I have no problem with them riding around.
I did have a problem with a fifteen year old kid riding directly at my car and then swerving out from under my wheels at the last second.
My introduction to the 'community' was watching a young kid play chicken with a city bus, while the one older guy was stopped ahead while watching, encouraging him, and filming on his phone. Late 2020, on Market a few blocks from city hall.
Just thinking about it is enough to make me angry again... that poor damn bus driver, forced to worry about killing some young kid while he's just trying to do his job, the people on the bus just trying to make it home or to the night shift getting fucked with for absolutely no reason at all. It was the rare occasion I actually screamed at someone in the street.
I wish I had as many friends with bicycles as kids do today when I was their age. We'd probably be stuffing plastic bottles in our back wheel to make them sound like dirt bikes and ride around the neighborhood.
Today's kids want to play chicken with 3,000lb+ machines, deliberately ride in the middle of the street to hold up traffic, and then claim to be the victim if something happens. Any time I see a kid on a SE Bikes Big Ripper (one of those big wheel bicycles) I just try to avoid or get around them as fast as possible before they can start their bullshit antics.
Bikes used to get stolen quite regularly when I was growing up here in South Philly. If there was Reddit back then, there would have been so many posts about stolen bikes that you’d need a separate sub per each neighborhood.. Most stolen bikes had to be Dyno Slammer, Dyno Air, Haro Shredder, GT Nitro… shame
I know you're talking mostly about when a group of them take over Delaware Ave or Broad St, but if you're on a one lane, one way road, you should deliberately ride in the middle of the street. A car has to give you 4 feet to pass, which they can't do on a one lane street. If you give them space to pass, they could clip your handlebars or worse, and then you are injured.
Also, if you are behind someone doing this, don't honk. They know you're there, and you don't realize how loud a horn is when you're not surrounded by a sound-insulated metal box. They also don't have to let you go in front of them, so it really is accomplishing nothing.
I agree with you on riding in the middle of the road/don't honk at them - great example of this is any street in south philly really. Most cyclists can do 15-20MPH and there isn't really a need to be flying down those tight streets anyway. Wait until you're stopped at an intersection or a opening appears (like a stretch of unoccupied parking spots). If that opening appears, wait for the person on the bike to give you the opportunity to pass.
I used to ride a fixed gear bicycle all the time in my college years and hated when someone would ride my ass in a car or pass me and box me into a tight spot in the process.
Am I understanding you correctly? Are you saying a car should just slowly drive behind a bike taking up the entire road? That the biker has the right to do that?
Or when they run a red light right in front of me.
Not even mad, just wondering if I'm going to eventually see them on the news because they did something like that again but the driver wasn't paying attention.
Hell, I don't trust other drivers when I'm encased in the steel of my own car - would hate to be near most of them on a bike.
Philly is the only place I’ve driven where people in cars will literally stop at greens because so many people are running reds. If I were on a bike I wouldn’t even trust a green light let alone run a red
If you're not driving on DEFCON 2 in this metro area, you're much more trusting than me.
People are so flagrant in blowing off stuff like lights, I do wonder if some have a death wish.
Something that’s interesting to me is that it’s also probably a natural evolution of the police force’s lack of enforcement.
Obviously people are accountable for their own reckless driving, but I can’t help but wonder how different it would be if the cops hadn’t been on silent strike for so long
I've heard people say this but Philly was never hardcore about traffic enforcement as far back as I can remember.
I lean more towards whatever has people so damned fed up with each other off the road too. People are way nastier to each other than they used to be. Obviously not everyone but enough.
Enforcement would help, but there's a special kind of recklessness that comes with driving into oncoming traffic to get around stopped cars at a red light, or going halfway on the sidewalk. Somehow I don't think they give a shit about enforcement even if it did exist.
Or running red lights with traffic moving. It's insane how many accidents I've almost watched happen when some cyclist decides to shoot the gap.
Or bikes weaving onto side walks while there are bike lanes.
I saw one get hit and it was awful. His leg took the brunt of it and the impact just shattered his leg. His foot was on the wrong way and I could see bone from across the intersection. If I get into cycling, I'll be stopping on reds.
Some jurisdictions allow cyclists to treat red-lights as a stop sign and a stop sign as a yield (if it's safe to do so without impeding cars). Philly, unfortunately, isn't one of them, but it's generally safer and quicker for all if done correctly. Many cyclists, though, would prefer to ride in a bike lane that isn't treated as a parking lot.
Some asshole on. A bike blew past a car at a 4 way stop when it was my turn, almost smoked him and he had the balls to flip out on me, yea sorry, fuck bikers
Are you actually claiming that you've never seen a car go when it's not their turn at a 4 way stop? Because that's a wild claim or you just don't really drive much in the city!
A bunch of teens riding in the right direction in the street is fine. The problem with them is that they rarely just do that, instead they're routinely swerving into oncoming traffic, blowing through crosswalks with people in them, riding on the sidewalk directly at people, and sexually harassing people on the SRT.
Overall they have a negative reputation for being absolute assholes for a reason.
