Lane Splitting...
An Awareness,

Accelerating between two lanes of heavy highway traffic on the 405, overtaking a car on the left and a truck on the right, it is virtually impossible not to cry:
"Dear God, he's..." A critical situation. If nobody moves, nobody gets hurt.

The rider who splits lanes relies on nearly mystical vision to guide themselves along the thin painted lines on the road. Like a trapeze artist or tightrope walker, the lane splitter never looks down but only ahead, gazing into an ever shrinking window of opportunity that opens and closes between fast moving lanes of traffic. To lane split is to know both the security of a motorcycle's superior agility and the insecurity of its dangerous invisibility. Passing speeding cars may sometimes be risky, but lane splitting is something altogether different.

Unlike the many aspects of motorcycling that tend to be highly individual and strictly personal, lane splitting lends a social dimension to riding. The lane splitter is a parasite who lives off surrounding traffic. Never following the road proper, lane splitting always occurs at the boundary, on the edge, along the margin. Neither here nor there, the (un)canny motorcyclist rides alone in the company of others.

When the motorcyclist rides between lanes, he or she secures for themselves an unstable position that is both apart from and yet integral to the road. Riding the edge ,he or she opens a space that is nowhere. Always venturing beyond society's regulated flows. The lane splitter gambles by taking seemingly senseless risks. Simultaneously attractive and repulsive to car and truck drivers who play by the rules. Lane splitters both provoke fear and loathing and inspire envy and jealousy. "What was that?" asks the dazzled driver as she is buzzed by a motorcyclist passing on the right. For a split second, the motorcyclist appears to be "within" her lane. For the motorcyclist, however, roads have no lanes but only lines waiting to be traced. Coloring outside the lines is said to be a child's game. Not surprisingly, drivers sitting in their sports utility vehicles, minivans, or station wagons often deride motorcyclists as childish and irresponsible. But lane splitters know that the meaning of responsibility is determined by where you sit and how you ride.

What is at stake in lane splitting is precisely the social game of traffic: a struggle for recognition and self definition in interplay of mixed vehicles on shared roadways. Solitary car drivers who are unwilling to fill their five seater's with other passenger are just as reluctant to share lanes with motorcyclist. Lane splitters scorn those who stick to the straight and narrow and insist that the only action that counts is on the margin. Each considers the other an unthinking fool. Car culture can no more tolerate land splitting that lane splitters can stay on the left or on the right. Both reckless prank and practical tactic, lane splitting lies at the heart of motorcycling's largely misunderstood methodical madness.

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Motorcycle safety - Course information including links into the Motorcycle Safety Foundation with information about California safety course and tips concerning motorcycle gear, motorcycle clothing and helmet safety.