mattp

If you do go to Rainer, I'm sure you can find some spots on the lower Nisqually, by dropping down the hill from Alta Vista, the viewpoint about 20 minutes up the hill from Paradise. The Coleman may be better in terms of being a little more readily manageable, though.

Agon, I find your little "joke" rather tasteless. Our furry friends have been known to chew on a fixed line in the cover of darkness and claim there is no problem with it. On snaffles.com they are probably all talking about how it was really the climbers' fault!

Can you read? I clearly wrote that Lowell was correct in suggesting that I could have anticipated a problem and that while in the past I have known climbers to go to the Aurora Bridge for that purpose, other locations would make a better choice.

Actually, traffic was moving past unimpeded and there was no apparent rubbernecking problem or other interference with traffic until the police showed up and, by then, I had recoiled my rope and was ready to walk off the bridge. My guess is that, if asked, the officers who responded would agree that there was no apparent problem with the traffic until they showed up but nevertheless they were bound to do their job. Some guy doing something in the pedestrian walkway - glance over and drive on. Two police cars parked broadside in the middle of traffic on the bridge? Better take a close look and see what is going on as you squeeze by in the center lane or speed past in the opposite direction. I believe, Mr. Nelson, you are wrong in your assessment on this point.

Like I said: lessons learned. I have in fact heard of climbers venturing onto the Aurora Bridge for the same purpose in the past. Other less public locations would be a better choice.

Ouch!

Oh, and now that you mention it, I agree with you that what we do affects others around us. In this particular case, the police response actually could have caused an accident. I'm not critical of the officers involved, because they were just doing their job and when I think about it in retrospect, I am sure that when they get a 911 call about somebody on the Aurora Bridge they have to act. But you know what? Had one of them simply driven by first, before they stopped broadside, I bet they might have concluded I was not a threat to myself or anybody else as I stood there, coiling up a rope that I had by then piled onto the walkway. Should this be their protocol? I don't know. Like I said, I am not critical of the officers involved - they were cool.

Baloney you're not meaning to jump on anyone, NTC. You're jumping to conclusions and jumping on me. First of all, you talk about what hazard it is to be on the Aurora Bridge doing something pefectly legal at - oh my god - noon of all times. Hello: that was my lunch hour. That is when I had time to be there. It wasn't rush hour, or darkness. Then you restate my story as if to make out that I was refusing to come talk to or stand next to the cops of whatever. That is not correct. We were literally standing on opposite sides of a 6" guardrail. I was 100% responsive, walked over to them, talked to them, and was respectful. I answered their questions directly and honestly, and you somehow suggest I am improperly assuming they have some deep seated knowledge of climbing. As the conversation followed I offered more explanation but when a police offier asks me what I am doing I believe it is best to answer succinctly and honestly. But you read some other "motive" into my response. Lastly, you argumentatively ask "what was my complaint?" Look back: I didn't complain, but I told a story of the police doing their job and noted I thought the whole thing did have an element of silliness to it. Lowell is right to suggest that, considering the history of suicides on the bridge, I might have anticipated that somebody might be concerned by the sight of any activity that might be "unusual." However, try to be objective here and answer this: why is it that I am any more of a suicide risk than the person who is standing in the bridge without a rope -- if I were planning to jump, I would have stood there without a rope and everybody would have driven by without even a notice. As far as I know, there is no law against being on a pedestrian walkway at any hour, or hanging a rope from a bridge where it dangles onto a piece of grass. Lesson learned. I posted it on this site both as a humorous story (I think it is) but also so that others might not make the same mistake.

Ravenna might be a good choice as there are not so many "good samaritans" driving by. How about Husky Stadium? A 60 meter rope touches down on a grassy lawn just north of the service drive leading to Adobe at the north end of the bridge.

What's your point, PP?

If they continue to "refine" things so those who pay more come up on top of a search list and load faster and etc., it may not be as you suggest, PP. In addition, I heard a guy on the radio saying that the telephone companies that run Internet services are deliberately setting up signal interruptions or slow downs or something to interfere with web-based telephone calls, so they can't as effectively compete. Some might call that "free market," I suppose, but others will call it "anticompetitive market manipulation."

Allright then. The guidebook is not out yet, so I've updated the name.

Climb: Aurora Bridge-Dropping Coils Date of Climb: 6/30/2006 Trip Report: I bought a new rope last night, and at lunch time I took it to the Aurora Bridge to dangle it over the edge and shake out the kinks before I take it climbing this weekend and get all tangled up. I tied it to the guard rail so I wouldn’t drop it, and fed it out over the edge, and I guess some passing driver thought I looked suspicious and called 911. Just as I was finished coiling it back up again, two police cars pulled up and the cops jumped out and were ready to wrestle me to the ground if I tried to jump or maybe start a protest or something. "What are you doing?" They demanded. “Untwisting a new rope,” I replied. "What are you doing?" (Again) “Untwisting my rope. (Again). “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” (One more time). Obviously, answering the question wasn’t working, so I asked one of my own: “did you think I was going to jump or something?” They demanded I climb over the fence to stand next to the police car and I said I didn’t really want to climb over the barrier that was there to protect pedestrians. I said “I’m sorry to cause you all this trouble,” and they told they weren’t going to arrest me or anything, but I still had to get in the car so they could drive me off the bridge. Be warned. Suspicious persons on the Aurora Bridge will be phoned in by someone who has a cell phone and just wants to do you a favor. Gear Notes: Dress slacks and shirt. Approach Notes: Pedestrian walkway. What would have happened if I did this on Friday night? How about if I wore some wild costume? I can understand the concern, sort of, but me thinks Seattle drivers and police are a little over-reactive here.