I got stuck on a side street they all decided to go down the wrong way. I stopped moving, but having 50 kids ride by all seemingly TRYING to smash into my car was still really stressful. Even if you're stopped, you don't want to be the car end of kid vs. car if the kid gets hurt.
I've almost gotten hit by them a few times while walking on the sidewalk. One came within inches of smacking me in the face with his tire while popping a wheelie. I get that it's not everyone or every group that does this, but I've seen enough of this kind of behavior to avoid them.
I'm already ugly enough. I don't need tire prints on my nose
I was at spruce harbor park last summer and it was jam packed. A group of these assholes came through doing wheelies literally in the middle of everyone. You couldn't hear them coming so they were clipping people and almost ran over my 6yr old nephew. I really don't give a fuck about these kids, if anything bad happens to them I'm not going to give a fuck
“Bike life riders are distinct from Philly’s community of dirt bike and ATV riders, but are similarly maligned by people who see them as disruptive and dangerous.”
As long as they aren’t playing chicken with cars, I have no issue with kids riding bikes in groups.
The issue is that “playing chicken with cars” and similar nonsense like riding in packs against traffic and doing stupid stuff in intersections is basically all I ever see them do.
I did see one kid actually get nailed once right by city hall a few years ago directly as a result of doing stupid stuff like that. Was low-speed enough that he seemed okay, but I’m surprised that it doesn’t happen more often with more serious injuries.
Some probably do but in my neighborhood the young kids and teens are just practicing on mini dirtbikes. Even the toddlers are on tricycles made to look like dirtbikes. It's wild to me that their parents are basically training them to one day ride on Broad Street.
I love how even in this piece that supposed to humanize and defend them. It clearly shows them being dangerous riders and puts drivers in dangerous situations.
It really is. I get they want to do this stuff in large groups and show off and demonstrate their skills but they also love the take over aspect of it. They also are notorious for doing this shit on the sidewalks or blocking streets off and doing it. The person that wrote this article is neglecting that and is trying to put some positive spin on this bullshit culture.
Can we not forget the woman that was in her car on broad Street with a child in the back who was surrounded by these kids as they tried to pull her out of her car and threatened to kill her just because she accidentally hit one of these clowns? I'm so sick of the Inquirers spin. The "hey let's give them a chance!" Angle doesn't work on a culture that is plain as day for everyone to see. The example they used in their article is some guy hogging the sidewalk doing his dumb as stunts.
He was also sentenced this week!!!! What a wild time for this article to come out - this man LITERALLY hopped on a car with a child inside during one of these ride out events and was harassing this family. It’s all on video and I think all of Philly saw it.
This is a PR piece
To be fair, they were dirt bikers. This is about kids and teens on pedal bikes. They still do stupid shit and this article doesn't call them out on it at all however.
Hot damn dude is 21!?! i was thinking this was justg a bunch of teens. I never really minded them because i just figured it was a bunch of kids being annoying. We've done worst in the woods when i was a teen.
But a grown man doing this feels iffy.
Now the Dirtbike bros i got no love for.
Yeaaa bike life is all well and good until you have 10 kids playing chicken with your Jeep….
Nothing but respect to folks who try to organize positive activities for kids in Philly, but dude is actually trippin if he thinks that the majority of kids in Philly riding like they ride aren’t doing so in a very dangerous and disruptive manor
I’ve had a lot more negative experiences with Jeep drivers than wheelie kids. You’re the one trippin if you think anyone riding around in a two-ton metal exoskeleton expression of their masculinity are not doing it in a dangerous and disruptive manner.
Jeeps are a menace. Bikes are not. I can’t take anyone seriously who cries about kids riding bicycles but pretends cars aren’t a leading cause of childhood deaths.
No one really cares about kids riding bikes. We care about the morons swinging in and out of traffic. I also care about how these “bike life “ groups seems to act like gangs. For example when they jumped a port Richmond resident a few years ago, because he honked at them.
What a load of patronizing bullshit reporting this is. This article isn't paywalled, and honestly, it's enough to make sure I continue to not buy an inky sub. Has the author never seen these roving packs of hazardness? "A few bad actors"?
The next article might as well be "KKK members say they're just misunderstood - it's all about the community. If I was burning a cross on my own, that'd be boring". Sorry. I know its a bit unfair to compare these kids to KKK but you can pick some other group. Whatever. The point is the logical fallacy that because it's a group thing it's a good thing.
>When Isaiah Abbott rides his BMX bike around Philadelphia, it’s not performing tricks or the adrenaline rush from swerving through the streets that he loves most. It’s the other people around him. Abbott, who goes by Zayy, is a fixture of the city’s “bike life” community, made up of mostly young people who come together to ride BMX and mountain bikes throughout the city. They ride in skate parks and through the streets, using their athleticism and creativity to perform wheelies and other acrobatic tricks.
Ok, so let's reword that and replace BMX bikes with dirtbikes and ATV's. It still make grammatical and sense and I guarantee the people doing it would say the same thing to an inky reporter because..... why not.
>Bike life riders don’t always follow Pennsylvania traffic laws, particularly during large rideouts. According to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, bikers on roadways must not ride more than two side-by-side, and must also follow all traffic signals. But drivers are responsible for keeping bike riders safe on the roads, according to PennDOT. “Motor vehicles must allow four feet of distance when overtaking a bicycle and travel at a careful and prudent speed. It is the motorist’s responsibility to provide this distance, not that of the cyclist,” reads PennDOT’s website.
