as they have a two tonne steel box
| to secure their bicycle in. You also get things like power-
| meters with these bikes, plus the owner has to wear a special
| polystyrene hat, at the insistence of their mother.
|
| Skoda are selling to those people that spend PS5K+ on their
| toy carbon fibre bicycle. They know the realities of car
| dependency.
| pandaman wrote:
| Why would somebody transport a bike on car to London and
| ride on the streets crowded with pedestrians? And attach a
| massive bell to a carbon bike to facilitate that? The video
| shows that they have given these to delivery riders, which
| seems to be the target audience for a device like that.
| Seeing that this story is going viral everywhere it appears
| to be a quite a successful PR campaign. I doubt it's a real
| product though now I imagine similar devices will appear on
| Alibaba and Amazon.
| i_am_proteus wrote:
| Bicycle bells are mostly for warning pedestrians when
| approaching from behind and passing on shared-use trails. I
| ride on shared infrastructure and cannot afford to build new
| infrastructure when my town will not. Not warning a pedestrian
| when approaching from behind introduces the possibility of
| collision if the pedestrian makes a sudden change in his
| walking course. I typically use this etiquette:
|
| Passing a single pedestrian or runner on a quiet day: no bell,
| coasting for a short bit with a loud free hub (the rotating
| ratchet element on the rear wheel) alerts the pedestrian to my
| presence.
|
| Passing a runner: normal ring from a distance so they have
| knowledge that the bicycle is passing
|
| Passing a cyclist: one loud ring from a distance
|
| Passing a pedestrian walking a dog: two loud rings, one far,
| one close, so that the pedestrian is aware of the approaching
| bicycle and he can prevent his dog from running at
| me/colliding. Many dogs do seem to enjoy a bicycle chase.
|
| Antisocial pedestrians (i.e., walking side-by-side such as to
| be blocking the path in both directions, preventing the
| bicyclist from passing): several loud rings of the bell until
| the antisocial activity has abated. Announcements in my local
| tongue (not English) that they impede the flow of traffic.
| 0x3f wrote:
| Right it has a wider non-emergency comms purpose, I do this
| too. But I wouldn't do it and assume they've heard or
| understood, and so overtake too fast on that assumption. The
| overtake should be safe regardless.
| noio wrote:
| I wonder if you are German?
|
| Spending some time in Germany from Holland I notice there is
| a significant difference in cycling etiquette :)
|
| Especially regarding "passing a cyclist" which also touches
| on the essential difficulty with having only one "ring"
| sound.
|
| Always when Germans pass me on the bike and they ring I get
| slightly annoyed because I interpret it as a "get out of the
| way" ring, and I feel like there is enough space. But perhaps
| it's just the cautious "don't do anything unexpected" ring.
|
| A Dutch person would rarely ring at another cyclist in the
| former way. But they also might be less safety focused while
| cycling (see also: helmet usage). Or we have safer
| infrastructure already.
|
| On a road bike, however, I too ring at pedestrians
| "preemptively". For sure GPs remark of "if you need to ring
| you're going too fast" applies here but that's the essence of
| road cycling.
|
| Ironically I'm also annoyed when road cyclists ring at me for
| the same reason.
|
| Just shows the case for having 2 clearly different types of
| rings.
|
| (Also for cars to have a "thank you" horn, haha)
| i_am_proteus wrote:
| Living now in Germany :)
|
| I ring a very nice bell and can "mute" the bell (touching
| it with my hand to stop the ring just after thumbing the
| striker), so when ringing for information rather than
| hazard, it's a short quick ring, rather than a long loud
| ring.
|
| Signs here alert cyclists to warn when passing, so
| certainly this etiquette is considered normal, but also I
| imagine it is not universal to all regions.
| sandos wrote:
| This is exactly the same thing with the car horn: in some
| countries it seems to be used for "hey you, unprotected
| person, do NOT swerve right now, I am passing you with my
| car" versus in Sweden where I live, your'e not allowed that
| usage at all.
|
| Also in Sweden, you do only use the bell if really needed.
| Vinnl wrote:
| As a Dutch person, I experience exactly this dilemma:
| ringing the bell feels like telling people to get out of
| the way, when often there is plenty of space for me to pass
| through, but I _know_ that there 's a significant chance
| that they're going to veer into my way if they don't know
| I'm coming.
|
| Of course, ringing my bell will often _cause_ people to
| veer into the way, too. But then if you ring at a
| sufficient distance, you risk them not hearing it. Except
| there 's no way to tell if they're not hearing it, or just
| consciously not veering into the way, and in the latter
| case, you don't want to ring again, because that will sound
| _even more_ impatient.
|
| Etiquette is hard.
|
| (And yes, I want cars to have a bicycle bell too, so they
| can greet people without jump-scaring me.)
| yencabulator wrote:
| I used to slightly pull & quickly release a brake lever
| that made a less-annoying and less-loud "clack" noise
| when I wanted to be noticed but not to be annoying,
| generally when I knew I had no right of way but wanted to
| politely ask for a way around a group of people who
| hadn't noticed me yet.
| Zvez wrote:
| as someone who moved to Netherlands couple of years ago, I
| started to be much more annoyed by cyclist in other
| countries. In Netherlands if I hear ring I know I'm doing
| something wrong and I need to stop and pay asses whatever
| I'm doing right now.
|
| In other countries rings now seem either unnecessary (they
| have enough space) or rude (I'm not on bike lane, why do
| you demand me to give you a way).
| empyrrhicist wrote:
| What they described is also good etiquette in the
| Midwestern US.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| cars are typically the biggest problems and it's usually
| their behaviour, but I always give a friendly wave when a
| car yields (or even just doesn't run me over).
|
| One small victory at a a time...
| Zvez wrote:
| I hate to tell you, but you are doing it wrong
|
| If infrastructure is shared it doesn't mean you have more
| rights to pass than pedestrian.
|
| Moreover, bell as a way to warn doesn't work. Because
| pedestrians will mostly get startled because of it and can
| actually do this sudden move you are trying to make them not
| do.
|
| So if you are on fast vehicle comparing to others in the same
| infrastructure, you need to drive in a way, that you can't be
| affected of sudden turn of someone in front of you. Which
| basically means you need to slow down or give enough space
| for others to do their sudden moves.
| hengistbury wrote:
| When cycling on shared use infrastructure I generally find
| pedestrians understand the meaning of a bell as a warning.
| Certainly some do become startled and move unpredictably,
| but if you travel at a low enough speed and bell with
| enough distance that this isn't an issue.
|
| I regularly cycle on a very narrow shared use pavement
| which is directly beside a 40mph road. There is space to
| pass pedestrians, but I would consider it dangerous to try
| and pass without ensuring they are aware of my presence,
| even when passing at a walking pace.
|
| A chime of the bell is more of a polite "I'm here" instead
| of a "Get out of my way!"
| phyzome wrote:
| If they're blocking a bike, they're also blocking other
| pedestrians. It's rude no matter what.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| shared infrastructure means exactly that.
| looperhacks wrote:
| Where I live, there are different levels of "shared" and I
| would be very confused if a cyclist would just stay behind
| me instead of ringing the bell. It's different cultures.
| furyg3 wrote:
| I've been a cyclist in SF and in Amsterdam, both for many
| years.
|
| In SF I used my bell much more aggressively. It was mainly for
| cars, if I'm in or entering their blind spot and my spidey
| sense tells me they are considering an action that places me in
| danger. For example, we all know when driving when the car in
| front of us is thinking about merging, even before they
| indicate (often I feel like I know before they do). I also used
| it for pedestrians stepping out into the street who are maybe
| looking past me for oncoming cars but somehow don't see me, or
| when approaching 'blind' situations like a sharp corner, a
| driver pulling out of a driveway but there is a tree between
| us, delivery drivers stepping out from their truck, etc. I
| can't say how many accidents have been prevented (the person
| may have eventually looked and seen me), but I can say that my
| bell has triggered people to look and see me earlier than they
| were going to had I not rang it.
|
| In Amsterdam my bell is used much more sparingly. It's mostly
| for tourists stepping into (or considering stepping into) the
| bike lane. If they are already _in_ the bike lane, I almost
| always prefer just to slow down a bit and dodge them, as
| ringing the bell often triggers a deer-caught-in-headlight
| moment or erratic behavior, which increases the chance of an
| accident or that I have to come to a full stop. The other
| situation is to express dissatisfaction at cars blocking bike
| lanes, cars /bikes not yielding, drivers blocking
| intersections, or other dangerous behavior. This isn't
| preventing an accident but I'd argue it is still important, as
| social control affects how often we make bad decisions. Outside
| the city I also use my bell to let other cyclists know I'm
| passing.
|
| So yeah, I'd say bells prevent accidents, but obviously not as
| well as good biking infrastructure, where pedestrians, bikes,
| and cars have clear separate spaces, and visibility of cyclists
| to drivers is high.
| sandos wrote:
| "Do horns and bells really prevent accidents?"
|
| If you are a sane person, absolutely not!! You _try_ the bell,
| if people react, then you go. Many times it just confuses
| people or people ignore it.
|
| If you are a high-speed maniac and _rely_ on the bell to clear
| a path for you... then yeah. But you are then also likely to
| take great risks in general and will probably be in other
| accidents...
| michael1999 wrote:
| There are a lot of runners on mixed use paths wearing
| headphones these days. They are an absolute danger to
| overtaking bikes. A bell they would hear would be useful.
| PowerElectronix wrote:
| To me, in a path with no priority to the bike, the only
| danger are cyclist who think they have priority and can
| overtake people at speed.
|
| Being able to get the attention of runners improves the
| situation, reducing the speed while circulating on a mixed
| path solves it completely. If you wanna go fast get on a bike
| lane or the road.
