OWN VOICE. By David Marsland, resident of Half Moon Bay.

I love the Coastside trail. We often walk the trail, sometimes with our small dog. I also love to bicycle on the trail.

When I’m walking the trail I try hard to stay on the right and avoid taking up more than half the trail even if I’m walking with others.

When I’m bicycling on the trail I also try hard to stay to the right and use my bell to warn people that I’m coming. As I get closer I often call out “On your left”, followed by “You’re good”, then “Thanks so much”, especially if they moved to the right.

Most trail users are great and willing to share the trail between pedestrians, bicycles and, other wheeled vehicles.

Unfortunately it seems there are often groups of tourists and others who like to walk in large groups taking the entire width of the trail. These groups are often endangering themselves and others.

It boggles my mind that there’s absolutely no signage recommending that people stay on the right. It’s so simple. If people just stayed on the right and remembered that they only get to use half the width of the trail, not the whole width of the trail, then we could all share the trail harmoniously.

Recently, I was navigating the short section of trail along highway 1, where we have to detour over half a mile around the bridge closure at Miramar. There was a group in front of me of about 8 people that were blocking the entire trail. I started ringing my fairly loud bell from one end of that trail to the other. As I got closer I called out “Bike coming on your left”. Seven of the people in front moved over to the right. Unfortunately, one person lagged behind talking on his cell phone, completely blocking the path on the left hand side. I literally had to shout out “Bicycle coming, please move to the right”. He finally moved over. Then as it went past I said “Thank you”. I said to everyone in the group, “Thank you all very much, please remember to stay to the right and try to only use half the width of the trail”.

I worry that distracted people walking on the left side or in groups taking the entire width of the trail could cause injuries. Careless pedestrians could be injured or cause others to be injured when a bicycle or skateboard or scooter comes around a blind corner. Occasionally I’ll see bicycles, skateboards, or scooters on the left side too, but that’s fairly rare.

Without any signage or pavement markings saying to stay on the right accidents are literally just waiting to happen. And when accidents do happen, the parks, towns and county are opening themselves up to lawsuits.

Pavement arrows and signs are far cheaper than accidents and lawsuits.

I would like to start a movement to petition the parks, the county, and the towns of Half Moon Bay, El Granada, and Princeton to place simple arrows at trail entrances, as is common practice. On the right side the arrow points forward and on the left side the arrow points backwards.

Would you like to join me in promoting this movement? Any ideas or suggestions? Anyone know who to talk with?

Thanks,

Your Neighbor, David

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