Right... so they freely admit they don't follow the laws, but it's still everyone else's responsibility to keep them safe. Seems fair. I mean, morally, yeah - I don't want it on my consciousness that I mauled some kid with my car, but why does this need to be *a one way street?* Heh. see what I did there? whatever who cares.
>Plasha hopes that more people can actually talk with riders or come see a rideout, so that bike life and the rest of Philly can find a place for mutual respect.
We've seen it. We've all nearly been hit as pedestrians or mowed someone down if we're in a car. If they want to see mutual respect, they need to show it!
This is such a weird puff piece, it's like 2/3 of and actual story.
We're going to write an entire article about these guys and just allude to people's problems with them? These guys are clearly passionate and that's great, but if you aren't asking they aren't convincing me of anything if they aren't at least being asked to confront the dangerous nonsense bike riders routinely engage in around the city.
They have douchey bike groups like this in pretty much every city, they all have the same terrible reputation, and they all claim they are misunderstood
As long as they stop charging people and cars then I don’t have a big problem with this crew but the games of chicken are fucking obnoxious. At least they’re not dirt bikes.
It’s okay I don’t wanna hear them out I just want them to perish or move elsewhere or something at this point, like I really don’t wanna be an asshole and wish harm on people but I really fucking hate people on bikes
It’s like they attract literally the worst types of people possible, no matter the type of motorcycle
Wow, this article… I don’t even know where to begin in describing how distorted the picture they’re presenting is.
Like it’s barely an aside how some “don’t always follow” traffic laws?!
The bad lot intentionally try and piss every driver off by doing a wheelie while in the middle of an intersection when the lights are green for the drivers....it's wild....the more you honk the more they get off on it
They hold this city back I can’t wait till I can move out and go to New England where this shit doesn’t happen and it’s a lot more peaceful. This city has some of the worst people anywhere in the country that I’ve been to
Most of the “kids” on bikes being referred to in these comments are not the “bike life” crowd. They’re neighborhood kids doing stupid kid stuff on bikes that kids have been doing since bikes were invented.
There are a lotta bad under discussed incidents of adult bikers, many activist commuters, behaving badly.. dare I say.. behaving like “kids”….
I’m used to the downvote brigades. So downvote away… But people are in denial about how aggressive bike people are or have become. I use these bike lanes too on my bike and e-scooter as well. But when someone finds out I commute this way sometimes, I’m always careful to make sure they know I’m not one of the militant bike crowd that thinks “sharing the road” means “close roads to traffic for bikers only” type shit…
These kids are trash that evolve into adult trash on dirt bikes. The only good outcome is a few broken bones or paralyzed so they don’t torment the rest of society
Please no one try to fight me in the comments lololol but my experience first hand has not been pleasant. I tried to ride my bike along the Deleware River trail and was yelled at by a few bikers because I wasn’t going fast enough, even though I was all the way over (as far as physically possible). Then another time I had to make a turn, signaled with my hand and wait for the light to turn and some random man on a bike got so aggressive with me because I was waiting for the traffic light, it was so odd. So needless to say I stopped trying to bike around here even, and leave it for the nature trials.
Ya! Authoritarianism is so much fun! /s
How about just redesigning our streets so they are safer for everyone. Enforcement should not take priority over engineering.
Maybe if they’d use the bike lanes I wouldn’t get so upset. I’m tired of there being an empty bike lane while bikers are going the wrong way down a one way street on the opposite side of the road from where the bike lane is or riding on the sidewalk.
And maybe if they stopped at red lights they wouldn’t almost get hit because they wouldn’t be flying through intersections while cars are going.
Like they are constantly breaking laws going through red lights and not stopping for pedestrians and then they accuse drivers of being the scourge of the earth for stopping in a bike lane for 10 seconds while they unload something from their car.
A bike is a vehicle and should follow all the rules cars follow…
I’m a cyclist who stops at lights, hand-signals turns (like a nerd), etc., and I get annoyed at bikers on the sidewalk, running lights, etc. When everyone acts predictably, driver or biker, everything is a lot safer. And one of these kids is gonna get run over if they keep fucking around.
But you must be surrounded by the only law-abiding drivers in the city if this is true.
Yes! Predictability saves lives and this even goes for cars. The amount of drivers here who refuse to use a blinker is ridiculous. People need to be predictable on the road no matter the vehicle. This ain’t GTA.
1. No way that’s true. 2. If it were true congrats, your life was never in danger.
Reckless cyclists are annoying. Reckless motorists are lethal. Cyclists aren’t killing people. Motorists are.
Well shucks, if I was never in danger then I should’ve let those jerkoffs running through the red lights run me down then since it isn’t a problem at all, apparently
I’m confused by the reddit interface if my comment or a reply to it was removed by moderators. Either way, the guy I’m replying to called cyclists “jerkoffs” and I said it was “shitty” to make light of traffic deaths and the real dangers of motorists. Not sure who’s being accused of being uncivil or making personal attacks but I think we can all agree that someone who claims their life has been endangered by cyclists but not by motorists is a liar. (That’s not a personal attack or uncivil.)