| pandaman wrote:
| I don't quite follow, how slowing makes the problem of a
| runner jumping into the side of your bike go away? If
| anything it makes it more likely he or she will knock you
| off the bike since a slower moving bike is less stable and
| also increases the time you are in the danger zone next to
| a runner. And runners do jump between the lanes for no
| apparent reason.
| throw83940449 wrote:
| Pedestrians are not danger, they are victims! Cyclist should
| slow down, while performing dangerous overtaking, and not
| crash into them! Same rules like with cars!
| falsemyrmidon wrote:
| I suppose you feel similarly about the dangers bikes pose to
| cars?
| faefox wrote:
| Running with ANC headphones on is like driving with your
| eyes closed. Safety is a two-way street and it's everyone's
| responsibility to maintain a basic level of situational
| awareness.
| sc__ wrote:
| Deaf people exist.
| serial_dev wrote:
| It's not only about preventing accidents (but I do believe it
| prevents _some_ to attempt answering your question).
|
| It's also about signaling to someone that they might be doing
| something wrong or they might not be paying attention. For
| pedestrians it takes significantly less time and distance to
| stop, for cars, trams, and bicycles, it takes longer.
|
| It happens all the time that pedestrians don't know the customs
| of a country, they don't recognize bike lines... in that case
| the cyclists do not need to pump the breaks anytime a clueless
| tourist gets in front of them... they can ring the bell,
| signaling:
|
| _" yo, it's not how we do it here, please watch out, I'm
| coming full speed and you are in the wrong, so please look up
| from your phone and stop right there"._
|
| I also had the luck to meet some people thinking they can be on
| their phone while cycling, drifting into my lane, etc... In
| that case, a bell is also adequate
|
| _" hey, please stop writing a text message while you are on
| your bike blazing through the city, you are driving as if you
| were drunk, pay attention please and stop multitasking (you
| moron)"_
|
| If nothing works to change their behavior, of course I'll try
| my best and hit the brakes safely, but I'd prefer they learned
| how to move around in the city safely.
| literalAardvark wrote:
| My experiences on a motorcycle tell me that if you feel the
| need to honk you should be focusing on braking and evasive
| maneuvers instead.
|
| The choice between between teaching some midwit the law and
| going home in one piece seems crystal clear to me.
|
| In a couple of years of riding I think the horn would have
| very slightly helped maybe... once or twice. If the other guy
| would have heard it at all which is doubtful.
| kzrdude wrote:
| As someone who cycles daily, the bell is less aggressive
| than a car horn and it's a useful signaling tool about
| every other day. I need to signal that I'm approaching from
| behind pedestrians, especially if they are walking without
| any safe gaps for me to pass them through.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Phones? I've seen cyclists using laptops. Some of the most
| oblivious and entitled vehicle operators on the road.
| tbrownaw wrote:
| > _I 've seen cyclists using laptops._
|
| How? That seems like it would be rather mechanically
| challenging.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Sort of perched on the handlebars. It did seem almost
| impossible. Maybe there is a bracket of some sort being
| used.
| gs17 wrote:
| Aw, I was hoping for some modded recumbent bicycle that
| has a whole desk on it.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| They certainly can, yes. Many crashes can be avoided if both
| parties slam on the brakes or swerve, not not quite if only one
| does. Also they're useful in parking lots when some dumbass is
| about to back right into you.
| prmoustache wrote:
| > In order for e.g. a horn to work you need enough time that
| the driver processes the situation and decides the horn will
| communicate something AND enough time for the pedestrian or
| whatever to process that and react to it. Generally it's a lot
| easier just to press the brake, and more importantly be
| travelling at a speed and in a manner where the brake is
| sufficient
|
| I have seen a small kid jump from his father's scooter just
| when I was overtaking them and they decided to stop because he
| had seen his grandpa or whoever was that old guy on the other
| side of the bike lane. His father managed to stop him by
| grabbing his sweater because I had rung my bell a few seconds
| before he decided to stop but the kid ended up inches from my
| bicycle. It was at very low speed, almost walking speed yet
| hitting a bicycle handlebars head first because you turn around
| without looking still hurts even if the bicycle his stopped.
| 0x3f wrote:
| If I'm driving and I see a young kid like this I always move
| out away from the curb if possible. So even if they dart out
| or fall into the road it's not a problem. Actually, same if
| I'm passing a bunch of parked cars and there is room, since
| kids can be stupid and emerge from between them.
|
| If someone truly runs into when you're stationary, I'm not
| sure anyone really has a problem with you in that scenario.
| prmoustache wrote:
| I don't want people to get hurts, regardless if it is my
| fault or not. Our world/societes could do with more empathy
| even if some people do errors.
|
| For the same reason I try to be courteous and try to always
| say "hello, thank you, have a nice day" even if sometimes I
| am fuming inside that someone cut my path and I had
| priority from a legal point of view. I also quietly slow
| down and give ample distance to someone who cross the
| street when I am driving even when it is a stupid decision
| from their part and others would have honked or shouted
| insults.
|
| I don't think our life and interactions should always be a
| case of us vs them.
| jmull wrote:
| You're right, it's certainly not the primary way to prevent
| accidents. But it helps at the edges, which seems worthwhile.
|
| That's assuming the bells aren't abused too badly, which is a
| mixed bag, but mostly true.
| kfarr wrote:
| Bells don't work on cars, I've been using this in SF and
| motorists respond very quickly
|
| https://loudbicycle.com/
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| horns & bells are for pedestrians IME, not cars.
|
| >> properly segregated infrastructure for each class of
| vehicle.
|
| I ride a lot in traffic and the problem with segregated
| infrastructure (i.e. bike lanes) is the interfaces and
| constriction. Pedestrians step off the sidewalk or out of cars
| into constrained bike lanes all the time and there's no where
| to go; cars turn across bike lanes with the same problem.
|
| You can't always do it, but if you can eliminate the speed
| differential I believe riding in traffic is much safer than a
| bike lane, at least until you get enough bike volume to keep
| drivers aware. THat's hard to do in most of NA or year round.
| left-struck wrote:
| In cars a horn has saved me a few times where someone was
| backing up or turning into me not realising I was there. In
| those situations my car was stationary so there was nothing
| else I could do as quickly as pressing the horn
| Alifatisk wrote:
| > Its a simple analog solution to a digital problem
|
| That's such a beautiful statement
| madsohm wrote:
| This bell would be illegal in Denmark, where our laws clearly
| state that you are only allowed one signal giving device and that
| any signal giving devices attached to vehicles (including bikes)
| can only produce one constant sound.
|
| How this would be enforced is a different topic.
| _diyar wrote:
| Really? I would have guessed you could argue that it qualifies
| as ,,one signal giving device" since it is one single piece of
| equipment (ie the horn in a car also has many parts, but it's
| presumably fine) and also that it ,,only produces one constant
| sound", where that sound is composed of different frequencies
| (again, car horns probably don't have a pure tone in Denmark
| either, right?).
| matsemann wrote:
| Not entirely the same in Norway, but the rule as written is
| roughly translated "Sound signal: A bike should have a bell.
| Other signalling devices are prohibited".
|
| Doesn't stop me from using an AirZound or digital airhorn.
| Saved me countless times. Like a bell is heard by a driver
| blasting their stereo while checking their phone, slowly
| veering into the cycle lane.
| tokai wrote:
| Non of those laws are enforced, ever. Even if you get stopped
| by police. When have you last seen a bike with all the
| mandetory reflectors?
| lxgr wrote:
| This is amazing. Would be great if emergency vehicle sirens could
| also adopt these findings. I feel like they're beyond painfully
| loud these days.
| ape4 wrote:
| I have noticed I can make a less sharp sound with my bike bell by
| ringing it a certain way. I use this to let pedestrians know I am
| coming but that they don't have to jump out of the way.
| afandian wrote:
| Cool idea. But bizarre that they worked with Deliveroo. Bike
| bells were designed for a time when cyclists travelled at speeds
| where you could safely get out of the way.
|
| Most "independent" cyclists do cycle safely.
|
| But delivery riders for delivery platforms commonly use illegally
| modified e-bikes. Platforms have the GPS data. They must know.
|
| They could make huge improvements in safety by actively
| preventing the use of illegally modified e-bikes that travel too
| fast.
| WastedCucumber wrote:
| >They could make huge improvements in safety by actively
| preventing the use of illegally modified e-bikes that travel
| too fast.
|
| Or by regulating bicycle food delivery services so thatheir
| employees' continued employment and wage magnitude doesn't
| hinge quite so thoroughly on how rapidly they deliver.
| afandian wrote:
| Yes, absolutely that.
|
| I nearly put a passive aggressive "employees" in my post, but
| that would mix concerns. But having drivers as "contractors",
| and dodging employers' responsibilities and liabilities, is
| really the root of this all.
| croemer wrote:
| Fun fact: Skoda means "pity" or "damage" in Czech, can also be
| used as "what a shame".
|
| Happened to be the company founder's surname.
| Markoff wrote:
| it is quote common family name in Czechia, my daughter's
| classmate has this family name as well
|
| same with most of the Japanese car brands or even Citroen,
| Peugeot...
| croemer wrote:
| But Citroen and Peugeot don't mean something funny like "What
| a shame"
| Markoff wrote:
| I think I would disagree naming the car brand Lemon
| (Citroen). When life gives you Citroen...
| upofadown wrote:
| Seems to be some misunderstanding of what bike bells are for
| here...
|
| A bell is helpful in a situation where a pedestrian is not aware
| of an approaching bike. The bell informs the pedestrian of two
| things:
|
| 1. That there is an approaching bike.
|
| 2. Roughly were the bike is approaching from.
|
| The hope is that the pedestrian will then behave in a predictable
| way to allow a safe pass by the bike. In almost all cases the
| pedestrian will be able to simply continue doing what they were
| doing before they heard the bell.
|
| If a pedestrian can not hear bike bells, for whatever reason,
| that is not a problem. They can just stay consistent with the
| centreline of the path/road/way. They then have a responsibility
| to shoulder check when shifting from side to side.
| chimpanzee2 wrote:
| Not sure I understand your criticism.
|
| Yes, bike bells are for pedestrians to hear.
|
| Problem: Pedestrians today wear ANC noise cancelling, thus
| being unable to hear approaching bikes' bells.
|
| Skoda: We made a bell with a frequency usually not cancelled by
| ANC, so these pedestrians still hear it.
|
| Sounds reasonable to me.
