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    Fell into a crack

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    42 Comments

    1. Isotheis on

      That sure is a weirdly wide and dangerous crack. Even in Europe, I think that’s good enough to have your insurance claim damages from the city.

    5. Curun on

      City would have to previously have it documented as a hazard. You may be the first.

      You might be a candidate for wider tires, consider shopping for a gravelbike swap.

    9. RustyWinger on

      I was riding in Quebec around the mountains and some of the descents had signs warning cyclists of these kinds of cracks. I guess if you’re not gonna fix it, this is definitely the next best thing.

    16. Ill_Initiative8574 on

      This happened to me some time ago. A fiber-optic company had made a 12” deep cut that was barely more than an inch wide all along the bike lane and hadn’t coned it or placed warning signs.

      I went front wheel first into it and my pedals slammed to horizontal as they made contact with the ground. The front wheel and cranks had some damage but I could barely walk because of the way the rearward pedal had slammed my right leg. I tried to dismount the bike but couldn’t lift my leg and had to lower the bike to the ground and kind of walk off it.

      I got a settlement from the FO company but I didn’t go to a lawyer and I should have. I have persistent hamstring pain in the right leg whenever I put my weight on it. Three years later it’s still there and isn’t getting any better. I didn’t realize the long-term damage that had actually been done.

      A lawyer would have made sure I got an MRI at the time to determine the extent of damage, and got me much, much more than what I got from the company and I very much regret not going that route. I’m not from the US (I live here) so I don’t have that litigious mentality, but I was wrong in this case.

    18. jared_d on

      This happened to me a couple of months ago, and I got tossed off the bike. Broke my wrist and thumb on my left hand, and dislocated my right shoulder and tore my right bicep tendon, rotator cuff, and labrum. You should feel very lucky that it’s only your wheel that got messed up!

    19. Dependent_Stop_3121 on

      A crack like that can happen overnight after a heavy rain how is the city responsible for that? I’ve seen it happen.

      Is it not our responsibility to look where we are going? Always looking out for danger?

    20. Pattern_Is_Movement on

      How… just how…. Like it’s not hidden at all, do y’all just ride with your eyes closed?

    21. LegDayDE on

      You can try. Worst they can say is no.

      If it is genuinely just the wheel then it’s probably only like $300 on Hunt crash replacement so not the end of the world. Especially for someone who can afford a nice Land Rover Defender.

    22. Deviljho12 on

      I taco’d earlier this year on some railroad tracks, really taught me to take really wide angles

    23. edhitchon1993 on

      Nothing useful to add here, but a chorister I used to sing with was riding his motorbike around Sheffield in the 1950s. The trams were gone but the tracks remained. By his telling he did nearly a whole lap of the city with his motorbike stuck in the tracks!

      Hope all resolves itself well – this sort of crap maintenance really winds me up because (at least in my council area) it doesn’t meet the criteria for urgent repair because it can’t affect cars.

    24. mikeyninja77 on

      Send a picture to hunt. They will send a new hoop out. They replaced mine this spring with a tiny chip in the brake track.

    26. AndiCrow on

      Where I live, if that’s already been reported for road repairs, the county responsible for repairs can be held liable for your loss.

    28. flamingfiretrucks on

      The only time I’ve ever ridden a road bike it felt like I was balancing on a knife’s edge, so I don’t doubt that a large enough crack could swallow up someone’s wheels. I’ve ridden hard tails since I outgrew my first kiddie bike, so riding a road bike felt scary lol

    29. squirre1friend on

      Sell road bike. Aquire gravel bike. Ride 44c.

      If you manage to fall into another crack sell all bikes and get a seeing eye dog and switch sports to speed walking.

      Have the dog sue the city when you fall into a sink hole.

    30. lil_fishy_fish on

      Don’t listen to people that tell you not to sue the city. You would do the same if a pothole broke the suspension on your car. This crack should have been filled and sealed properly. The city probably pays out hundreds of people each year for poor road maintenance.

      Riding skill doesn’t have anything to do with the broken infrastructure. People that say otherwise are being ignorant and petty and would also sue if it happened to them.

    33. parochial_nimrod on

      Most US cities have some sort of application you can fill out for road damage. I ate shit on a motorcycle once because of unsafe road conditions left by the city. It’s a quick pdf app, send in photos, wait for someone to approve it and you’ll have a check in the mail.

    34. TrueFernie on

      This is how I broke my thumb earlier this year but it was with my front wheel getting stuck, luckily the damage is only cosmetic on your end!

    35. dwaynewaynerooney on

      Were you in a group? You didn’t see the crack? Asking so that other cyclists and I can avoid a similar fate.

    38. velowa on

      Definitely report it to the city at the very least. Some cities have a way to report potholes and such and they actually get repaired.

    39. Buttleston on

      This happened to me more than a decade ago. Interface between concrete curb and asphalt road, bad drought caused it to open up. My front wheel wedged in there good, I went over the handlebars. I don’t have any memory of flying off, I came to pretty quick. I’d pulled the bike seat off with me and bent the seat bars

      I kinda landed on my face – scraped my face and gashed my chin pretty good

      I remember the ER doc being mad at me. “Why weren’t you wearing a helmet” (I was). “Why were you riding after dark” (I wasn’t, I’d just been waiting at the ER for *hours*)

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