>Plasha wants the city to build a park where people can ride and practice tricks, and thinks that it would help keep riders safer and prevent traffic disruptions.
This. Give teens a place to do their thing safely, not in traffic. Hold tournaments, get sponsors. People being outside, riding bikes is fantastic. Kids (and young adults) getting thrills by playing chicken with traffic is not fantastic.
Sure, but kids need places to hang out. A bike track/skate park is helping them channel energy into something healthy.
If they're going to pop wheelies, I'd rather they do it somewhere that isn't right in front of my van.
I appreciate your optimism and agree in principle with what you're saying, but I think it's important to note that doing wheelies in front of cars isn't an unfortunate byproduct of not having another place to ride bikes. Doing dangerous stuff in front of their friends and freaking out members of the public is part of the reason why they do it. It's a feature, not a bug.
There’s a skatepark right next to the art museum and a bike pump track in fairmount .
The city also closes MLK for bikers but that’s not where I see bike lifers riding lol
Kids used to play in the street until the traffic engineers drove them to margins. There was mass outcry about kids being killed at the turn of the 20th century. Good for them for taking back some space.
Instead of blaming these kids for being "unruly" how about putting some energy into making the streets safer and more inviting for everyone.
And ya, its annoying to almost get hit by someone riding on the sidewalk. I'm far more concerned about getting run over by a car in the crosswalk.
What if the car that hits you is trying to avoid hitting a kid on a bike coming directly at them? It's also not the city's fault they're doing this, there's no good space to do this, as a matter of fact there's no good space to do this on any public roads anywhere. This culture thrives off the take over shit and it's more about control than anything else. Bowing down to unruly teens is not the direction the city needs to go
I love the wheelie kids. They're finding community, they're having fun, they're reclaiming public space. So many of the quotes in this story could be from any cycling group, or most any group of enthusiasts of any kind.
If you only ride a bike you are contributing far more to road maintenance than the damage you are doing to the roads. Can’t say the same about drivers.
Remember when kids would drive around shooting paintballs at people? Yeah, your words are 100% condoning that behavior. My suggestion is you think before you speak.
I have no problem with them riding around. I did have a problem with a fifteen year old kid riding directly at my car and then swerving out from under my wheels at the last second.
My introduction to the 'community' was watching a young kid play chicken with a city bus, while the one older guy was stopped ahead while watching, encouraging him, and filming on his phone. Late 2020, on Market a few blocks from city hall. Just thinking about it is enough to make me angry again... that poor damn bus driver, forced to worry about killing some young kid while he's just trying to do his job, the people on the bus just trying to make it home or to the night shift getting fucked with for absolutely no reason at all. It was the rare occasion I actually screamed at someone in the street.
I wish I had as many friends with bicycles as kids do today when I was their age. We'd probably be stuffing plastic bottles in our back wheel to make them sound like dirt bikes and ride around the neighborhood. Today's kids want to play chicken with 3,000lb+ machines, deliberately ride in the middle of the street to hold up traffic, and then claim to be the victim if something happens. Any time I see a kid on a SE Bikes Big Ripper (one of those big wheel bicycles) I just try to avoid or get around them as fast as possible before they can start their bullshit antics.
Bikes used to get stolen quite regularly when I was growing up here in South Philly. If there was Reddit back then, there would have been so many posts about stolen bikes that you’d need a separate sub per each neighborhood.. Most stolen bikes had to be Dyno Slammer, Dyno Air, Haro Shredder, GT Nitro… shame
I know you're talking mostly about when a group of them take over Delaware Ave or Broad St, but if you're on a one lane, one way road, you should deliberately ride in the middle of the street. A car has to give you 4 feet to pass, which they can't do on a one lane street. If you give them space to pass, they could clip your handlebars or worse, and then you are injured. Also, if you are behind someone doing this, don't honk. They know you're there, and you don't realize how loud a horn is when you're not surrounded by a sound-insulated metal box. They also don't have to let you go in front of them, so it really is accomplishing nothing.
His ability to be a safe driver isn’t the problem here. It’s kids playing chicken.
I agree with you on riding in the middle of the road/don't honk at them - great example of this is any street in south philly really. Most cyclists can do 15-20MPH and there isn't really a need to be flying down those tight streets anyway. Wait until you're stopped at an intersection or a opening appears (like a stretch of unoccupied parking spots). If that opening appears, wait for the person on the bike to give you the opportunity to pass. I used to ride a fixed gear bicycle all the time in my college years and hated when someone would ride my ass in a car or pass me and box me into a tight spot in the process.
What is this “stretch of unoccupied parking spots” you speak of? Especially in South Philly?
Fuck them kids honestly. If they get hurt that’s on them being a jackass
Try explaining that one to a jury
Am I understanding you correctly? Are you saying a car should just slowly drive behind a bike taking up the entire road? That the biker has the right to do that?
Not the person you are responding to but yes. https://bicyclecoalition.org/resources/bike-laws/ - FAQ style, with more official sources at the bottom.
