Photo by Eric Gilliland.

AAA Mid-Atlantic must not have gotten the memo: bicycles aren’t a scourge to oppose at all costs.

May is National Bike Month, and the national organization put out a press release urging drivers to respect bicyclists. “AAA appreciates the continued efforts of stakeholders and transportation officials towards making roads safer for motorists and cyclists alike.”

That’s welcome, because many residents don’t feel similarly. Michael Dresser, the Baltimore Sun traffic columnist, had to dress(er) down some readers who wrote to complain about “Lance Armstrong wannabes” and “packs of city dwellers” using “their” roads.

“Cry me a river,” Dresser wrote. “[Bicyclists] do not impede traffic; they are an integral part of traffic. It has been thus since the dawn of the auto age.” He also refutes the argument that cyclist don’t pay taxes and (ironically, the letter writer who brought that up said cyclists should “have no more special privileges than pedestrians.” Does this driver also think that every pedestrian should jump out of a crosswalk if he’s approaching?

Despite AAA’s pro-share-the-road stance and even the attempts by some of its local clubs to woo cyclists, AAA Mid-Atlantic remains one of the nastiest and most anti-everyone-not-driving groups.

Reacting to news that DDOT is building the Pennsylvania Avenue bike lanes, AAA immediately got some knee-jerk, incendiary quotes into the hands of most local reporters, which they dutifully reprinted into relatively or fully unquestioning articles. Have these guys ever said anything nice about cyclists?

The worst is a “Weblink” from Fox 5, which only paraphrases a few AAA talking points and then provides a direct link for its presumably-irate readers to comment to COG.

Newschannel 8 starts out by quoting an angry driver, but at least finds a few pro-lane residents as well.

WashCycle calls the Post’s article the “best of the batch,” at least including a detailed response from DDOT and noting that bicycling doubled in eight years. However, WashCycle writes,

I wish they’d have interviewed someone who could make the point that bike lanes increase cycling and cycling reduces congestion, so — as long as it’s reasonable — bike lanes can reduce congestion; that Penn is massively overbuilt so it has room for bike lanes; and that even if there is a little added congestion it will be somewhat compensated by less pollution and CO2, improved safety and improved public health. But they didn’t.

Tommy Wells jokingly Tweeted, AAA “likely lamented the big sidewalks too. [Pennsylvania Avenue] could have been 12 lanes wide.”

AAA Mid-Atlantic is, as usual, taking the reflexively anti-bicycle position without really backing it up. But they don’t need to to get in the paper; they’ve realized that if they just say pithy things, they get quoted. No need to actually argue whether the lanes will slow down drivers’ commutes, which DDOT says even the traffic models say won’t happen as Pennsylvania in this area is wider than it needs to be.

WashCycle also notes, have none of these reporters heard of WABA?

Also to kick off National Bike Month, in the grand tradition of columnists writing about thinks they have no knowledge of, the Examiner’s conservative “Beltway Confidential” David Freddoso blasted the upper 7th Street bike lane which didn’t even take away space from cars.

Freddoso’s bio says he used to work for Robert Novak; apparently he’s trying to follow in his mentor’s footsteps in more ways than one.