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Just how much do you trust your GPS? I have to admit, although I know they have errors, they are fairly accurate. My GPS tends to be off by about 100 feet most of the time. But hey, if I can't find something 100 feet away, I have bigger problems! The reason I ask is because I had an attention getter on my ride yesterday. I was coming back from Florida and it was about 7PM. I had already ridden about 400 miles and decided to just take a direct route home - first mistake. So, instead of taking a known route, I decided to let my GPS select the route by selecting "go home" - second mistake. All was well until I had to make two fairly quick turns. The GPS said to take an exit and make an immediate right turn on an offramp. I was doing about 75 as I came off the exit and slowed to about 45 to take the offramp. The offramp was a "circling ramp" (according to the posted sign) that made a hard right circling turn. So I leaned into the turn only to discover the ramp wasn't there!!
4: The pavement abruptly ended about 15 feet in front of my bike! So I had to make an immediate stop - in a hard lean - without crashing! Argh! Amazingly I pulled it off without dropping the bike - not an easy feat for me. I just had to get off - catch my breath and take a picture! Here is what I saw...
In the first picture, you can barely see the fence that ran along a cow pasture! Whew, that barbed wire would have hurt! What really amazed me was that the turn lane was there, the turn arrows were painted on the pavement, and about the first 75 feet of the offramp were there. It wasn't an old offramp and the paint looked brand new. So, I'm assuming it was new construction. However, if this was new construction, where were the barriers, warning signs, work horses, etc?
Unfortunately, this isn't the first time I have run across this in FL. I was on a ride a few months ago with a group when the pavement suddenly ended on a 4 lane! There was about a 15 foot dropoff with a section about 200 feet long missing! A HD in front of our group had to lay his bike down to prevent going into the pit. It would have most definitely caused him hospitilization if not death since we were all going around 60. The rest of us swerved left and right as we saw the pit - narrowly avoiding disaster ourselves. There were no construction signs, warning lights, and nothing blocking or warning of the pit!! Now that I have had my second narrow escape in Florida, I'm just wondering if this is a new snowbird control technique
4:


In the first picture, you can barely see the fence that ran along a cow pasture! Whew, that barbed wire would have hurt! What really amazed me was that the turn lane was there, the turn arrows were painted on the pavement, and about the first 75 feet of the offramp were there. It wasn't an old offramp and the paint looked brand new. So, I'm assuming it was new construction. However, if this was new construction, where were the barriers, warning signs, work horses, etc?
Unfortunately, this isn't the first time I have run across this in FL. I was on a ride a few months ago with a group when the pavement suddenly ended on a 4 lane! There was about a 15 foot dropoff with a section about 200 feet long missing! A HD in front of our group had to lay his bike down to prevent going into the pit. It would have most definitely caused him hospitilization if not death since we were all going around 60. The rest of us swerved left and right as we saw the pit - narrowly avoiding disaster ourselves. There were no construction signs, warning lights, and nothing blocking or warning of the pit!! Now that I have had my second narrow escape in Florida, I'm just wondering if this is a new snowbird control technique