County irked with cyclists, races

March 12, 2013, 9:00 pm by James Walker

Cycling events in the Hill Country, like Race Across America which came to Marble Falls last weekend, have so far gone without incident. But, County Commissioners are concerned serious accidents will happen unless more is done to ensure cyclists obey traffic laws.

The Burnet County Commissioners spent much of their meeting Tuesday discussing bicycle races and events, including next month’s HITS Triathlon in Marble Falls.

The commissioners, especially Precinct 2’s Russell Graeter and Precinct 3’s Ronny Hibler, have become concerned about safety and what they said is bad behavior by cyclists in past events, the number of which has increased dramatically in recent months.

There are safety concerns because cyclists participating in the events ignore traffic laws on county roads, Hibler and Graeter said.

"It’s a matter of when, not if, someone gets killed at one of these things,” Hibler said. "We’ve been fortunate in the past, but we’ve never had this many coming at us at any one time.”

In addition to the HITS Triathlon in Marble Falls, he is aware of eight other cycling events scheduled to take place in Burnet County between now and June 1, most of them in the northern part of the county, Graeter said.

For the full story, see Wednesday's Burnet Bulletin or Friday's Highlander.