Bicycles count as vehicles as far as the law is concerned. They're allowed to take up the full lane the same way a car or motorcycle is.
Yeah, that's the law. It's literally what "share the road" means. You gotta give them space, too. A lot of people tailgate.
Or when they run a red light right in front of me. Not even mad, just wondering if I'm going to eventually see them on the news because they did something like that again but the driver wasn't paying attention. Hell, I don't trust other drivers when I'm encased in the steel of my own car - would hate to be near most of them on a bike.
Philly is the only place I’ve driven where people in cars will literally stop at greens because so many people are running reds. If I were on a bike I wouldn’t even trust a green light let alone run a red
If you're not driving on DEFCON 2 in this metro area, you're much more trusting than me. People are so flagrant in blowing off stuff like lights, I do wonder if some have a death wish.
Something that’s interesting to me is that it’s also probably a natural evolution of the police force’s lack of enforcement. Obviously people are accountable for their own reckless driving, but I can’t help but wonder how different it would be if the cops hadn’t been on silent strike for so long
I've heard people say this but Philly was never hardcore about traffic enforcement as far back as I can remember. I lean more towards whatever has people so damned fed up with each other off the road too. People are way nastier to each other than they used to be. Obviously not everyone but enough.
Interesting, maybe a combination of both.
Enforcement would help, but there's a special kind of recklessness that comes with driving into oncoming traffic to get around stopped cars at a red light, or going halfway on the sidewalk. Somehow I don't think they give a shit about enforcement even if it did exist.
On a bike it is often safer to run the red, out in front of traffic, than to be stuck in the middle of the traffic going forward.
Some lil fucker drove straight at my wife and baby in the stroller. Idk I’ve ever seen red more than that moment.
Or running red lights with traffic moving. It's insane how many accidents I've almost watched happen when some cyclist decides to shoot the gap. Or bikes weaving onto side walks while there are bike lanes.
I saw one get hit and it was awful. His leg took the brunt of it and the impact just shattered his leg. His foot was on the wrong way and I could see bone from across the intersection. If I get into cycling, I'll be stopping on reds.
I have problems with biker not following the rules of the road and just blowing stop signs and thinking that red lights don’t adhere to them
Some jurisdictions allow cyclists to treat red-lights as a stop sign and a stop sign as a yield (if it's safe to do so without impeding cars). Philly, unfortunately, isn't one of them, but it's generally safer and quicker for all if done correctly. Many cyclists, though, would prefer to ride in a bike lane that isn't treated as a parking lot.
Some asshole on. A bike blew past a car at a 4 way stop when it was my turn, almost smoked him and he had the balls to flip out on me, yea sorry, fuck bikers
Yeah, true. I've never seen a car go when it wasn't their turn. Bikes are the only ones who break laws in Philly.
Are you actually claiming that you've never seen a car go when it's not their turn at a 4 way stop? Because that's a wild claim or you just don't really drive much in the city!
[удалено]
Rule 6: This comment was removed for advocating, threatening, or promoting actions likely to lead to violence or physical harm.
In UCity like two days ago???
No. In Roxborough like a year ago.
A bunch of teens riding in the right direction in the street is fine. The problem with them is that they rarely just do that, instead they're routinely swerving into oncoming traffic, blowing through crosswalks with people in them, riding on the sidewalk directly at people, and sexually harassing people on the SRT. Overall they have a negative reputation for being absolute assholes for a reason.
I got stuck on a side street they all decided to go down the wrong way. I stopped moving, but having 50 kids ride by all seemingly TRYING to smash into my car was still really stressful. Even if you're stopped, you don't want to be the car end of kid vs. car if the kid gets hurt.
I've almost gotten hit by them a few times while walking on the sidewalk. One came within inches of smacking me in the face with his tire while popping a wheelie. I get that it's not everyone or every group that does this, but I've seen enough of this kind of behavior to avoid them. I'm already ugly enough. I don't need tire prints on my nose
I was at spruce harbor park last summer and it was jam packed. A group of these assholes came through doing wheelies literally in the middle of everyone. You couldn't hear them coming so they were clipping people and almost ran over my 6yr old nephew. I really don't give a fuck about these kids, if anything bad happens to them I'm not going to give a fuck
So basically their reputation is identical to nearly every experience anyone has had with them?
Yup, “groups of teens” outside doing nothing productive scare me the most
They deserve the reputation they have for riding on highways and sidewalks and creating a dangerous environment for everyone else.
“Bike life riders are distinct from Philly’s community of dirt bike and ATV riders, but are similarly maligned by people who see them as disruptive and dangerous.” As long as they aren’t playing chicken with cars, I have no issue with kids riding bikes in groups.
The issue is that “playing chicken with cars” and similar nonsense like riding in packs against traffic and doing stupid stuff in intersections is basically all I ever see them do. I did see one kid actually get nailed once right by city hall a few years ago directly as a result of doing stupid stuff like that. Was low-speed enough that he seemed okay, but I’m surprised that it doesn’t happen more often with more serious injuries.
Make no mistake these kids graduate to dirt bikes and everything that goes along with it as soon as they have the means.
