[ale] Linux Sys Admin needed

[Jim Popovitch]

JK wrote:
> 
> In real bike-friendly cities, cars and cyclists
> usually don't have to share the same pavement.
> I bike around El Paso (TX) a lot, which is not
> particularly bike-friendly, and I try to be polite
> to motorists, but motorists don't often return
> the favor. If I take off from a red light as fast
> as I can, it's still likely to piss off the guy
> in the Porsche that has to wait for me. It's a
> basic conflict between huge fast cars and light
> slow bikes trying to share bandwidth, so to speak.
> 
> OTOH, I spent two weeks in Portland OR
> last month visiting a client, and rented a bike in
> order to avoid turning into a slab of lard.  I
> also had a really nice rental car, but it turned out
> that in Portland, bicycling was a *much* better way
> of getting around the city than driving.  At rush
> hour, the 4-mile drive from my hotel to the client
> site took about 40 minutes, including finding parking
> (which was sometimes impossible); biking took
> about 20 minutes, because nearly every single major
> street had a lane reserved for bikes; and parking a
> bike is never a problem.  Furthermore,
> motorists in Portland respect the bike lanes. Plus,
> downtown Portland has bike-friendly and *FREE*
> mass transit! It was really an excellent experience.
> Someone moving from Portland to Atlanta (or El Paso)
> would probably feel like they went 20 years backward
> in time.
> 
> I'm not saying that motorists are evil (I am one
> much of the time); just that making bike commuting
> practical takes a serious commitment from everyone
> involved, as well as money. IMO the improvement in
> quality of life for a city that makes that investment
> would be worth it, though.

All good points.  Unfortunately Atlanta is no more a bike friendly city 
than it is a mass-transit city.  Those are things that are designed into 
the city's infrastructure over decades and unfortunately Atlanta (and 
the surrounding suburbs) never seem to have elected leaders who can see 
further then their next election.  It's sad, but it's true.

-Jim P.