Climb: Aurora Bridge-Dangling Cord Date of Climb: 6/30/2006 Trip Report: I bought a new rope last night, and at lunch time I took it to the Aurora Bridge to dangle it over the edge and shake out the kinks before I take it climbing this weekend and get all tangled up. I tied it to the guard rail so I wouldn’t drop it, and fed it out over the edge, and I guess some passing driver thought I looked suspicious and called 911. Just as I was finished coiling it back up again, two police cars pulled up and the cops jumped out and were ready to wrestle me to the ground if I tried to jump or maybe start a protest or something. "What are you doing?" They demanded. “Untwisting a new rope,” I replied. "What are you doing?" (Again) “Untwisting my rope. (Again). “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” (One more time). Obviously, answering the question wasn’t working, so I asked one of my own: “did you think I was going to jump or something?” They demanded I climb over the fence to stand next to the police car and I said I didn’t really want to climb over the barrier that was there to protect pedestrians. I said “I’m sorry to cause you all this trouble,” and they told they weren’t going to arrest me or anything, but I still had to get in the car so they could drive me off the bridge. Be warned. Suspicious persons on the Aurora Bridge will be phoned in by someone who has a cell phone and just wants to do you a favor. Gear Notes: Dress slacks and shirt. Approach Notes: Pedestrian walkway.

It is not as confusing as we've managed to make it sound and (just like so many other things in climbing) everyone has their own "must do" rules that in many cases directly contradict and which may or may not be helpful.

That gunks.com article has some discussion of this "alternate clipping" method favoring a reduction in potential falls while clipping, as opposed to the more traditional double rope technique oritented more toward concerns for rope drag.

Catbird has referred to a past conversation we have had, I suppose in order to generate more to talk about, but he has not accurately stated what I said in that past conversation: I believe that on most climbs there are relatively few (but more than zero) placements where the extra shock put on a piece due to clipping both ropes will make the difference that causes the piece to fail. In a placement with questionable rock, like maybe a thin flake or a flared crack or whatever, I’ll certainly be more likely to favor only clipping one rope. When climbing on good rock, and where I am worried about falling shortly after placing pro, I am often more concerned about my belayer's having difficulty feeding one rope out while taking the other in and keeping a good grip on both ropes. It is all a matter of sizing up the situation. Also, and Dru or Catbird may disapprove of this, but I frequently violate the "rule" that if you are using separate pro anywhere on a pitch, you should not clip both ropes into the same biner anywhere else on that pitch. Again, each situation is different, and I do what makes sense balancing a bunch of unrelated factors such as (1) how solid do I think the pro is, (2) am I emotionally more secure about having both ropes clipped to that last piece whether it is "technically" correct or not (3) how much do I want to / can I stand there and dink with the pro, (4) what will the placement do to rope drag, (5) how will it affect my second's belay, (6) do I trust my belayer to feed one rope out while taking in the other and keep both snug as possible, (7) what did I have for breakfast. Also, Dru left out category 2.5: pieces that will blow if shock loaded with a falling climber but will withstand body weight.

Aside from "big corporations suck," and "government intervention is always bad," does anybody know more about what the actual issues here are? Who is going to make/lose money over this? What actually is proposed for regulation? How might it affect my future browing experience?

Dru and Catbird are both correct, but from what I've seen in 20 years of climbing on double ropes, both here and in Europe, the reality is that much of the time the fall comes on one rope or primarily so. I believe that the difference between ropes rated for "twin" and "double" is largely due to this factor. Where I expect a fall, I will try to place pro so both ropes will be involved in the "catch," because it just plain makes me feel safer, but this is by no means something that is always possible. To suggest that you are using double ropes "wrong" if you do not always place your pro on both ropes at or near the same length is again incorrect. Here is an illustration from Gunks.com There is a good article there, outlining a lot of advantages of double rope technique, but it doesn't answer your question which (I guess) is how can they get away selling thinner ropes for double and not suggesting you use two "normal" ropes. http://www.gunks.com/index.php?pageid=67&pagenum=1&smGroup=2&smID=4

I'm not sure what Dru is saying, but I think he may be wrong. In normal usage, people usually do not place two pieces of pro on the two different ropes at close to the same height unless they are unusually sketched - and of course this assumes they even have the opportunity to do so. Also, frequently with double ropes one is "left" and the other "right" (not necessarily alternating) for rope drag purposes. If you clip one rope, climb another distance and clip the other, and then if you fall somewhere above that second clip, you will have less rope out on that "other" rope, and the piece it runs through will be higher than that on the first rope. You will be caught by the "other."

Are the people who live in an area covered by a cell tower really paying all the cost of installing and operating that tower?

I don't agree with any simple "let the market decide" argument. Consider the telephone: without regulation along the lines of what I understand "net neurtrality" to be, you'd have no telephone service in rural areas or at least no affordable service because it is so much more expensive to install phone lines that run long distances with comparitively little traffic. I DO think the Net is a public utility, and it should have some degree of regulation, but the question remains to what extent and how it should be regulated.

It seems to me that I’d like cc.com or even smaller sites to have the same access and same service speed and same search engine presence and everything else as some large business enterprise like MSNBC or whatever, and those arguing for Net Neutrality say that without some regulation, we will lose this as the business interests take over "our" Internet for commercial puroposes. I think it is likely that Internet business will almost certainly warp even more than it already has so as to favor big players over the small guy without some kind of government or regulatory intervention, but what do you folks make of the argument that the currently proposed regulation or other efforts to protect “equal access” on the Internet will “stifle innovation?” Do we care if Google or Microsoft don’t make quite as much extra profit by developing or marketing new services? Just what kind of "innovation" might we stand to lose? What are the real issues here?

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