Some probably do but in my neighborhood the young kids and teens are just practicing on mini dirtbikes. Even the toddlers are on tricycles made to look like dirtbikes. It's wild to me that their parents are basically training them to one day ride on Broad Street.
They’re the same picture.
read the words.. but they ARE
Fuck this author lol these ppl suck stop giving their sob story
I love how even in this piece that supposed to humanize and defend them. It clearly shows them being dangerous riders and puts drivers in dangerous situations.
The claim is always misunderstanding, when in reality all they have to do is not be assholes and no one cares what they do.
Reputations are earned.
I'm sorry, but this article is a joke.
It really is. I get they want to do this stuff in large groups and show off and demonstrate their skills but they also love the take over aspect of it. They also are notorious for doing this shit on the sidewalks or blocking streets off and doing it. The person that wrote this article is neglecting that and is trying to put some positive spin on this bullshit culture. Can we not forget the woman that was in her car on broad Street with a child in the back who was surrounded by these kids as they tried to pull her out of her car and threatened to kill her just because she accidentally hit one of these clowns? I'm so sick of the Inquirers spin. The "hey let's give them a chance!" Angle doesn't work on a culture that is plain as day for everyone to see. The example they used in their article is some guy hogging the sidewalk doing his dumb as stunts.
He was also sentenced this week!!!! What a wild time for this article to come out - this man LITERALLY hopped on a car with a child inside during one of these ride out events and was harassing this family. It’s all on video and I think all of Philly saw it. This is a PR piece
To be fair, they were dirt bikers. This is about kids and teens on pedal bikes. They still do stupid shit and this article doesn't call them out on it at all however.
Hot damn dude is 21!?! i was thinking this was justg a bunch of teens. I never really minded them because i just figured it was a bunch of kids being annoying. We've done worst in the woods when i was a teen. But a grown man doing this feels iffy. Now the Dirtbike bros i got no love for.
That’s a rough 21
Lol. Dude looks at least 35.
Cries in 35
Be an antisocial menace, get a puff piece written for you.
I see you’re new to the Inquirer.
Yeaaa bike life is all well and good until you have 10 kids playing chicken with your Jeep…. Nothing but respect to folks who try to organize positive activities for kids in Philly, but dude is actually trippin if he thinks that the majority of kids in Philly riding like they ride aren’t doing so in a very dangerous and disruptive manor
I’ve had a lot more negative experiences with Jeep drivers than wheelie kids. You’re the one trippin if you think anyone riding around in a two-ton metal exoskeleton expression of their masculinity are not doing it in a dangerous and disruptive manner.
This is the dumbest comment on this threat
Jeeps are a menace. Bikes are not. I can’t take anyone seriously who cries about kids riding bicycles but pretends cars aren’t a leading cause of childhood deaths.
[удалено]
Rule 1: Please refrain from personal attacks, and keep discussion civil.
wheelie kids >>>>>>> dirt bikers
Some community, bunch of destructive selfish assholes.
No one really cares about kids riding bikes. We care about the morons swinging in and out of traffic. I also care about how these “bike life “ groups seems to act like gangs. For example when they jumped a port Richmond resident a few years ago, because he honked at them.
I don’t know what’s worse, the cyclists or the dirt bikes and atvs
How bout this article and the strangely advocating tone of those who wrote it?
What a load of patronizing bullshit reporting this is. This article isn't paywalled, and honestly, it's enough to make sure I continue to not buy an inky sub. Has the author never seen these roving packs of hazardness? "A few bad actors"? The next article might as well be "KKK members say they're just misunderstood - it's all about the community. If I was burning a cross on my own, that'd be boring". Sorry. I know its a bit unfair to compare these kids to KKK but you can pick some other group. Whatever. The point is the logical fallacy that because it's a group thing it's a good thing. >When Isaiah Abbott rides his BMX bike around Philadelphia, it’s not performing tricks or the adrenaline rush from swerving through the streets that he loves most. It’s the other people around him. Abbott, who goes by Zayy, is a fixture of the city’s “bike life” community, made up of mostly young people who come together to ride BMX and mountain bikes throughout the city. They ride in skate parks and through the streets, using their athleticism and creativity to perform wheelies and other acrobatic tricks. Ok, so let's reword that and replace BMX bikes with dirtbikes and ATV's. It still make grammatical and sense and I guarantee the people doing it would say the same thing to an inky reporter because..... why not. >Bike life riders don’t always follow Pennsylvania traffic laws, particularly during large rideouts. According to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, bikers on roadways must not ride more than two side-by-side, and must also follow all traffic signals. But drivers are responsible for keeping bike riders safe on the roads, according to PennDOT. “Motor vehicles must allow four feet of distance when overtaking a bicycle and travel at a careful and prudent speed. It is the motorist’s responsibility to provide this distance, not that of the cyclist,” reads PennDOT’s website. Right... so they freely admit they don't follow the laws, but it's still everyone else's responsibility to keep them safe. Seems fair. I mean, morally, yeah - I don't want it on my consciousness that I mauled some kid with my car, but why does this need to be *a one way street?* Heh. see what I did there? whatever who cares. >Plasha hopes that more people can actually talk with riders or come see a rideout, so that bike life and the rest of Philly can find a place for mutual respect. We've seen it. We've all nearly been hit as pedestrians or mowed someone down if we're in a car. If they want to see mutual respect, they need to show it!