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| 750 Hz. Baby crying sound is around 300-400 Hz and let me tell
| you my airpods pro definitely let me hear the baby cry. I think
| Apple built that as an obvious safety feature.
|
| Interestingly, all the shrillness noises (chalkboard, balloon or
| polystyrene screech) are in similar frequency too.
| dasKrokodil wrote:
| It's mildly interesting, but ultimately it's just a little
| greenwashing project. They even painted it green to make that
| clear :)
| throw83940449 wrote:
| I carry air horn. Great for dogs and aggressive cyclists.
| Pedestrians have no obligation to jump into ditch, to clear
| walking path for speeding cyclists!
| WastedCucumber wrote:
| In Germany we have rules, and one of those rules is that
| pedestrians on the sidewalk who are in the cyclepath (usually a
| too-subtle red stone) do, in fact, have to get out of the way
| for cyclists.
|
| I imagine there's also a rule about directing airhorns against
| law abiding cyclists.
| throw83940449 wrote:
| I am quite often in Germany.
|
| Red stone in Germany is cycling path, not general walk path
| where cyclists are not allowed.
|
| Air horns are generally allowed upto 105 dB. Peper spray,
| telescopic batons and other similar devices are illegal. I
| also carry walking cane.
| wolvoleo wrote:
| > In Germany we have rules, and one of those rules is that
| pedestrians on the sidewalk who are in the cyclepath (usually
| a too-subtle red stone) do, in fact, have to get out of the
| way for cyclists.
|
| Yeah that's the problem, it's often too subtle and hard to
| notice.
|
| That's why bike lanes should be dedicated with a stone
| barrier/kerb, or bikes should just not be allowed there.
| BrtByte wrote:
| This is one of those ideas that sounds a bit like marketing fluff
| at first, but the underlying problem is actually very real
| mc7alazoun wrote:
| I genuinely had a similar thought a few days ago while riding my
| motorbike; I had my AirPods on with noise cancelling, and I was
| like: I wish there was something that would alert me to
| horns/bells ... not that AirPods are super efficient at
| cancelling background noise but still!
| jameshart wrote:
| Noise cancelling headphones while riding a motorbike is... a
| choice. Do you also wear a blindfold?
| bux93 wrote:
| Here's my hot take: just get rid of bicycle bells and horns
| altogether. When's the last time you heard one and were usefully
| informed about some behavioral change to avoid accident? How
| often does that happen as opposed to needless use of the
| bell/horn, or not noticing it for whatever reason (let's be
| charitable and exclude use of ANC headphones, but include general
| noise levels and boy-who-cried-wolf). How often is it just a jump
| scare, making traffic less safe?
|
| Just ride/drive a bit more thoughtfully so you don't hurt people,
| even if they're deaf.
| BLKNSLVR wrote:
| Bike bells are useful for me most weekends to let me know
| there's a bike soon to overtake me while I'm skating.
|
| Headphones on folks while they're out walking is ridiculous and
| antisocial and if they get hit because they didn't hear a bell
| then they had it coming. I only use a single earbud at a time
| so I don't lose my situational awareness entirely, but even
| that can still wash out the rest of the world noise pretty
| well.
| grvbck wrote:
| For anyone that wants to actually hear the bell before reading
| all the marketing material:
|
| Bell sound starts at 2:09 in the video.
| renata wrote:
| And seems to sound like a normal bell, or maybe that's just my
| ears. I guess I can see why they didn't put it up front, but
| that was also all I wanted.
| everdrive wrote:
| It's hard for me to understand why people choose to walk around
| in public wearing headphones. I'm aware that it's incredibly
| common, but you put yourself at risk of theft, accident, and of
| course the mild hearing loss that accompanies _any_ frequent
| headphone usage. In the case of both theft and accident, you
| cannot hear your assailant coming, and miss the queues that would
| otherwise keep you safe.
| chimpanzee2 wrote:
| > and of course the mild hearing loss that accompanies _any_
| frequent headphone usage
|
| curious, you got any citations for this claim?
| everdrive wrote:
| "Loud" is a bit subjective, but in my experience most people
| make their volume far too loud. Even moreso if you're
| attempting to overcome the background sound around you.
|
| The articles below discuss both volume and duration. It's
| also worth checking out the OSHA guidelines which pretty
| cleanly show the relationship between duration and volume.
| (ie, "safer" volumes still cause damage with enough
| duration.)
|
| https://health.clevelandclinic.org/how-to-rock-out-with-
| ear-...
|
| https://healthcare.utah.edu/healthfeed/2024/01/listen-
| headph...
|
| https://www.cnet.com/health/wearing-headphones-right-now-
| fol...
|
| https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/noise/prevent/understand.html
| moritonal wrote:
| It's a definitive statement that you don't want to talk to
| people. In London not wearing headphones ironically means you
| become a target for people who want your attention. And it
| blocks out the otherwise very loud cityscape.
| sunrunner wrote:
| I know a few people that simply wear headphones to help with
| managing sensory overload, so I wouldn't assume that having
| headphones on is a guarantee of listening to something (though
| still likely to be strongly correlated).
|
| As far as assailants, a skilled ninja wouldn't be detected even
| if their target weren't wearing headphones...
| algesten wrote:
| Are you really living your life walking around thinking about
| the next assailant?!
|
| Must be terrifying.
| thenthenthen wrote:
| Where I used to live it was smart not to wear headphones,
| being it for muggers, drunk drivers, random shootings or
| crazy dogs. It was not a chill place no.
| everdrive wrote:
| Not these days, but I moved away from Baltimore.
| ljf wrote:
| Same reason I listen to music or podcasts in the car.
|
| I am very lucky to live in a city/country where risks of theft
| from my person is low - when I lived for 20 years in London I
| never once felt unsafe listening to music.
|
| The closest was two young men got very close to me on the tube,
| when I was playing on my brand new Hong Kong imported PSP - but
| I just took my headphones off. I think they were just
| interested as most people hadn't seem one in the flesh yet.
|
| I can't say I know of anyone personally who suffered theft or
| accident _caused_ by them listening to music on headphones.
|
| When I cycled a lot, I had a small speaker strapped to my
| handlebars rather than wearing headphones, as I liked being
| able to hear cars around me - but when I was younger I
| regularly cycled in headphones, and was still able to hear
| enough of the road around me to not feel that I was missing
| anything.
|
| Remember, we don't make drivers drive around with no music and
| their windows open, so that they are better able to hear
| cyclists...
| pwlb wrote:
| Many neurodivergent people are simply overwhelmed by the sound
| on the streets
| michh wrote:
| Coincidentally, I bought a 12v car horn yesterday with the intent
| of wiring it into my ebike's power supply with a little button on
| my handlebars.
|
| Not because of other cyclists or pedestrians wearing (anc)
| headphones but because modern cars are so heavily sound-proofed
| they don't hear a bicycle bell anymore. A recent incident with an
| inattentive taxi driver in a brand new EV nearly flattening me
| prompted me to want to pursue this.
|
| I'm still waiting for my cheap AliExpress dc-to-dc step down
| converter but otherwise I have everything I need and I think it
| _should_ work. The horn module itself is definitely loud enough:
| I connected it to a 12v power supply at my desk and jumped out of
| my chair.
| f3d46600-b66e wrote:
| I did that, but I used battery - couldn't figure out how to
| hook up to the e-bike's 50v electrical system (plus the DC-DC
| converter with high enough current...)
|
| So I am using LiPo 3S, 2200mAh. Works like a charm. I keep it
| at its storage voltage (3.7-3.8v per cell), and it hardly
| drained the battery (there is no paracitic drain). Whole thing
| was like $20.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| I pondered doing that but thought it would agitate other road
| users so decided against.
| iwontberude wrote:
| Some locales are downright itching for a reason to road
| rage so I don't blame you. One thing I have to say about
| being a motorcyclist is that our residents in California
| are so considerate and have never once mistreated me for
| beeping, lane splitting/filtering, stalling my bike at a
| green light, etc.
| michh wrote:
| mm, if i can't get it to work with the dc-dc converter i'll
| definitely go that route, good idea
| natebc wrote:
| if you ever want an upgrade look into nautilus air horns. I had
| one on my 250cc Vespa that would clear an intersection.
|
| Needs like 18 amps if that tells you anything.
| srejk wrote:
| When I was commuting 60k/day on my bike in shitty suburban
| conditions, I used one of these instead - you get limited use
| per trip, but you can always fill it up with a CO2
| cylinder/bike pump:
|
| https://www.hpvelotechnik.com/en/recumbent-trikes-bikes/acce...
|
| It is _loud_.
| amluto wrote:
| That's a crappy pressure vessel holding 350ml of 80psi air,
| for about 100J of stored energy. I'm not entirely sure I'd be
| comfortable with that, especially anywhere with my face in
| the line of fire it it fails.
| srejk wrote:
| Good point, but I abused it pretty well and it seemed to do
| OK - was also in a water bottle holder so closer to the
| legs than anything.
| stronglikedan wrote:
| > That's a crappy pressure vessel
|
| That's a huge assumption, and likely incorrect.
