On 2004-11-09, Dej wrote:

"Stuart Lamble" wrote in message
...
Second question relates to routes. Anybody have any suggestions on good
roads/bike routes to take, heading south from Mitcham (call it about
halfway between Mitcham and Heatherdale stations, on Brunswick St) to
Monash Uni Clayton? What's (eg) Springvale Road like during peak-ish
hour (~7-8am, ~5-6pm) for cyclists?

I'd seriously avoid blackburn rd, its pretty ugly between high st rd and ftg
roads.
The lanes are narrow and theres usually heavy traffic (cars, busses, trucks,
you name it)

I know _exactly_ what you mean. My current route to work when I take the
bike is the backstreets through to Blackburn Road where it meets the
freeway, then south along B'burn Rd to the road that cuts through the
north side of Monash Uni (I live south of Waverley Road at the moment).
Whilst I'm reasonably comfortable with Blackburn Road south of Waverley
Road, because of the third lane, I'm decidedly _un_comfortable with it
north of that point (until around Highbury Road) -- hence the question.

I ride from surrey hills to notting hill just north of monash. Whenever i've
wanted to take the long way, i've gone down ftg to springvale then left and
straight up springvale to maroondah in preference to riding blackburn rd. I
find springvale rd to be just as busy, but the lanes are a bit wider.

And the fact that there are more of them means that there's less
compunction on my part about my riding habits (although if the lane's
sufficiently wide, I'll cope without hogging the whole lane -- I'll
adjust according to circumstance

The only problem part for me is riding east along ftg road between blackburn
and springvale, you get all the ppl coming off the freeway onto ftg road
still belting along

Yup. Eyes sharp, as always -- vital for anybody on two wheels,
especially those without motors.

Thanks. Food for thought, in any case; I'll probably be buying around
December (might be better to wait until January, and avoid the Christmas
rush.)

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