
Pop-up bike lanes show that demand exists - jseliger
http://bicycletimesmag.com/if-you-build-it-they-will-ride-pop-up-bike-lanes-prove-that-demand-exists/
======
eecc
That's how bicycles came to the Netherlands. Many think bikes always existed
since the beginning of time but that's not true: during the rebuild in the
immediate post-war cities were designed around car-based transportation. Only
after a couple decades, raised awareness about street safety , accidents
causing death of children, the first Oil-shock and general tree-hugging '60s
eco-friendliness did the country evolve into the cycling paradise it is now.

That is to say: anyone can do the same, anywhere. So get on with it.. :)

~~~
flippyhead
> anyone can do the same, anywhere.

I love Holland and I love biking but you guys have it easy compared to, say,
Seattle where I live part-time. The hills make it a very different problem. I
bike a lot but will still drive/uber when I can't deal with being crazy sweaty
for a meeting or something.

I was very disappointed when they decided NOT to install electric bikes in the
bike share system here. Electric bikes are the only way you'll get the
ridership numbers needed in a place with the topography of Seattle. I also
suspect it rains more in Seattle than Holland.

~~~
bryanlarsen
AFAICT Seattle has fewer hills than Aarhus, Denmark. 47% of commutes in Aarhus
are done by bicycle.

~~~
Freak_NL
It also does not appear to rain more in Seattle than in, say, Amsterdam:

[https://weather-and-climate.com/average-monthly-Rainfall-
Tem...](https://weather-and-climate.com/average-monthly-Rainfall-Temperature-
Sunshine,seattle,United-States-of-America) [https://weather-and-
climate.com/average-monthly-Rainfall-Tem...](https://weather-and-
climate.com/average-monthly-Rainfall-Temperature-
Sunshine,Amsterdam,Netherlands)

This is a cultural and legacy infrastructure problem mostly.

------
Tommyixi
I'm a biker in Boston; I cycle 5 miles to work and 5 miles home on a daily
basis. I think the city is doing an amazing job with what they are given but
so many of the roads are just too narrow for dedicated bike lanes. Most
streets have "sharrows" which is great but honestly what it comes down to is a
lack of understanding on how to share the road. I'm constantly honked and
shouted at for commanding full use of the driving lane when no bike lane is
present, which is perfectly legal but often results in aggression from
drivers. I've even had cars tailgate me and hit my back tire with their car.

~~~
coldpie
It is pretty frustrating to be forced to go 10 MPH on a 30 MPH road. The roads
also aren't designed for traffic to go 20 MPH slower than it ought to be,
traffic starts to build up, causing more delays and frustration. I think we
should be more accommodating of bikers, but asking them to share the road and
be treated the same as cars is not the answer.

~~~
Tommyixi
I mean, if we're talking about Boston then the roads weren't originally
designed for cars either: they were created for horse drawn carriages.
[http://www.mass.gov/eea/docs/dcr/pe/historic-
parkways/4d72bd...](http://www.mass.gov/eea/docs/dcr/pe/historic-
parkways/4d72bd01.pdf)

They have been engineered to accommodate cars, so now they're undergoing a
renovation for bikes.

~~~
coldpie
> so now they're undergoing a renovation for bikes.

Good! Renovate them to accommodate bikes. That's great, do more of that. But
"sharing the road" is a terrible solution, which leads to the honks and
dangerous situations the OP described. Neither the biker nor the drivers in
the OP's post are in the wrong. It's just a really terrible situation that
really should not happen.

~~~
landhar
> Neither the biker nor the driver in the OP's post are in the wrong

In the OP's situation, the drivers that exhibit aggressive and dangerous
behavior are clearly in the wrong. You could argue that their frustration is
understandable, but their behavior is certainly wrong.

~~~
coldpie
So is the guy who steals an unlocked bike. What are you going to do? You're
going to not create that situation in the first place. You're going to use a
bike lock. "Share the road" is a dumb solution, as evidenced by the OP. It
simply _does not work_. Find another solution.

~~~
untog
To be clear: you think that someone stealing an unlocked bike is not "in the
wrong"?

~~~
coldpie
I agree I phrased that poorly. My point is humans are predictable. If you
leave an unlocked bike, it will get stolen. Yes, it's the thief's fault and
the thief is wrong, but you could have done something to avoid it, too.

------
TulliusCicero
Easily the biggest problem in the US with biking is that the infrastructure
is, nearly without exception, absolutely atrocious.