| gibspaulding wrote:
| Your bike already has two crappy 80psi pressure vessels,
| why not three?
| amluto wrote:
| Those two pressure vessels are highly engineered and are
| wrapped with materials with pretty good tensile strength.
| Also, they're made out of materials (fabric and rubber)
| that absorb a decent amount of energy when they tear and
| that don't fragment. And the whole assembly usually
| depressurizes slowly.
|
| Having personally blown up beverage bottles by
| overpressurizing them (be very very careful doing this!),
| when they go, they go violently.
| BenjiWiebe wrote:
| I've blown up beverage bottles for fun. Hooking an air
| compressor to a 2L bottle and exploding it makes a
| satisfyingly loud boom.
|
| *We had a valve on the air line so we could be at a safe
| distance when pressurizing. Be very careful. It's
| unpredictable exactly at which point they'll blow.
| Sometimes they hold full pressure for a couple seconds
| and then go.*
| samdelucia wrote:
| i like to use dry ice for pressure, make sure you have a
| gun to shoot it if it doesn't go off
| shiroiuma wrote:
| If this is a modern bike, 80psi is way too high. 50psi is
| sufficient and will give you a more comfortable ride as
| well as higher efficiency on real-world surfaces.
|
| 80+psi is for old-style road bikes with narrow 23mm
| tires. Modern bikes (even road bikes for racing) don't
| use these any more; 28mm is the minimum these days.
| deathanatos wrote:
| ... I have a modern bike (a Specialized). The tires'
| rated range is 75psi to 100psi. I usually pump it to
| around 80-85psi. The tires are 33mm.
| shiroiuma wrote:
| You're overinflating your tires. A lower pressure will
| increase your speed and efficiency unless you're riding
| in a velodrome. Here's a video about this:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7r8f3w89XeM
|
| (watch out, there's a lot of extra stuff in this video
| about the machine they use to measure efficiency)
| deathanatos wrote:
| (Well, they should tell the manufacturers...)
|
| The video's result for both tires they tested was peak
| efficiency at 5 bar. They had a _really_ coarse sampling
| of a whole bar, so that works out to a pressure of 65-80
| psi.
| ordersofmag wrote:
| Not to be pendantic (but to be pendantic) 80psi _is_ the
| correct pressure for 28mm tires ridden briskly on good
| roads. At least according to ye olde Silca tire pressure
| calculator. Back in the day when folks ran 23mm tires
| they would typically run above 100psi (though that may
| not have been optimal...).
| shiroiuma wrote:
| That calculator is wrong. Cycling people have been
| overinflating their tires for ages (as well as using too-
| narrow tires), with the assumption that the ground is
| perfectly smooth. Lower pressures yield higher efficiency
| (and better comfort) on rougher surfaces.
| LorenPechtel wrote:
| Because the danger posed by a fairly low energy pressure
| vessel is highly related to it's failure mode. That's why
| OSHA has rules about what compressed air pipes can be
| made of--it's not about the pressure resistance, it's
| about what will happen if one fails.
|
| It's likewise why most military boom is mostly not
| actually boom. With artillery you obviously need a very
| tough case, but standard aircraft-dropped iron bombs are
| mostly that: iron. They don't need that kind of strength
| except specialized bunker-busters, they're built that way
| because for a given weight of bomb you'll do more damage
| by throwing bits of bomb casing from a smaller charge
| than from a bigger charge without the fragments.
| pjdesno wrote:
| It's a soda bottle - it fits in your water bottle holder,
| and you can replace it for a couple of bucks if it fails.
| 80 psi is pretty low pressure (typical narrow tires are
| 100-120) and the bottle itself is very low mass, so the
| fabric around the bottle should ensure safety if it bursts.
|
| IIRC these came out in the early-mid 90s; a bike messenger
| trick at the time was to fasten the horn to your handlebars
| with velcro, so you could take it off and hold it near a
| car window when triggering it.
| hdgvhicv wrote:
| If it fails by blowing the end off toward your face what
| damage will it do?
| amluto wrote:
| I suppose I should maybe not worry about 80 psi so much.
| An ordinary bottle of soda on a moderately warm day is
| around 80psi. The energy is 1/2 * pressure * head space
| (roughly), and head space is minimal. But you can chill
| it in the fridge, then open it and quickly pour out half,
| then close it and let it warm up, and you may still be
| near 80 psi, and I've never heard of anyone getting
| maimed by an exploding soda bottle.
| jandrese wrote:
| > When I was commuting _60k /day_ on my bike in shitty
| suburban conditions
|
| Here I thought my 4.5 mile (7.25 km) bike commute was a bit
| long...
| srejk wrote:
| An hour and a bit each way, took about as much time as
| public transit and better than a coffee for waking up. A
| good road bike goes a long way, and the suburbs suck for
| road sharing but are great for not having to stop at many
| lights.
|
| The winters were rough though.
| deathanatos wrote:
| I used to bike ~20 mi / day ... back when there were
| offices. Just as fast as public transit.
|
| Aside from idiots with cars, it's relaxing. Only some of my
| route was on the road, though.
|
| Like the other poster says ... The winters were rough
| though. I just didn't bike, though my coworker kept trying
| to get me to.
| khaki54 wrote:
| Yeah I had something like this for several years. Works
| really well for cars
| theodric wrote:
| I wonder if one of those recently-emerging Chinese electric
| blowers that sub for canned air would generate enough air
| volume to sound the horn usefully. Possibly not quickly
| enough.
| Tepix wrote:
| Can confirm, AirZound is great!
| kfarr wrote:
| If diy doesn't work I've been using loud bicycle horn and it
| works great.
|
| https://loudbicycle.com/
| philips wrote:
| Gah! mini usb instead of USB C. Love the concept but it is
| remarkable how long bike accessories have been holding out on
| USBC.
| vscode-rest wrote:
| At least they're forward about it - I've lost count of how
| many bike accessories claimed to be USB C, but they only
| charge when connected to their specialized cable that
| converts from USB A to C.
| hnuser123456 wrote:
| Double-sided USB-C connections require a handshake before
| sending voltage. USB-A ports can have the 5v line active
| at all times. Cheap USB C gadgets often don't make the
| handshake, they just use it as a 5V input, necessitating
| an A to C cable.
| vscode-rest wrote:
| Interesting. Does UsBC spec/licensing require any sort of
| notation for products that don't implement handshake?
| bmicraft wrote:
| There is no handshake, all that's needed are two 5.1 kO
| pulldown resistors. By omitting them the manufacturer
| saved all of about 0.1c and made their device
| incompatible with compliant usb-c chargers.
|
| More info: https://hackaday.com/2023/02/07/all-about-usb-
| c-manufacturer...
| auguzanellato wrote:
| Such products shouldn't exist by spec, they're just not
| compliant.
| alacritas0 wrote:
| If you add 5.1kO pulldown resistors on the CC lines for
| USB-C, you can get the standard 5V without a handshake
| although current may be limited by some chargers without
| negotiation.
| hdgvhicv wrote:
| One of the many deficiencies of usb-c (who knows what
| power your cable supports, charger supports, if you
| accessory will charge, of it will connect at all)
| amstan wrote:
| I think you're overstating this. The "handshake" is
| purely 2 simple resistors correctly installed. The
| problem is a lot of folks do it wrong for various
| reasons, most likely never testing with anything more
| than type a to type c cables.
|
| https://people.kernel.org/bleung/how-to-design-a-proper-
| usb-...
| NooneAtAll3 wrote:
| I'm still waiting on full-size usb-c instead of current
| mini-usb-c
| ebcase wrote:
| I've got one of these fwiw, and it's outstanding.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| I had a digital bell from aliexpress on my winter commuter
| because pogies on the bars prevented a typical dinger. It was
| very annoying and very effective; my wife referred to it as
| "the friend maker".
| YesBox wrote:
| for your safety, when people hear a car horn, they're going to
| be looking for a car.
| moffkalast wrote:
| It should make a ring-ring sound but at 120 decibels?
| fifilura wrote:
| Ooh, the telephones in the 80s! You should get one of
| those!
| kube-system wrote:
| A motorcycle horn might be a better choice
| GJim wrote:
| > I bought a 12v car horn yesterday with the intent of wiring
| it into my ebike's power supply
|
| Putting an aerosol fog horn (available from boating supply
| shops) in the bikes water bottle holder is much simpler, louder
| and more effective.
| dylan604 wrote:
| And where does your water bottle go then?
| GJim wrote:
| Courtesy forbids me from suggesting where it could go.
| glenjamin wrote:
| on the rare occasions where I need to loudly indicate my
| presence to a motor vehicle I wouldn't really want to be moving
| my hands - if I have time to move a hand to a horn I probably
| have time to brake/manouvre instead.
|
| Generally in those situations I shout really loudly at the
| driver, and in general they seem to hear me
| dheera wrote:
| Squeeze horns are usually loud enough to be heard by cars in my
| experience.
| Bender wrote:
| I want to see a bike with a train horn. Cars do it all the
| time. [1][2][3][4] _illegal and highly satisfying_
|
| People have used drills+pumps to drive similar hand-held horns
| at football games so it is doable.
|
| [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOKgg5iCw_c
|
| [2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enF0m6J7g2w [Tiny car
| with train horn]
|
| [3] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w31s5NsoOyg
|
| [4] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLfD1AFsb1I
| FuriouslyAdrift wrote:
| Oh yeah... the good old 3 or 4 tone "train" honrs from
| Cadillacs
|
| https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/are-you-tired-of-your-
| wi...
| amarant wrote:
| Be careful with your ears! (And those of others)
|
| A unexpected loud noise recently caused me to get tinnitus and
| hyperacusis, and trust me, you don't want either of them!
|
| You know a diagnose is bad when Wikipedia lists suicidal
| thoughts as a common side effect....