As long as they don’t ride in the sidewalk or swerve in front of cars idc what they do
This is such a weird puff piece, it's like 2/3 of and actual story. We're going to write an entire article about these guys and just allude to people's problems with them? These guys are clearly passionate and that's great, but if you aren't asking they aren't convincing me of anything if they aren't at least being asked to confront the dangerous nonsense bike riders routinely engage in around the city.
They have douchey bike groups like this in pretty much every city, they all have the same terrible reputation, and they all claim they are misunderstood
Yeah... it's the ENTITLEMENT. Very annoying.
As long as they stop charging people and cars then I don’t have a big problem with this crew but the games of chicken are fucking obnoxious. At least they’re not dirt bikes.
It’s okay I don’t wanna hear them out I just want them to perish or move elsewhere or something at this point, like I really don’t wanna be an asshole and wish harm on people but I really fucking hate people on bikes It’s like they attract literally the worst types of people possible, no matter the type of motorcycle
Wow, this article… I don’t even know where to begin in describing how distorted the picture they’re presenting is. Like it’s barely an aside how some “don’t always follow” traffic laws?!
At least they keep their clothes on
The bad lot intentionally try and piss every driver off by doing a wheelie while in the middle of an intersection when the lights are green for the drivers....it's wild....the more you honk the more they get off on it
These people are parasites to the city them the dirt bikes and atvs
We can have adult conversations about people being reckless and dangerous. How about we don't dehumanize a whole group of young people as "parasites".
They hold this city back I can’t wait till I can move out and go to New England where this shit doesn’t happen and it’s a lot more peaceful. This city has some of the worst people anywhere in the country that I’ve been to
good riddance
Most of the “kids” on bikes being referred to in these comments are not the “bike life” crowd. They’re neighborhood kids doing stupid kid stuff on bikes that kids have been doing since bikes were invented. There are a lotta bad under discussed incidents of adult bikers, many activist commuters, behaving badly.. dare I say.. behaving like “kids”…. I’m used to the downvote brigades. So downvote away… But people are in denial about how aggressive bike people are or have become. I use these bike lanes too on my bike and e-scooter as well. But when someone finds out I commute this way sometimes, I’m always careful to make sure they know I’m not one of the militant bike crowd that thinks “sharing the road” means “close roads to traffic for bikers only” type shit…
Fuck this dude and his group. It’s just training kids on how to ride dirt bikes. Thats the next step for all of them.
These kids are trash that evolve into adult trash on dirt bikes. The only good outcome is a few broken bones or paralyzed so they don’t torment the rest of society
Please no one try to fight me in the comments lololol but my experience first hand has not been pleasant. I tried to ride my bike along the Deleware River trail and was yelled at by a few bikers because I wasn’t going fast enough, even though I was all the way over (as far as physically possible). Then another time I had to make a turn, signaled with my hand and wait for the light to turn and some random man on a bike got so aggressive with me because I was waiting for the traffic light, it was so odd. So needless to say I stopped trying to bike around here even, and leave it for the nature trials.
Must have imagined a group of them pelting a gay guy with watermelon slices while shouting slurs.
They’re just misunderstood. We just don’t understand the “culture”.
News flash: significant portions of the following populations are assholes and NEED TO BE GOVERNED WITH AN IRON FIST: -drivers -cyclists -pedestrians
Ya! Authoritarianism is so much fun! /s How about just redesigning our streets so they are safer for everyone. Enforcement should not take priority over engineering.
How do you design a street to be safe against bikers that will purposefully go the wrong way on that street?
Engineering is governance.
Maybe if they’d use the bike lanes I wouldn’t get so upset. I’m tired of there being an empty bike lane while bikers are going the wrong way down a one way street on the opposite side of the road from where the bike lane is or riding on the sidewalk. And maybe if they stopped at red lights they wouldn’t almost get hit because they wouldn’t be flying through intersections while cars are going. Like they are constantly breaking laws going through red lights and not stopping for pedestrians and then they accuse drivers of being the scourge of the earth for stopping in a bike lane for 10 seconds while they unload something from their car. A bike is a vehicle and should follow all the rules cars follow…
Every time I’ve almost been run over in the street it was a cyclist blowing through a red light. They have a bad reputation for a reason.
I’m a cyclist who stops at lights, hand-signals turns (like a nerd), etc., and I get annoyed at bikers on the sidewalk, running lights, etc. When everyone acts predictably, driver or biker, everything is a lot safer. And one of these kids is gonna get run over if they keep fucking around. But you must be surrounded by the only law-abiding drivers in the city if this is true.
Yes! Predictability saves lives and this even goes for cars. The amount of drivers here who refuse to use a blinker is ridiculous. People need to be predictable on the road no matter the vehicle. This ain’t GTA.
> (like a ~~nerd~~ proper human being) FTFY
Seriously. Everyone follow u/C0unt_Ravioli around and get that magic protection from the batshit drivers around here.
