Fool for Manhole Covers

By now you have read on this blog or other cycling-focused outlets about sharrows, the road sharing program that encourages the co-mingling of bikes with traffic.  The idea is catching on and more towns are adopting sharrow roads and more bike riders are cruising along with the flow of traffic.  The cars are no problems for bikes, we see them and they see us.  One thing that the SBT has been thinking about when it comes to sharrows is the unseen danger of manholes.

Manholes and manhole covers can be a problem.  First, let’s correct the vernacular, the PC world has come to the idea of a manhole.  The preferred term is subsurface chamber.  Now that is out of the way we need to look a little more into the problems manholes create for bike riders.  The things are a necessary evil, they have taken most of what is unsightly out of our field of vision: wires, cables, sewers, storm drain run off and much more.   Each time something new is built the possibility of a new, or many new manholes, appearing on a road surface is real.  Today’s construction moves many things underground.  That’s all well and good but and once a shiny new 110 pound manhole cover gets put into place it looks just fine sitting flush with the asphalt.  That flushness only lasts for a little while.  The combination of gravity, weight, and the elements cause manhole covers to sink into the blacktop.  That sinking creates a lip, a road anomaly that our front wheels can catch if we aren’t careful.  Once our wheel gets knocked out of round we are looking at a period of no riding as the machine heads to the local bike shop for some wheel truing.  

Metropolitan and suburban riders will have to deal with manhole issues more than our rural rider friends.  Out in the country most service cables and wires are still carried by utility poles.     

The surface of the manhole can get slippery, more so than blacktop or concrete.  The little nubs on the top can add some bounce to your passage as well.  And last, years of sitting and baking in the sun causes them to fade into the same color as the faded blacktop on which it sits.  The things after time can be an unseen nuisance.  The worst possible scenario is a cover that becomes electrified due to a phenomenon known as “stray voltage.”  On this very rare occasion a manhole cover can deliver an electric shock. 

The photo is all you need to know about the problem manholes create.  When you are riding in a sharrow road be aware of manholes.  In Europe, be doubly aware, they tend to get stolen on the Continent for their scrap value. 

Note about the photo: Most rock fans will recognize the cover of the 1975 album “Fool for the City” by Foghat.  The fisherman is the band’s drummer Roger Earl.  Earl was angling in the middle of 11^th street in Manhattan.  Foghat was formed in the UK in 1971 and adopted the name Foghat after a night of Scrabble in which one of the band members tried to pass off the made-up word as real stating that it is a type of cap one would wear in a heavy London mist.  "Fool for the City" was Foghat’s most successful album earning platinum status.  

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