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperacusis
| sc__ wrote:
| May I ask what the loud noise was? And sorry to hear that.
| Tinnitus and hyperacusis suck.
| amarant wrote:
| A small firework rocket that someone launched sideways
| instead of up exploded within a few meters of me.
|
| I say small but I mean tiny. One of those that are sound
| only, no visuals.(Why are those even a thing?)
| Thorrez wrote:
| Bottle rockets I assume. I had a lot of fun with them as
| a kid. Thankfully no one involved with those got hurt.
|
| https://www.nhpyro.com/black-cat-bottle-rockets.html
| lancewiggs wrote:
| Yeas ago I motorcycled a lot, all over the world. I escalated
| to an air horn and hi-viz. But I pretty quickly realized that
| these made no tangible difference to the behavior of larger
| vehicle drivers. So I ended up for later vehicles with a stock
| horn and hi-viz only for heavy rain.
|
| These days our family cycles a lot for commuting. It's really
| easy to observe that people in vehicles treat us far better if
| we look like humans, wearing normal street clothes, rather than
| wearing high-viz or, far worse, cycling gear.
|
| The bike bell is for polite notice, not alarming. The best
| alarm system you have is your voice, which is variable volume
| and tone. For ultimate effect slap the panels of cars, as it is
| very loud inside the vehicle.
| Joe_Cool wrote:
| Sadly I had to kick a few cars that thought they could run me
| off my motorcycle. Worked every time. All of them didn't look
| out the window or they would have looked right into my face.
| Yelling and horn did absolutely nothing.
|
| Most of them were extremely apologetic or even shocked (as if
| I appeared from thin air). None of them were angry for
| scratching their door. Some people are just lost in thought
| it seems...
| Swizec wrote:
| > or even shocked (as if I appeared from thin air)
|
| Motorcyclists are invisible. Never rely on others seeing
| you, ride as if they're an obstacle _you_ have to navigate.
|
| You can hide a whole truck behind the A-pillar of modern
| cars, let alone a motorcycle. At certain angles, human eyes
| have complete blind spots that we're not aware of because
| our brain filters them out. Motorcycles fit perfectly into
| those.
|
| Never hover in people's blind spots. Pass quickly or stay
| back. Do not drive parallel with another vehicle. Goes for
| cars too.
|
| When approaching another car perpendicularly (like an
| intersection), remember that humans lose depth perception
| because their nose covers one of the eyes. A driver
| literally cannot tell how far you are. Our usual proxy is
| the distance between headlights. Motorcyles have 1
| headlight so this heuristic doesn't work, but we don't
| realize that it doesn't.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x94PGgYKHQ0
| Joe_Cool wrote:
| Oh I know. They look at me while turning left cutting me
| off.
|
| Maybe I need a bigger bike, the 2cyl 400cc is
| particularly invisible. ;)
|
| Best one was a woman who cut me off doing her left turn.
| I high-beamed her and honked. She put her hands in front
| of her face and came to a dead stop in my lane directly
| in front of me. I was already braking before I honked.
| Nothing happened. I stopped wondering and just assume
| everyone is out to kill me.
|
| It's a rule that also applies to bicycles.
| Swizec wrote:
| > I high-beamed her and honked. She put her hands in
| front of her face and came to a dead stop in my lane
| directly in front of me.
|
| Personally I skip the honking and high beams. Just
| perform evasive action assuming driver will continue on
| their current path at roughly their current speed.
| Swerving behind their path of travel usually works great.
|
| Spooked drivers behave erratically. Very dangerous.
|
| So far I've had 0 serious incidents in ~8 years of
| riding. A couple close calls when I was being an idiot.
| So I think my approach is working :)
| Joe_Cool wrote:
| Honking is more for the people behind/around me. I also
| don't want to be hit by inattentive people following me
| to closely.
|
| May I ask where you are riding? I am currently in
| Bavaria. The danger level is usually higher after the
| winter. Drivers need to re-accustom themselves to sharing
| the road with two wheeled riders.
|
| Evasive action could be even more dangerous in cities. In
| my experience being able to come to a stop without
| hitting anything is even better.
|
| Lot's of dead people had the right of way. Ride safe, I
| agree. I also had 0 accidents so far in 30 years. But you
| still experience new things you hadn't thought would be
| an issue.
| LorenPechtel wrote:
| Yup. If you don't have armor around you the only real
| defense is to assume you are invisible unless you know
| they've seen you or can't help but see you (for example,
| going in the traffic direction in front of a stopped car
| that's waiting to go--they're looking at the cars,
| they'll see anything else coming along.) Doesn't matter
| if you have wheels or feet under you, you still are
| invisible.
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| Slapping panels in the US will occasionally get people trying
| to fight you, as I've had happen. Not really sure what a good
| solution to that looks like short of cultural changes.
| kccqzy wrote:
| As a pedestrian I slapped a panel of a slow car that failed
| to yield to me at a crossing. The driver glared at me and
| looked ready to reverse into me. I never slapped any panel
| any more.
| LorenPechtel wrote:
| Second the fact that it's only useful for polite notice.
| Emergency, someone's already not paying attention and it's
| probably the car.
|
| Car horns are useful warnings because speeds are higher and
| thus stopping time is longer--more opportunity for someone to
| hear and react.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| > because modern cars are so heavily sound-proofed they don't
| hear a bicycle bell anymore
|
| Agreed. I had a supercharged V8 Jaguar that I could barely
| hear.
|
| And my Audi has a system that actually pumps engine noise into
| the cabin, so you can hear that, but not the outside world.
|
| The Fire Department I was at was looking at "thumpers" -
| augmentations to sirens that make cars in front of them vibrate
| (a la those people playing too much bass too loud).
|
| Not just sound proofing, but inattentiveness. I've been behind
| people on semi-rural quiet roads with my 40,000lb fire engine
| behind them, lights, sirens, and airhorns, and they've driven
| for a mile or two completely oblivious.
| sc__ wrote:
| Seconding the point to please not use this on anyone not in a
| soundproofed car.
| burnt-resistor wrote:
| LOL. I put the loudest 12V train/air horn I could buy on my 60
| mph escooter with a 72V to 12V buck converter and a motorcycle
| handlebar button. It was pretty easy to install. (I added a
| fuse too.) Stupid motorized vehicle drivers get the horn of
| doom.
| superbowl wrote:
| Aside: folks living near bike paths where this happens are
| going to suffer. I don't know what the solution is, but
| increasing volume to defeat increasing sound-proofing seems
| like a recipe for noise pollution.
| CalRobert wrote:
| This may also be of interest to people - emulating a car horn for
| bikes https://loudbicycle.com/
|
| (of course, there's also the locomotive horn, but the equipment
| required is a bit impractical -
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTQSWtK65PE)
| macintux wrote:
| I've periodically toyed with the idea of adding a locomotive
| horn to my motorized vehicle, but I'd be afraid that using it
| would cause an accident.
| red_admiral wrote:
| Or this: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000ACAMJC
| (compressed air).
| kfarr wrote:
| I use the loud bicycle horn on my daily rider, it's excellent.
| Car drivers actually respect it. Prevents right hooks
| red_admiral wrote:
| In the scenario presented (London, mostly not segregated bike
| paths), the solution is for the cyclist to ride in a way they're
| not endangering pedestrians.
|
| There's even a fairly recent UK law
| (https://www.gov.uk/government/news/the-highway-code-8-change...)
| that more or less says in a collision, the "stronger" road user
| is at fault unless proven otherwise. That applies to car v.
| cyclist as much as cyclist v. pedestrian.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Political cyclists hate this because they think anybody who
| complains is just a car driver concern trolling, but having
| been hit by a cyclist I can attest to it being a real problem.
| Sure I wasn't in real risk of dying, but I was bruised and
| scraped up for a week after that. I've done my fair share of
| road cycling in my years, I don't do it now but I still cycle
| on trails. The way some cyclists push back on any criticism at
| all is very ideological, and a real problem for not just
| pedestrians (and drivers) but cyclists too, because the
| outspoken attitudes and public stunts of political cyclists
| breed a lot of contempt for cyclists broadly speaking, to the
| point where normies groan when I say I spent my weekend going
| on a trip with my bike, and still act weird when I explain I
| was on a rail-to-trail not clogging up a highway.
| micv wrote:
| It's one thing when you're a fit adult male and get hit by an
| idiot cycling recklessly on the pavement, it's another if
| you're a small child or frail through sickness or old age.
| I've seen a couple of very near misses that would have ended
| very badly for the pedestrian through no fault of their own.
|
| Saying this it's mostly teenagers in the idiot role from what
| I've seen and they are reckless by default.
| red_admiral wrote:
| Although the truly reckless ones are now on their ~50mph
| tuned illegal scooters with a "yolo" cheap lithium battery.
| micv wrote:
| Those things are terrifying. Someone's little scooter's
| wheel base is definitely not stable enough for that sort
| of speed.
|
| And that's before the battery fires.
| jmalicki wrote:
| I've been nearly hit by a bicycle-messenger looking dude in
| San Francisco when I was crossing the street with a "walk"
| sign at a crosswalk and he blew through the red light at
| probably about 15mph, and I have plenty of other
| experiences like that.
|
| If you are running a red light at 15mph on a bicycle,
| dodging pedestrians, you are just an asshole - maybe you're
| slightly less dangerous than an SUV running a red light,
| but it is still completely not okay.
|
| There are dumb teenagers, which is one thing, but the
| aggressive "well, we're not emitting carbon, so we can do
| whatever we want crowd" is probably even more crappy and
| dangerous, since they're _deliberate_ about it, and more
| present in areas with lots of pedestrians.
| izacus wrote:
| Did you consider that your talking about GROUPS of people
| where _some_ individuals from ALL groups regularly behave
| poorly and deserve criticism and action?
|
| Or is that too much of a nuance against tribal thinking?
