We suppose we should be politically correct and laud the arrival of "sharrows," but we think they are an expensive waste of time and tax dollars.

"Sharrows" are those things you can see painted on several streets around the city. For a look at what they are, see the photo and story on Page One of today's paper.

They have been called "innovative new pavement markings" and endorsed by the biking community.

What they are supposed to do is warn drivers and bikers they must share the road, thus the name, a merging of "share" and "arrow" which points to the direction of travel.

San Francisco, Portland and New York City have them and they have been endorsed by such august bodies as the National Committee on Uniform Traffic Control Devices.

They are called cousins to bike lanes but the area the sharrows marks are not bike lanes. The hype is that such graphics painted on the road somehow suggest that bikers stay a but further out into the street to avoid suddenly opened parked car doors. Apparently, drivers are now going to be warned that bicyclists are going to ply this roadway.

So, what is new? Bicyclists have legal right to use the streets, and they are supposed to follow the rules of the road, which most good bikers do. Motorists, unless they debarked yesterdayfrom the former planet known as Pluto, know bicyclists are likely to be on most arterials at any time. Most drivers do what they are supposed to do and give adequate room to the bicyclist. And, yes, there are idiot drivers as there are idiot bikers who ignore the rules.

Sharrows will fix all of this? We think not. Ask a smoker when the last time he or she read the dire warnings on a cigarette pack.

Sharrows are a feel good measure, but a rather expensive one. We wish the city would fill some of the Baghdad style potholes instead of wasting money on painted gidgets on our streets.

- Jack Mayne