The other issue that we haven't addressed enough is survival. It seems like hardly a week has passed this summer without a story of a bike rider being struck and killed by vehicles on roadways.

If you think someone's not going to die or be maimed on that dark section of the Lakeside blacktop some night, or be struck riding in fast traffic on Highway 7 between Storm Lake and Alta, or on the airport road, you're kidding yourself.

We have local committees on trails, and that's great. What we don't have is money. Doing a stand-alone trail can cost a million bucks a mile - and that's IF you can get access to the property needed.

About 50 people have been killed in the past 10 years in Iowa car-bike collisions. In a striking irony, during the "Mile of Silence" on the RAGBRAI ride this year to remember those killed and injured while biking, a retired journalist was struck from behind by a pickup and killed on the route by a driver who claimed to have not seen anything. In the middle of RAGBRAI, and you're not looking out for bikes?

Yes increasing traffic and numbers of people using bikes may be part of the trend. But I would venture to guess there is another reason. Anyone who has done any riding on roads can tell you war stories of close calls when car drivers are busy looking at their cell phones instead of what's in front of them. Are we enforcing distracted driving penalties, and are these penalties strong enough?

Iowa is one of only 10 states that has no law about passing bicycles. Such a bill was introduced during the 2016 legislature, and lawmakers, unbelievably, failed to come to an agreement to pass it.

How difficult is this, really? You set aside politics for one moment, and you unanimously pass a bill that requires vehicles to change lanes when going around bikes, just as they would to pass a car or a motorcycle, and you save lives.

Bike riders around here will tell you stories too of getting run off the road, accidentally or otherwise, or being clipped by a car mirror, or pelted with gravel off a speeding truck inches from them.

The Iowa Bicycle Coalition has a petition going around now, with thousands of signatures demanding safety changes including a passing law. It's ridiculous that it takes such a thing to cause legislators and our governor to do the proper thing.

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