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Why do you think I'm not aware of this? Did I not just
| explain how different people who do the activity have
| different perspectives, priorities and proclivities? Did I
| not just explain how I disagree with the way some cyclists
| conduct themselves, while plainly being aware that not all
| cyclists are like this?
|
| Maybe none of this way apparent to you, despite it being
| plainly written out in simple English, because... I don't
| know actually. Can you explain your failure to read?
| izacus wrote:
| And yet you immediately started with an anti-cyclist
| whine while ignoring pretty much everyone else.
|
| These debates are so stupidly tiresome.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| You have brain worms, I started by explaining that I am a
| cyclist. Obviously not all cyclists are particular ones I
| disagree with.
| Ylpertnodi wrote:
| > not clogging up a highway.
| paulnpace wrote:
| Years ago, SF pedestrians took care of this problem by punching
| bicyclists until they stopped riding their bicycles on the
| sidewalk.
| angiolillo wrote:
| > the "stronger" road user is at fault unless proven otherwise
|
| In general I agree with this, but a lot a lot depends on how
| "unless proven otherwise" is interpreted.
|
| If a driver is typically at fault when a pedestrian or cyclist
| unexpectedly moves into their path then it seems like that
| practically restricts cars to speeds close to biking or walking
| in many cities.
|
| Similarly, if a cyclist is typically at fault when a pedestrian
| unexpectedly moves into their path then it seems like that
| restricts bikes to speeds close to walking in many cities.
|
| This effectively pedestrianizes car lanes and bike lanes which
| would be lovely in some areas, but it also restricts travel to
| walking speeds which also has downsides if enforced across an
| entire city.
|
| Edit: after reading the post at
| https://www.gov.uk/government/news/the-highway-code-8-change...
| the guidance seems to strike a reasonable balance:
|
| > People cycling, riding a horse or driving a horse-drawn
| vehicle should respect the safety of people walking in these
| spaces, but people walking should also take care not to
| obstruct or endanger them.
| elAhmo wrote:
| Writing as a regular cyclist, the other side is seemingly
| always the problem.
|
| Cars, cyclists, pedestrians, each of them thinks they are right
| and other side is wrong.
| gs17 wrote:
| That seems to be exactly the case. As a pedestrian, my
| problem is the cyclists who think the sidewalk is for going
| faster than the speed limit and the bike lane is for
| pedestrians to dodge into. As a driver, it's cyclists who
| think "you can treat stop signs as yields if there's no
| traffic" means "stop signs are go signs, yield signs are go
| faster signs, there's no such thing as a red light". I'm sure
| if I biked, I'd be complaining about cars not seeing me and
| pedestrians being unpredictable and hogging the sidewalk. I'm
| sure if I was a train driver, I'd rant about cars blocking
| the tracks!
| dahart wrote:
| > yield signs are go faster signs
|
| Reminds me of a good line from Starman...
| looperhacks wrote:
| Two of the three clips clearly show a bike-lane blocked by
| pedestrians. The third looks like a shared space - but blocked
| in a way where it seems reasonable to ask for space by ringing
| the bell?
| cocoto wrote:
| I'm sure Android and iOS could add some AI feature to let some
| specific noises in the headset when needed (baby cries when
| enabled, smoke detector alarms, bike/car bells, etc). Simply stop
| the music for the duration of the specific noise and replay it.
| That would be a cool use of AI.
| c0n5pir4cy wrote:
| So you don't even need Android or iOS for this feature and it's
| been a thing on certain headsets for a while; both my Sony
| headphones and buds do this.
|
| It also has an integration with the phone which can add GPS
| awareness but it works fine without it in my experience.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Absolutely crazy to be out in traffic with headphones, lead alone
| noise cancelling ones. I've never even dared to ride my bike on
| trails with earbuds, the whole thing seems crazy.
| ChoGGi wrote:
| You could also not blast past me on the path, yes I am off to one
| side, and no I don't wear headphones outside.
| gambiting wrote:
| That's fantastic. Where can I buy one?
| Retr0id wrote:
| I'm very sceptical of their claims that ~780Hz is in some way
| special, especially the way they represent it graphically.
| Playing a frequency sweep while wearing WH-1000XM3 headphones, I
| don't notice any particular drop-off there.
|
| Near where I live, heavy goods vehicles are fitted with reversing
| indicators that make a "cshh cshh cshh" sound i.e. pulsed white-
| noise. White noise like that is the hardest for ANC to cancel.
| Sample: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3Wt1_51EVA
| post-it wrote:
| The construction site next door is using those vehicles, and
| they're also a lot more pleasant throughout the day. It's
| easier to tune out white noise than beeping. The first cshh is
| a little louder than the others, which is a nice design touch.
| bityard wrote:
| Speak for yourself, I can tune out a steady beep much easier
| than the sound of a seagull being strangled to death. (That's
| what the ones around here sound like anyway.)
|
| On a more serious note: the loud beeping backup alarms were
| DESIGNED to be annoying and difficult to miss. I would not be
| surprised in the least if a study showed these "less
| annoying" backup alarms correlating to a higher number of
| children being run over by reversing vehicles.
| atoav wrote:
| There have been studies and those _resulted_ in the less
| annoying backup sounds. These sounds are essentially harsh
| white noise, which has one significant difference to the
| beeping: it 's level drops off differently with distance,
| meaning you can blast it louder and people who are _really_
| in the wrong spot will notice better it means them, while
| people who are not meant will not be annoyed or fatigued by
| it. Two noise sources combine different than two tonal
| sources and the human ear can locate broadband sources
| better than single tones.
|
| This was developed especially for use in backup heavy
| environments like harbors where workers started ignoring
| constant beeps.
| Majromax wrote:
| There's also another difference: beeps can reflect
| coherently off of surfaces, causing directionality
| confusion in a dense environment. White noise is much
| less likely to have odd interference patterns, maximizing
| our ability to localize the sound.
| mightysashiman wrote:
| On my wh-1000xm2, wh-1000xm3, wf-1000xm4 and lastly wf-1000xm5,
| there is a quite high frequency pitch (usually coincides with
| some public transport beeps, and some accidental squeaking of
| doors) that toggles ANC to transparent mode automatically. I
| remember reading something about this on Sony's support
| website.
| walthamstow wrote:
| Also triggered by baby screams unfortunately
| haritha-j wrote:
| An evolutionary adaptation to ensure parents wearing
| headphones don't ignore their babies.
| walthamstow wrote:
| We don't ignore him. I wear headphones while soothing
| him.
| jkestner wrote:
| I have a new idea for a bike horn.
| RobotToaster wrote:
| Please do not duct tape a baby to your handle bars.
| bmicraft wrote:
| My XM4's always do that at the beeps from the cash register,
| although I always attributed that to their volume rather than
| frequency. My theory was that they refuse to produce sound
| loud enough to cancel the beeps for safety reasons.
| ziml77 wrote:
| I suspect as much too. If there's a failure to match the
| noise perfectly then the headphones are just going be be
| blasting a loud sound into your ears. And if it matches the
| frequency correctly but lines up with the sound instead of
| being out of phase, then it's acting as an amplifier!
| btown wrote:
| Right? This feels like an "arms race" similar to scraping vs.
| anti-scraping; countermeasures will be developed, likely due to
| the action of actors entirely disconnected from what you're
| doing, but to block something else in the ecosystem... and
| you'll need to re-engineer your approach entirely. Rinse and
| repeat.
|
| (The amount of innovation in anti-anti-scraping that's resulted
| from "sneaker bots" - automated scalping of limited-edition
| shoe releases - is astounding, and somewhat relevant here in
| how an environment can become adversarial in ways that impact
| broad ecosystems. I suppose the equivalent here would be
| environmental ads that seek to penetrate noise-cancellation in
| a similar way.)
|
| I suppose, though, that all this is good news for a company
| that wants to turn your bicycle bell into a subscription
| product!
| MoonWalk wrote:
| I don't see why this would become an "arms race." There's no
| particular competitive value in filtering out this ONE sound.
| btown wrote:
| I think there's a broader indication of an arms race
| between noise cancellation systems and things that want to
| be heard, like advertising. And this just-happening-to-
| exist bandpass that the DuoBell is depending on could
| easily become collateral damage in that fight.
| GCUMstlyHarmls wrote:
| I was going to make a joke about advertisers working in
| some kind of ultrasonic modulation to their audio so it
| breaks ANC (I'm aware this wouldn't really work) but then
| thought, whats more likely, advertisers doing that, or
| advertisers partnering with 80% of ANC chip makers to
| just let them by-pass with specific tone markers...
|
| Then we'll be hacking our headphones with specific 3d
| printed clip-ons that involve a particular brand of
| coffee filters that happen to attenuate the "clear freq"
| enough for the headphones to miss it.
| btown wrote:
| "Dad, why do our coffee filters advertise that they can
| run fast fourier transforms?"
|
| "Well, kid, back in the year 2026, there was this bicycle
| bell.."
| Animats wrote:
| Right. From the article:
|
| _Through acoustic testing, the research team identified a
| narrow frequency band - a "safety gap" - capable of penetrating
| ANC headphone filters. This range lies between 750 and 780 Hz._
|
| Is there a standard specifying this "safety band"? Is whatever
| Apple does for AirPods a de-facto standard?
| SoleilAbsolu wrote:
| Me too, as soon as I saw this I put on my Anker Soundcore
| noise-cancelling earbuds and fired up my AAS Multiphonics CV-3
| software synthesizer. Sweeping a sine oscillator, there was
| zero difference in perceived volume in the 750-780 Hz range.