Nobody would accept having only 'painted walk lanes' on busy streets to get
around, much less having them appear and disappear from the road seemingly at
random, and yet that's the default state of bike lanes in nearly all US
cities.

If biking had as much infrastructure as even walking -- meaning, physically
protected lanes on most streets -- Americans would bike in enormous numbers.

~~~
justinph
Minneapolis, MN is one of the exceptions. The city has invested in good bike
lanes and as a result, people do bike in big numbers. Some folks bike year
round, even when the temperature is well below freezing.

The city benefited greatly from some disused rail right-of-ways and turned
them into completely separated bike highways. Many of the on-street bikeways
that have been set up use plastic divider posts to signal to drivers
separation. It's much cheaper than building grade-seperated lanes, but gives a
real sense of protection to the bikers.

~~~
TulliusCicero
The thing is though, even for Minneapolis, the total length of bike
lanes/paths amounts to what, _maybe_ 5% of the total length of
sidewalks/walking paths? (spitballing here looking at Google Maps)

Which just strengthens my point: even quite modest efforts can result in big
biking gains. And that's in Minneapolis, who nobody is going to accuse of
having great weather for biking.

------
pmontra
This in Milan, Italy three weeks ago:
[https://www.wired.it/lifestyle/mobilita/2017/06/01/milano-
pi...](https://www.wired.it/lifestyle/mobilita/2017/06/01/milano-pista-
ciclabile-attivisti-guerrilla-biking/)

It's on a narrow bridge quite dangerous for cyclists as cars tend to cut the
turn to the left. After years of asking somebody decided to help themselves.

~~~
zwp

        > i milanesi hanno percorso in media 18,6 miglia
        > in bici per andare al lavoro...
        > velocità media a Milano 14,8 miglia all’ora
    

"The Milanese cyclist averages 18.7 miles per day to go to work... at an
average speed of 14.8 mph". Is my translation okay? That seems improbable
[time & distance, not speed]: the _average_ Milanese cyclo-commuter takes over
an hour each way? Currently 36C/97F in Milan.

Or is this per week? Is it current to talk in "miglia" in modern Italian?
(though even km would be high IMHO).

~~~
pmontra
That's so weird: nobody uses miles in Italy (or Europe, except the UK). I
checked the article and the source is Strava Insight which probably defaults
to miles. The journalist copied and pasted without converting the units into
something readers would understand.

14.8 miles per hour is 23,68. I usually do 20 when I move in the city because
I don't want to sweat and I don't see many bikers going faster than me. Maybe
that's because only fast bikers use Strava and it skews distances and speeds.

~~~
nerdshoe
I would never log my daily 3km ride to work in Strava, and I've had it count
my after work singletrack romps as commutes. How strava thinks it can be a
good source of commuter data is beyond me.

------
awjr
The arguments for segregated cycle tracks (physical barriers) rather than
cycle lanes (paint) can be answered by one question: "Would you let your child
cycle here?" [https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/jun/15/urban-
planner...](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/jun/15/urban-planners-let-
child-cycle-here-denmark)

However the argument against cycle tracks focuses on resident car parking and
becomes extremely political. So a key part of developing a good end to end
cycle network, given that a network is only as good as its weakest link, is
parking control. This is where paint fails and you create these bitty networks
where drivers feel happy to park their cars in the cycle lanes, because they
can.

A more interesting approach is to look at road capacity. A typical road
consists of:

footpath|parking|lane|lane|parking|footpath = 19,000 pedestrians + 2000
drivers per hour => 21,000 people.

Converting this to: footpath|cycle track|lane|lane|cycle track|footpath =
additional 14,000 cyclists per hour = 35,000 people

Providing a 67% increase in road capacity while protecting pedestrians,
reducing congestion, and making a population healthier is a big win for any
urban environment. Politcally this is finally becoming easier, but it is a
fundemental recognition that our roads are not there to store private
property.

More interstingly is that many cities are focusing on routes to centres of
employment. The focus needs to be more on connecting schools to communities.
An immense amount of congestion is caused by parents dropping their fat little
kids off at school.

Analysis I did on UK Census 2011 data looking at range traveled across 112
towns and cities in England and Wales indicate 6 million residents drive to
work in the city/town they live in. 1 million live within a 20 minute (2km)
walk of work 3.5 million live within a 20 minute cycle ride of work.

Looking at Bath,UK that's about 20,000 local car journeys in a city that is
3miles in diameter. