For me the whole issue of the Reed Bates case is the rumble strip. Rumble strips basically say "decide now and forever hold your peace about what side of the rumble strip you are going to ride on." Reed may have decided badly but that’s the whole problem, once you decide you are stuck with it. While I have never driven the road that Mr. Bates was arrested on but I can say that the presence of a rumble strip has caused me to abandon the shoulder I normally would have normally ridden on for the travel way even though 99% of the shoulder was rideable.
Rumble strips change the decision process to a lesser of two evils based on best guess on a wide verity of criteria over a long stretch of time and distance. No mater what option you decide, too often there will be a down side to that choice. Without the rumble strip you can react to conditions then present, with a rumble strip you have to guess about conditions down the road. So essentially Reed was convicted for having too few options over a long stretch of time and distance and a defective crystal ball that did not accurately foretell future conditions.
Rumble strips are so bad even LAB ( https://www.bikeleague.org ) has an alert out on their home page about them, and I quote:
"For example, has roadway safety been improved if cyclists are all but forced to ride in the travel lane of a high-speed rural roadway because the shoulder has been rendered useless by rumble strips?"
And here we have such a case yet Andy Clark calls this road with rumble strips a "perfectly rideable shoulder"
Unbelievable.
Please join with me in asking LAB to be consistent in supporting rumble strip free (or at least with gaps ) shoulders wherever cyclists are allowed. email: bikeleague@bikeleague.org
Biking in Baltimore