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This, unfortunately, matches my experience in semi-rural, suburban, and light urban in a moderately-sized American city and surrounds. Nearly to a person, cyclists that I encounter on non-neighborhood roads want all the benefits of being considered a "real vehicle" when it suits them, and also all the benefits of being a "fragile human being" when it suits them. Even to the point of having no sense of self-preservation or common sense - for example, there is a twisty back road near my house which is posted at 45mph, has approximately 3" of shoulder (and a drop-off into the ditch), and many twisty bends such that a bicyclist riding not on the shoulder will not be visible to a car until VERY late in the game, and a driver not being very defensive and careful would have a hard time avoiding them...
And yet, constantly, I see bicyclists do this, including getting upset when I refuse to go around them when I can't see far enough beyond where they are to know that moving out into the actual other lane of traffic (which their road position will make me do) would be actually safe.
The reason for bicycling on non-neighborhood roads is they are the ones which go places. Same reasons the drivers use them. I'm not sure what else you'd expect.
The comment was more directed at why pick a road which has (1) a speed limit which even doped-up Lance Armstrong could not approach or sustain, (2) that has no escape routes either for the bike or for a car which encounters a bike, and (3) highly restricted sightlines that make bikes much more of a rolling roadblock than under other circumstances. The area is not lacking in bike trails, and based on the attire selected, approximately 0 of the bikes I see doing this are doing it just to get from point A to point B.
(1) A speed limit is not a minimum. (2) You are supposed to be able to stop even for stopped traffic, not depend on magic escape routes to get you out of trouble. (3) You are supposed to drive in a way that is suitable for the circumstances.
And bike trails can be quite short, unsuitable for a racing bike, not linked to other nice roads that one might use, etc.
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