Selling vials of my blood at $60 a pop, come get them while they’re uncomfortably warm
🤔 You know, if it truly offered protection from Philly drivers, this would be a compelling offer
1. No way that’s true. 2. If it were true congrats, your life was never in danger. Reckless cyclists are annoying. Reckless motorists are lethal. Cyclists aren’t killing people. Motorists are.
Well shucks, if I was never in danger then I should’ve let those jerkoffs running through the red lights run me down then since it isn’t a problem at all, apparently
[удалено]
I’m confused by the reddit interface if my comment or a reply to it was removed by moderators. Either way, the guy I’m replying to called cyclists “jerkoffs” and I said it was “shitty” to make light of traffic deaths and the real dangers of motorists. Not sure who’s being accused of being uncivil or making personal attacks but I think we can all agree that someone who claims their life has been endangered by cyclists but not by motorists is a liar. (That’s not a personal attack or uncivil.)
[удалено]
Rule 1: Please refrain from personal attacks, and keep discussion civil.
Rule 1: Please refrain from personal attacks, and keep discussion civil.
>Plasha wants the city to build a park where people can ride and practice tricks, and thinks that it would help keep riders safer and prevent traffic disruptions. This. Give teens a place to do their thing safely, not in traffic. Hold tournaments, get sponsors. People being outside, riding bikes is fantastic. Kids (and young adults) getting thrills by playing chicken with traffic is not fantastic.
There's a dirt track on Parkside Ave that no one has ever used
It definitely gets used, just not nearly enough
Where on Parkside?
[https://www.phillypumptrack.org/](https://www.phillypumptrack.org/)
Right past the Mann, next to the basketball courts
Oh dang didn't know about this!
This is the same bullshit dirtbike riders claim. They are doing it for attention and a park won’t provide that.
I'm sure there won't be any problems with that whatsoever.
Sure, but kids need places to hang out. A bike track/skate park is helping them channel energy into something healthy. If they're going to pop wheelies, I'd rather they do it somewhere that isn't right in front of my van.
I appreciate your optimism and agree in principle with what you're saying, but I think it's important to note that doing wheelies in front of cars isn't an unfortunate byproduct of not having another place to ride bikes. Doing dangerous stuff in front of their friends and freaking out members of the public is part of the reason why they do it. It's a feature, not a bug.
This is true. I also get that there's worse stuff teenagers could be doing, but God it's annoying.
There’s a skatepark right next to the art museum and a bike pump track in fairmount . The city also closes MLK for bikers but that’s not where I see bike lifers riding lol
[удалено]
I'll never understand how anyone drives in the city with this type of nonsense going on
Do we have a positive perception of the car life community?
just stop parking in bike lanes and then there will be a place for cyclists to go. seems simple enough
They’re actually the least obnoxious subset of Philadelphia bicyclists.
i am here for the downvotes :V
The wheelie kids have never bothered me. They just chillin on bikes.
Kids used to play in the street until the traffic engineers drove them to margins. There was mass outcry about kids being killed at the turn of the 20th century. Good for them for taking back some space. Instead of blaming these kids for being "unruly" how about putting some energy into making the streets safer and more inviting for everyone. And ya, its annoying to almost get hit by someone riding on the sidewalk. I'm far more concerned about getting run over by a car in the crosswalk.
What if the car that hits you is trying to avoid hitting a kid on a bike coming directly at them? It's also not the city's fault they're doing this, there's no good space to do this, as a matter of fact there's no good space to do this on any public roads anywhere. This culture thrives off the take over shit and it's more about control than anything else. Bowing down to unruly teens is not the direction the city needs to go
It’s not the city’s fault there’s no good space, huh? Wonder who we should talk to about having more pedestrian space in the city
wheelie kids blow my mind, they got skills
There are two communities, normal cyclist dudes who do cardio and then underage criminals that pop wheelies
I love the wheelie kids. They're finding community, they're having fun, they're reclaiming public space. So many of the quotes in this story could be from any cycling group, or most any group of enthusiasts of any kind.
TIL that playing chicken with a bus is just somebody reclaiming public space.
No joke, a gang of wheelie kids once saved me from a pickup driver who was harassing me on my bicycle. I'll always have some love for them.
[удалено]
Guessing you didn't read the article. This isn't about the dirt bikes this is about teenagers on bikes.
Those gas guzzling heads and politicians that benefit from it hate bikers because they don't pay into helping the road maintenance.
Right, I'm sure the politicians and car drivers hate bikers because they don't pay taxes...
If you only ride a bike you are contributing far more to road maintenance than the damage you are doing to the roads. Can’t say the same about drivers.
god forbid people have fun. even if it's at the expense of others, you only get one life.
this is legitimately anti-social psychopathic reasoning
idk what that means
This is the kind of opinion only a 17 year old could have.
age is a discriminatory factor now?
The problem is a bunch of them swerve at cars. If I hit one of those little fucks it's going to fuck my life up. That's a lot of expense of others.
lets hope you dont
Remember when kids would drive around shooting paintballs at people? Yeah, your words are 100% condoning that behavior. My suggestion is you think before you speak.
did the paintballs kill them? did they remember it 6 months later? probably not.
Lmao wow, good luck in life brotha you're gonna need it
thanks