Cars, especially in high school, get too much praise. Yes, they’re useful and make you look “older” and “cooler.” However, those of us who bike and “share” the road with cars can easily say that cars are frightening. Mill Valley has decided to make biking significantly less dangerous by installing safe-hit bike posts to separate the bike lane from the car lane. Call me what you will, but personally, I’m psyched.

Ever since elementary school, I’ve been responsible for getting myself to and from school every day. More often than not, this entails biking. While the still air of a frosty December morning might be scoffed at by those riding in their heated windproof cars, I must say the natural high I get from my morning bike ride is splendid. It also gives me a chance to clear my head before diving into the crazy mayhem that we call high school.

However, one’s day can quickly take a turn for the worse when one finds himself approaching a car head on at a combined speed over 30 miles per hour. That might seem like an unlikely situation, but for some reason that I cannot explain, for the past two years, I’ve had the pleasure of dealing with innumerable drivers under the impression that cutting into the bike lane while going around a turn is a good idea. Each and every time, the result was the same. The driver came rocketing around the curve, inner wheel sitting smack in the middle of the bike lane, and upon seeing me, quickly swerved back out of the bike lane.

Over the past two months or so this problem has virtually been eliminated, thanks to the work by the generous city of Mill Valley. Since the installation of reflective “safe-hit posts,” along the curved sections of Almonte Boulevard, drivers now have a physical barrier which prevents even the slightest infringement upon any bike lane.

Between Tam Junction and Mill Valley the curved road is not only blind for cars but also has no segregated bike lane. Mill Valley’s decision to add in reflective bike posts makes my twice daily bike rides much safer. My experience with car induced injuries were painful and hopefully with these safe-hit posts, accidents won’t happen again. Mill Valley has made a simple change that will largely benefit the community for years to come.

Needless to say, I feel much safer each morning as I make my way to school, as I can imagine other pedestrians and bikers do. I’d like to extend my graditude you to the Mill Valley Department of Public Works (responsible for the installation of the safe-hit posts) for transforming this small section of roadway from a dangerous corridor of bike lane infringement into a safe haven for bikers and pedestrians alike.