Why do some kids in Baltimore and D.C. take such joy in beating up cyclists?
By Dave Jamieson Last night I had a few beers with a buddy who lives in Baltimore. This friend is an avid cyclist who does just about everything with his road bike, whether it's commuting to the train station, going grocery shopping, or escaping the city limits on the weekends. But lately even the shortest rides around his neighborhood have come with a bit of anxiety. Apparently, a lot of cyclists in his part of town have been getting beaten up by groups of teenagers.
On Saturday the Baltimore Sun reported on the rash of assaults, muggings, and bike-jackings in Charles Village. Three arrests had been made in connection with two robberies before another cyclist was jumped and his bike stolen last Wednesday. "The attacks -- which include several instances of harassment and rock-throwing, many that were not reported to police -- generated discussion on Facebook among bike commuters and the city's pedestrian planner, Nate Evans," the Sun reported.
My buddy asked me a question in earnest last night: Which do I think would be easier to use while biking -- a can of Mace, or one of those retractable (and illegal) batons?
To people who ride in D.C., the situation in Baltimore must seem pretty familiar, especially the bit about the rock throwing. A few years back the City Paper ran a couple of articles about a spate of random assaults directed at cyclists and pedestrians in Columbia Heights and the U Street corridor. As Ryan Grim reported, rocks and bricks were raining down from Garfield Terrace onto cyclists who were trying to brave the bike lane along 11th Street above U. And as I reported, kids fresh out of Garnet Patterson Middle School in the afternoon were taking aim at cyclists and pedestrians.
I remember stopping to talk to a Garnet student who had trained a rock on me, unprovoked, while I was biking on V Street NW. The boy, who was among a large group, had been suspended before for rock-throwing with his friends. He explained to me that they often pulled cyclists off their bikes just to get a chase going. In other words, it was mostly about having fun. When I asked what kind of people they did this to, he looked me up and down, smiled broadly, and pointed right at me. If I recall correctly, I was wearing a Social Distortion t-shirt and an oversized blue bike helmet, looking every bit the gentrifying 20-something dork.
The recent incidents in Baltimore seem to be more about thievery than anything else; the kids have been, above all, after the bicycles. But the rock-throwing and harassment at play certainly suggest an undercurrent of joy to the whole thing. Honestly, I don't really get it. But I do know this: When I'm riding my bike and I see a group of a dozen kids on the side of the road looking especially bored, I'll often cruise over to the other side of the street. And I won't feel guilty about it. [And I'll note making a u-turn and finding another route is also equally viable.]
<a href="http://www.tbd.com/blogs/tbd-on-foot/2010/08/why-do-kids-in-baltimore-and-d-c-like-to-beat-up-cyclists--941.html">http://www.tbd.com/blogs/tbd-on-foot/2010/08/why-do-kids-in-baltimore-and-d-c-like-to-beat-up-cyclists--941.html</a>;
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