
Junction design in the Netherlands [video] - bane
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpQMgbDJPok&feature=share
======
bane
This is how to do it. Clean separation of road vehicles from bikes, none of
this painted line in the parking lane nonsense. Engineer for the most
vulnerable, give space for everybody.

Even as a driver, this is how I want things to be.

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radicalbyte
It's not just the roads, it's the whole infrastructure. I live in a modern
estate (cira 1990); from here I can cycle to three town centers within 15-20
minutes. Our local shopping center is 5 minutes cycle, or 7-8 minutes by car.

My wife cycles to work, and takes our 15 month old to daycare on her bike.
Next year I'll be able to cycle too. Can't wait :)

------
rertrree
The future of transportation is; separate different modes of transportation as
much as possible.

When I was younger, I was regularly biking in between the car lanes( sometimes
very risky ), skipping the bicycle paths since they were much slower or simply
missing. I would almost always get there before I would with a car or a bus,
and parking wasn't a problem. If the lanes were completely separated this
could be done safely.

From my experience the roundabouts where the bicycle lane isn't separated, are
the least safe for bicyclists, out of any type of intersection. I think the
cause is that apart from normal intersections with stop signs or lights, where
stopping is the usual procedure, the roundabouts are fluid where drivers stop
much less and thus "prefer" not to stop or just think they have the right of
way.

~~~
jules
Just as important as junction design is driver education. In the Netherlands
they focus very hard on driving safely with respect to cyclists. A big part of
that is indeed roundabouts. An average driving course will make you practice
driving safely on different types of roundabouts many many times, and the main
focus is on avoiding accidents with cyclists. This is important because on
most roundabouts the cyclists do have priority when they are going around the
roundabout over a car who is leaving or entering the roundabout, and cyclists
_will_ take that priority without a second thought because they know that the
driver will stop as he/she should.

This also means that it can be hard to pass a driving exam for foreigners who
already have a drivers license in their home country. I know several people
who have failed the exam multiple times despite driving for years in their
home country.

~~~
wolfgke
Rather off topic, but have you already considered that the obligation of a
driver's license is against the hacker ethics and thus hackers should campaign
for an abolition of driver's licenses?

Let me explain: In Levy's hacker ethics
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_ethic#The_hacker_ethics](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_ethic#The_hacker_ethics))
it is formulated as the first point:

"Access to computers—and anything which might teach you something about the
way the world works—should be unlimited and total. Always yield to the Hands-
On Imperative!"

Since today's cars are computers on wheels (source: transcript of "The Coming
War on General Computation" of Cory Doctorow:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUEvRyemKSg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUEvRyemKSg)
from
[https://github.com/jwise/28c3-doctorow/blob/master/transcrip...](https://github.com/jwise/28c3-doctorow/blob/master/transcript.md)):

"We don't have cars anymore, we have computers we ride in; we don't have
airplanes anymore, we have flying Solaris boxes with a big bucketful of SCADA
controllers [laughter]; a 3D printer is not a device, it's a peripheral, and
it only works connected to a computer; a radio is no longer a crystal, it's a
general-purpose computer with a fast ADC and a fast DAC and some software."

this rule should also apply to cars. Also for point 3 of Levy's hacker ethics

"Mistrust authority—promote decentralization"

it is clear how an mandatory driver's licenses violates it, since there is a
central authority which allows/disallows driving.

To state one thing clear: If you want to drive a vehicle, I strongly recommend
taking some driving lessons. But making a driver's license madatory is a clear
violation of the hacker ethics and any hacker or supporter of the hacking
scene should make in no uncertain manner clear that they espouse an abolition
of mandatory driver's licenses.

~~~
krapp
You're arguing against trusting authority while insisting we all should do
exactly what Steven Levy tells us to do.

Also, a drivers' license doesn't deny one access to a car, nor does it deny
one the ability to drive (except perhaps legally.) So I fail to see how
requiring a license to drive limits a hackers' access to the computer in a car
in any meaningful way.

You could just as well argue we should all steal anything with a chip in it
because stores are limiting access to electronic goods by requiring people to
pay for them. Or that every network in existence which employs any privileged
access (passwords, sudo, etc) violates that ethic because by definition,
they're denying _someone_ access to some part of the code.

The hacker ethic is fine and all, but like anything, once you take it too far
it just becomes another form of fascism.

------
gpvos
It gets even better. Look at this innovative traffic light for cyclists:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiznpGdVsiY&feature=share](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiznpGdVsiY&feature=share)

------
DonHopkins
Hans Monderman was a famous Dutch traffic engineer who hated traffic signs,
which he considers an admission of failure.

He said: "The trouble with traffic engineers is that when there's a problem
with a road, they always try to add something. To my mind, it's much better to
remove things."

Wikipedia: Hans Monderman:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Monderman](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Monderman)

Project for Public Places: Hans Monderman [http://www.pps.org/reference/hans-
monderman](http://www.pps.org/reference/hans-monderman)

Urban Design London and Urban Design Group Multimedia: Hans Monderman:
[http://www.urbannous.org.uk/Hans-Monderman-
Presentation.htm](http://www.urbannous.org.uk/Hans-Monderman-Presentation.htm)

Roads Gone Wild:
[http://archive.wired.com/wired/archive/12.12/traffic.html](http://archive.wired.com/wired/archive/12.12/traffic.html)

Hans Monderman on the Importance of Human Interaction:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOH9-DgJdTo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOH9-DgJdTo)

His philosophy reminds me of the premise of "Magic Ink: Information Software
and the Graphical User Interface": "I argue that interactivity is actually a
curse for users and a crutch for designers, and users’ goals can be better
satisfied through other means."

Interactivity is a failure state of user interfaces that could have predicted
what the user wanted by context and history, and presented it to them without
demanding so much of their time and attention.

Magic Ink: Information Software and the Graphical User Interface
[http://worrydream.com/MagicInk/](http://worrydream.com/MagicInk/)

------
svisser
If you want to learn more, this video also shows a good foreign perspective:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0GA901oGe4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0GA901oGe4)

------
bradleyboy
Wonder if cyclists there optimize their route for right turns (a la UPS) since
it is so convenient in this setup.

~~~
pootsbook
Most definitely. I’ve been cycling in the Netherlands for three months now and
I've found myself instinctively opting for a quasi-circular route when going
to and from a destination to ensure maximum flow via right-hand turns.

------
bmsleight
Quite a good insight. The Dutch design for the motorist last. Hence cycling is
prevalent.

------
mrbman7
Amusing no one wears helmets.

~~~
louwrentius
We Dutch are basically born on a bycicle and learn to ride it at a young age.
Everybody can cycle, it's so...ingrained.

almost 17 milion people. 200 deaths a year. 65000 accidents required doctor
treatment (maybe we are not zo great at cycling as we think). 15000 end up in
a hospital. Especially old people tend to get killed.

[http://www.rijksoverheid.nl/documenten-en-
publicaties/public...](http://www.rijksoverheid.nl/documenten-en-
publicaties/publicaties/2014/04/24/tabellen-verkeersdoden-2013%5B2%5D.html)

Still, overall 570 traffic deaths (including cars and pedestrians etc) for
2013 is quite good.

~~~
IkmoIkmo
Puts us in the top 15 with the usual suspects. United Kingdom was a surprising
one for me though, would not have expected it to be better than say Finland or
the Netherlands.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-
re...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-
related_death_rate)

