Atlantans: Get your collective head out of your collective ass

I rode home yesterday, but the app only recorded from school to Baker. Too bad. I'll still write up the interesting anecdote here:

I generally like one-way roads while on the bike, because they provide multiple lanes for motorists to pass without bothering me. In this story, I was in the far-left lane on (one-way) Centennial Olympic Park Dr to make a left turn onto (one-way) John Portman (old Harris). I slowed a bit while approaching the light to allow pedestrians to cross and noticed a pick up a couple lanes over doing the same, with the left directional on. Realizing that this truck meant to turn left from a right lane, across several lanes of traffic (and probably into me), I yelled "Hey! Hey! Hey!" and made eye contact through the open window. He returned "Hey what?! I see you." And he proceeded to turn left from his right lane, behind me, into a left lane on Harris.

The pedestrians, who were several adults and a few children and maybe a younger teenager, of course witnessed this whole exchange. They saw fit to make fun of my "hey hey hey" as they continued down the sidewalk. Yes, that is exactly the behavior you should teach your children.

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Also, a note to motorists: that solid white line that often precedes an intersection or cross-walk, or accompanies stop signs, is a stop line. You are supposed to stop at it, not on it or over it. Your front bumper should not cross it if you are stopping at that intersection, even if it is not even with the stop line in the lane next to you: that is by design, for visibility and tight turns. When you stop across that line, or inch over it, you make me angry, and you put me in danger.

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On my ride home on Tuesday, the driver of an 18-wheeler took the right turn from Baker to Luckie too wide (it's a brand-new, poorly designed intersection, because Atlanta: no one makes deliveries to the Aquarium), while I was stopped at the light waiting to make a left. I saw he couldn't make it and backed up. He started waving wildly and told me to just get off the bike and change lanes. What if I were a car? He endangered me by not calculating his turning speed, and then by forcing me to change lanes and re-enter traffic for my left turn at a light as it changed.

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I hate this city.