Sunday, April 30, 2017

Skateboarding In San Francisco

Yesterday while driving on Bush St near Grant Avenue in San Francisco an interesting entertainment occurred. Bush St there is fairly steep. It's also a crowded street of cars and many people in crosswalks.So I'm driving about 25 MPH. A skateboarder passes me!He is swerving from lane to lane as to mitigate his speed. There are no brakes on skateboards. While swerving he's filming with a hand held iPhone.His brain darting from photo taking and navigating the streets ambient traffic along with controlling his speed invites my speculation when he will fall. This is San Francisco and has more attorneys in the Yellow Pages than anything else certainly individually and many other categories combined. I don't want to run over him. Because he is certainly worth more dead to his surviving relatives and acquaintances than alive.To slow his speed to a stop with a fast approaching crowded intersection he must slow down dramatically. To this purpose he lurches his skate board to the left at an almost 45 degree angle. And then back to the right at a similar steep perpendicular angle. He's about 5'8" and weighs app 170 pounds.So the effective weight as per weight multiplied by speed is considerable. Particularly when the skate underpinnings weren't meant for such torque on a crumbly pavement. But he made it. Just in time to exit the street via a handicap ramp in place on the sidewalk.Could be prophetic.

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