| barbegal wrote:
| The actual research paper shows it's pure nonsense
|
| https://cdn.skoda-storyboard.com/2026/04/Skoda-DuoBell-Resea...
|
| As expected ANC headphones cancel less noise at low frequencies
| so I guess the 780Hz is a trade off between high enough
| frequency to be a bell and low enough frequency to get
| attenuated a little bit less than high frequencies.
|
| The research paper is pretty poor quality and this is mainly a
| marketing exercise.
| Groxx wrote:
| It's fairly easy to test out: https://onlinetonegenerator.com/
|
| Anecdotally, bells have always come through fairly clearly for
| me. They filter out lower tones, not higher + sine waves.
| Nothing about this adds up to more than any normal $5 bell,
| especially rotating ones which hammer repeatedly.
| Nition wrote:
| That diagram is pure marketing nonsense. The real chart is on
| page 10 of their paper[1]. It shows a modest ~3dB less
| attenuation around 800Hz across several brands.
|
| [1] https://cdn.skoda-storyboard.com/2026/04/Skoda-DuoBell-
| Resea...
| moralestapia wrote:
| Not a single place to hear how it sounds.
|
| For a device that ONLY produces sound touted as such a re-vo-lu-
| tio-na-ry device this is a massive marketing failure.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| hopefully this is because it's a prototype, but doesn't solve the
| #1 problem with these type of thumb-lever rotating bells:
| everything (including the axle) is plastic and they break if you
| look at them funny. The hammer-type with plastic hammers or
| hinges don't work either; maybe solve the "actually make a noise"
| problem first.
| gield wrote:
| This might seem weird coming from a car manufacturer but Skoda is
| a big sponsor of cycling races, most notably of the Tour de
| France and other ASO races. And as explained in the footer, they
| started out with building bicycles in the 19th century.
| laweijfmvo wrote:
| Am I nuts or is "regular bike bell" exactly the kind of sound
| that ANC does not cancel well?
| Coeur wrote:
| This seems to be part of a type of brand marketing where a brand
| claims it has invented something, but the only thing that ever
| exists of significant economic value is the attention raised by
| the promo video / article. Not the thing/service.
|
| Examples:
|
| - Samsung safety truck
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GNGfse9ZK8
|
| - Citroen motion sickness glasses
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aco63dlq_WE
|
| - Amazon Prime Air https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AVVTBmtDdo
|
| - IBM Smart Ads https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbEMVdzXiCY
| (implies they created lots of ad posters, but they only made 3
| posters for this video)
|
| - Lexus Hoverboard https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFf7Meqkim8
|
| I wonder if there is a term for this. "Vaporware marketing"?
| mkesper wrote:
| There's at least a paper to download: https://cdn.skoda-
| storyboard.com/2026/04/Skoda-DuoBell-Resea...
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| I'm not sure IBM Smart Ads were ever an actual
| product/invention, and Prime Air is a live service (albeit
| geographically limited):
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Prime_Air
| allenu wrote:
| I love these types of videos because they create this fiction
| of how design happens, where people sit around a table with
| drawings and or come up with beautiful mock-ups (the motion
| sickness glasses is a good example). Often, a lot of design
| decisions are super obvious and don't require a lot of sweat
| and collaboration to come up with, but in videos they're made
| to appear very difficult as it presents better. And other
| things are super messy, but you're not going to show that as
| it's hard to communicate.
| npunt wrote:
| Yeah a lot of this is a very very cleaned up, performative
| version of design process. It's like its own subgenre.
| Original thinking is wild, feral, messy, often solo tho
| heavily influenced by the context around you. None of that
| presents well.
|
| _However_ I bristle at the idea that core design decisions
| are usually super obvious, even when the end results are. Not
| sure this is even your point so forgive the tangent if not,
| but this issue is my particular hill to die on, it 's 100%
| the single biggest gap in understanding that I see between
| those that regularly engage in original creative work vs
| those who do not.
|
| People see something obvious and say "That's simple, I could
| have come up with that!" But that's all hindsight, like
| saying "I could have bought bitcoin in 2010!" It's not even
| wrong, it's answering an entirely different question of
| capability, not probability.
|
| The question is _would_ you have come up with that, were you
| tasked with the problem and put in the same context? I 'd
| estimate for most great-but-simple inventions, it's not many
| people who could plausibly say that, because so much of what
| we bring to bear on problems comes from our own histories and
| unique perspectives & influences, not to mention talents and
| predilections.
|
| This distinction between could vs would is core to
| understanding creative output, _especially_ the ideas that
| are the simplest to use or understand. The delta between
| understanding vs coming up with there is often vast; simple
| things are often the hardest things of all to conceive.
| downthefoxhole wrote:
| > People see something obvious and say "That's simple, I
| could have come up with that!"
|
| That's the problem with user interface design as a career.
| It takes a lot of effort to create simple to understand and
| simple to use design, and then when users see them, they
| see it is simple and think it must have been easy to do.
| Most programmers tend to make programs for themselves and
| other technical people and has horrible design. The classic
| corollary example I like is when Apple came up with MP3
| players and marketed as 'It can hold 1000 songs' instead of
| the current marketing at the time 'It has has 1GB of
| storage'. Technical folks would not be satisfied with 1000
| songs becuase they would be doing back of the math
| calculations on how low of a bitrate you have to get, in
| order to fit 1k songs in a given space... while the other
| 95% of the population doesn't want to do any math, and if
| even if they did, they don't know.. or at least back then,
| didn't know what a GB was, or how many megabytes an MP3
| consumed....
| allenu wrote:
| I'm in total agreement regarding some designs that seem
| obvious later but really took several iterations to reach.
| There's definitely hindsight bias when a design works so
| well that it feels obvious.
|
| My point was more that I've seen product demos where parts
| of a product were presented as having been pored over
| painstakingly when in reality it was decided on day one
| that it would work that way. However, because it's a
| prominent feature, it feels cheap to show the reality, so I
| get that for demos there's a bit of storytelling that goes
| into it so the audience feels like it was a revelation.
|
| For UX that I've designed myself, I have definitely found
| that a lot of the great ones required a ton of iteration
| and almost "courage" to go against my initial bright ideas
| and look at things from a different perspective. It often
| required taking away elements that I thought were
| absolutely required at first but later realized made more
| sense to go without. If someone were to look at the final
| result, they would definitely think "Well, obviously that's
| how it should work." But more likely they'd have go through
| a similar journey that I did to come up with it if they
| hadn't seen the solution.
|
| In a way it's like finding out how a magic trick worked.
| It's only obvious in retrospect.
| MoonWalk wrote:
| I think you nailed it. You can't even buy this bike bell, as
| far as I can see.
| npilk wrote:
| To be fair, I think Prime Air is real, but I've only heard
| about it when they've had drone crashes:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGdOpR-Mv-E
|
| AFAIK it's only available in a few very specific places
| (seemingly for good reason).
| abyssin wrote:
| Any innovation benefiting cyclists and coming from the auto
| industry is a way to move attention away from the fact that
| cars are the most dangerous thing on the road.
| lucumo wrote:
| Well, obviously. What else did you expect to be the most
| dangerous thing on roads? Sharks?
| charcircuit wrote:
| A tank.
| xxs wrote:
| trucks? Or they still considered cars?
| cucumber3732842 wrote:
| Statistically the answer is probably cop cars or
| motorcycles.
| hofo wrote:
| I thought the use case would be for cyclists to alert runners
| with NC headphones that the cyclist is about to pass them
| ale42 wrote:
| I first thought it was a 1st April joke. But the date is wrong.
| jameshart wrote:
| Innovationwashing, maybe?
| rorychatt wrote:
| Why is significant economic value the metric for success?
|
| Skoda publishes the research and design openly (no patent, no
| product for sale), to solve a real problem (increase in bike-
| related accidents from noise cancelling headphones), to ensure
| that the safety outcome can be spread as quickly and easily as
| possible.
|
| We should be celebrating companies that open source material
| findings related to safety, not lambasting them for not
| exploiting it for maximum value.
|
| it feels disingenuous to lump this in with most of the other
| items you listed.
| notatoad wrote:
| i think the slightly less cynical interpretation of this is
| that it's not marketing, it's an employee morale booster.
|
| some skoda employees got to have fun with this. just like the
| amazon engineers got to have fun building drones for a while.
| letting the engineers out to play every now and then is cheaper
| than just giving raises. the shiny marketing videos gives the
| people who worked on the project something to show off to their
| friends.
|
| i can't imagine the actual marketing value here really does
| anything for the company.
| mikepurvis wrote:
| The original Boosted Boards Kickstarter video has a lot of this
| energy:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWV8irg64oM
| port11 wrote:
| Jokes on them for the wasted resources. If they don't intend to
| market, I hope someone will. Where I live cyclists use ANC
| headphones all the time, and I'm tired of the near misses.
|
| Student cyclists that ignore the rules and wear ANC (or even
| large headphones) should be fined more often.
| jrg wrote:
| You seem to have misunderstood the invention. It's not about
| cyclists wearing headphones.
| CorrectHorseBat wrote:
| Bicycle bells can be used to warn other cyclists
| port11 wrote:
| Not if they wear thick or noise-cancelling headphones.
| port11 wrote:
| I haven't. It breaches through ANC, pedestrian or
| otherwise, which would help with cyclists as well.
| botzi2001 wrote:
| I think the Citroen ones are just a bit different, as in, there
| are actually products available to buy apparently:
| https://www.amazon.com/seetroen/s?k=seetroen
| stronglikedan wrote:
| That's nice and all, but the onus is really on the person walking
| on shared paths with noise cancelling headphones. My bell works
| fine, and I ring it before passing peds as the law requires, so I
| don't intend to waste money on a new bell anytime soon.
