A great number of students, as well as faculty, opt for a cycle to school rather than what can sometimes be a longer and more stressful drive in. After all, there is a certain satisfaction in zooming past a turning bus or even beating it to school, given the recent surge in road closures.Not only is it a great form of exercise, but it is also better for our environment. On a large campus like ours, bicycles are not only efficient, they are a convenient means of getting around.

Now I realize that Ms. Hain was specifically referring to cyclists on campus area sidewalks. In that regard, the department of public safety specifically states that “bicycle riders must not use campus sidewalks except those specifically designated as bicycle paths.”

That’s just it — many of ISU’s sidewalks are meant for both pedestrians and cyclists. There are green signs posted at regular intervals to remind both user groups of this fact. If you are a pedestrian in such a space then looking over your shoulder is not only appropriate but courteous to cyclists approaching from behind. In her commentary she says that the “bicyclists have instilled a fear…to the point where I am constantly looking over my shoulder, wondering who is going to whiz by me at 10 miles an hour and take me down with their brand new Schwinn.”

This does seem a little excessive in description. But, I will give her the benefit of the doubt and say that she has indeed encountered it. Her “walking on an innocent sidewalk shouldn’t be dangerous, but it is” comment on the other hand does seem incredulous.

As a cyclist, one of my greatest concerns are the pedestrians with headphones. Not only are they listening to music but it is too loud to hear anything else. Typically when passing someone before I “fly” by I holler out “on your left” or “on your right” given the situation at hand.

Through a headset of music it is impossible to hear anyone hollering at you and I must pass at my own risk. I have seen riders run off shared walks in efforts to avoid colliding with people not paying attention. From a bicycle point of view, pedestrians on cell phones are just as hazardous as drivers on cell phones. They walk out into the flow of traffic distracted by a conversation or sending a text message and like a car bicycles must also swerve to avoid hitting them.Sometimes a bike is almost necessary to get from one side of campus to another — especially if you only have 10 minutes to get there. A person may be late if they didn’t ride.

Riding on the road can also be perilous to a cyclist’s safety. Just ask my classmate Emily Broderson who in swerving to avoid being struck by a car badly bruised her hip after crashing her bike. “Bikers should be rewarded for riding to school and reducing car traffic on campus. They should be rewarded by being allowed to get right to the door of their building,” Brodersen said.

“Restricting bikes to streets not only puts riders at risk, dissuades people from riding at all, but also stands to increase car traffic,” she added. As far as she is concerned, “the university should encourage as many people as possible to bring their bikes to school.”

Many roadways were originally not designed for the use and the given road allowance is inadequate for the task. In a perfect world there would be a lane for biking and one for foot traffic. However, at ISU as many of us know, space is at a premium.

Given all of the bike racks located around campus and the accompanying clusters of bicycles attached to them they are certainly not going to disappear anytime soon. Similarly, they are also not monsters out to terrorize people around them. Branding all cyclists based on the behaviours of some when it comes to sidewalk etiquette is premature.

There are bad cyclists out there — we have all seen them — there are equally bad pedestrians- and we have all seen them too. Rather than banning bikes from the sidewalk we should become better accustomed to the shared-use concept of our walkways. Maybe then things would get better for all of us however it is we travel across ISU.