| bigblind wrote:
| It's unfortunate that this is necessary. It should be obvious
| that wearing noise cancelling headphones in trafic, including as
| a pedestrian, is a bad idea.
|
| I'm legally blind, so I have my own bias here, but I think people
| really over-rely on sight. If you do want to listen to something
| while walking around a city, I can highly recommend bone
| conduction headphones, that keep your ears unblocked.
| jrg wrote:
| There is, of course, at least one category that don't over rely
| upon their hearing: deaf people.
| kribbi wrote:
| My trick after biking 10+ years in Amsterdam. Never use your
| bicycle bell, instead try to predict their trajectory and bike
| around it. Ringing your bell is always a gamble because everyone
| responds differently
| kribbi wrote:
| After 10+ year biking in Amsterdam I never use my bicycle bell.
| Instead I try to predict their trajectory and steer around it,
| way more predictable because everyone responds differently
| omar_alt wrote:
| Oh great let's have even more noise pollution because pedestrians
| won't get out of the way of cyclists who are trying to beat their
| personal best time on their commute to work.
| moffkalast wrote:
| It wouldn't be a problem if pedestrians weren't blocking
| cycling paths completely while apparently forgetting their
| hearing aids at home. Some people have even less situational
| awareness than common sense.
| zymhan wrote:
| You probably should not be living in a city then.
| MarkusWandel wrote:
| People use their ears to navigate traffic (as non-car-users) much
| more than they realize. There's a reason kids need to be drilled
| in "look both ways before crossing the street" - you can hear
| that there's no car coming, what's the problem? There's a reason
| electric cars need to make that strange noise so you can, in
| fact, hear them coming. Absolutely a headphone user, with not
| only ANC to reduce external noises but loud music to mask them,
| is missing a primary sense for navigating traffic. Absolutely
| these things increase accidents from minor (someone walking into
| the path of a cyclist on a multi-use path, oblivious to bells and
| callouts) to major.
|
| But can that bell penetrate loud music? How many people really
| walk around with ANC headphones just as a "cone of silence"
| device?
| rplnt wrote:
| What do you call it when a car manufacturer has a little bicycle
| division? Is it still greenwashing or is there a more specific
| term?
| cobbzilla wrote:
| My horn is my larynx. I usually belt out "please don't kill me"
| in a stern voice-of-command at my "max volume."
|
| A loud voice travels very well through car windows at short
| distances, even for big soundproof vehicles.
| criddell wrote:
| I assumed this bell was for alerting pedestrians or other
| cyclists wearing noise cancelling headphones.
| dec0dedab0de wrote:
| my Bose quite comfort headphones will still allow any non-regular
| noise through, I believe that is by design for this very reason.
| Do other brands not do this?
| embedding-shape wrote:
| Overall this bell seems like the wrong solution, and it took me a
| while to realize not every country has outlawed headphone wearing
| for bicyclists, something I guess I took for granted.
|
| It doesn't make sense for a car driven to use headphones, so not
| sure why it'd make sense for other vehicle-users to use them
| either, as you say, we really do use our ears to help navigate
| traffic so allowing people to be so careless seems... Careless?
| bmicraft wrote:
| You can turn up your car stereo and mow over pedestrians
| undisturbed in your two ton death machine yet I'm not allowed
| to cycle on a bicycle-only path with with a podcast and
| transparency mode enabled? For my own safety? Safety from car
| drivers that fell asleep driving with their stereo on?
| embedding-shape wrote:
| Don't know where you live, but where I live it isn't legal to
| play so loud music that you cannot hear the outside,
| especially if it's so loud you cannot hear other car horns.
| So no, neither should be allowed, because again, we use our
| hearing when we're in traffic to help our other senses.
|
| Mostly for others safety, and I guess if it helps you; for
| your safety too.
| jrg wrote:
| It's about pedestrians wearing the headphones.
| ivanjermakov wrote:
| Can't wait for a headphone commercial that claims that their ANC
| is so good you won't hear those annoying bicycle bells :)
| not_your_vase wrote:
| What if you would rather stay in the bicycle lane instead of
| terrorizing pedestrians? Quite a lot of taxes were paid for those
| lanes. Use them, and stay out of my headset.
| oytis wrote:
| E.g. in Germany many pedestrians, especially tourists, tend to
| think that bycicle lanes are fancily-painted sidewalks
| elAhmo wrote:
| Great idea, kinda ridiculous they tested it in VR and not out
| there in real life, since it is a bell, not a car they need to
| manufacture to test it.
| accelbred wrote:
| A pedestrian shouldn't need to be able to hear to be safe from
| cyclists. Focusing on headphones is ignoring that the same
| dangers are being imposed on deaf people and people with
| otherwise bad hearing. If a cyclist needs to use the bell for
| safety, they should hit the brakes.
| MoonWalk wrote:
| No, Google, I do NOT mean "skoda doorbell." Morons.
|
| Meanwhile... you apparently can't buy this thing anywhere.
| elcapitan wrote:
| A slightly more controversial, but equally effective solution
| would be to glue an angry toddler to your handlebar.
| unglaublich wrote:
| It's almost hilarious that such efforts are spent on bicycle
| bells while emergency vehicles are featuring deafeningly loud
| alarms to penetrate the sound isolation of cars.
| jmugan wrote:
| I don't understand why it is my responsibility to hear your bell.
| Just don't hit me.
| post_break wrote:
| If only people had spatial awareness, they would look around vs
| listening to their phone changing directions randomly while
| walking. The bell is for both persons safety.
| jmalicki wrote:
| Is there an interpretation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act
| where using this bicycle bell to circumvent the computer system
| used in your headphones for active noise cancellation would be a
| federal felony in the United States?
| johnfn wrote:
| Be careful with that because then bikers are just going to
| start using car horns.
| john_strinlai wrote:
| probably. i am pretty sure you can spin up a CFAA violation
| with some string and 2 cups.
| GeoAtreides wrote:
| hey, if they can prosecute for whistling into a handset...
| BXLE_1-1-BitIs1 wrote:
| There's been the odd idiot wearing headphones mowed down on train
| tracks. The trains air horn didn't get the message through.
|
| The Air Zound is wonderful. You can get pedestrians' attention
| with light toots. I reserve the full blast for developing danger
| or people who didn't get the message from the toots.
|
| Survival depends on being heard in a car with closed windows with
| possible loud radio or squabbling kids.
| dhosek wrote:
| It may have been intentional. More than one suicide by train
| has involved the person who died by suicide wearing headphones
| as they walked on the tracks (it was clear that it was a
| suicide and not intentional as engineers have reported the
| person looking at the train when the horn was sounded but not
| leaving the tracks).
| leemelone wrote:
| won't this just make the sound cancelation teams at the tech
| companies work hard to "improve" their features?
| culi wrote:
| I love to see high-tech mechanical/analog solutions like this. I
| recently bought a vintage mechanical kitchen timer and it almost
| feels like you have a different relationship to your possessions
| when you know they're mechanical.
|
| It's also so nice to know I can put it away and not worry about
| finding it a year later with the battery I forgot to remove
| having exploded
| fareesh wrote:
| looks like one of those things the ad agency (AMV BBDO) claims to
| have invented just in time for awards season
| a-dub wrote:
| the experimental report pdf is a fun read. it would be cool if
| they added each individual bell of the duobell and the
| combination to tables 4 and 5. (the topline result is in the
| infographic, but it would be cool to see the effects of the
| individual contributions of the various features and how they
| combine)
| wolvoleo wrote:
| I think it's better to separate dangerous traffic. Have dedicated
| bike lanes instead of those stupid stripes on the pavement that
| are really hard to see. Ban cars from city centres (fortunately
| my city is making some headway with this). Increase public
| transport.
|
| I wear these things because traffic is too noisy though. Assholes
| with super loud motorbikes or mopeds in particular, cars aren't
| the worst.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| _Through acoustic testing, the research team identified a narrow
| frequency band - a "safety gap" - capable of penetrating ANC
| headphone filters. This range lies between 750 and 780 Hz._
|
| Building an entire product around EQ crossover frequencies (which
| are not standardized or regulated in any way) seems a bit risky
| to me. Those are things that could change at any time, as could
| the shapes of the EQ curves themselves. there are fads in
| engineering design like anything else and in this wholly digital
| era they tend to cycle and proliferate faster because increased
| performance (or at least hte temporary consumer perception of
| such ) is only a software update away. People are extraordinarily
| susceptible to placebo effects in the audio realm (probably
| because most people prioritize their visual sense), so just
| moving EQ crossovers around or making them dynamically adjustable
| is an easy path to consumer buzz. You see this all the time with
| pro audio plugins.
| Khaine wrote:
| Good to see we're ensuring cyclists remain as endearing as ever.
| zeristor wrote:
| Or pedestrians could walk around with halberds to fend off
| cyclists steaming through pedestrian areas.
| egorfine wrote:
| Can't wait for ads delivered via this method.
| deafpolygon wrote:
| Well, if you're on a bicycle and you can see the pedestrian is
| not paying attention (whether they are on the noise-canceling
| headphones or are deaf themselves)... do the right thing and
| proceed with caution. Assume they don't see you and prepare to
| stop. Wait for visual confirmation that they saw you.
|
| That will eliminate the bulk of traffic "accidents" involving
| bicycle and pedestrian; it's expected and common to do this in
| the Netherlands.
| fennecfoxy wrote:
| My crotchety old neighbours just got one of those high pitched
| anti-fox speakers.
|
| Was mowing the lawns the other day and could still hear the high
| pitched tones it emits even with noise cancelling headphones on.
|
| Situation is pretty lame because I liked the foxes sleeping in
| the garden, super fun to take photos of them and they don't do
| much harm.
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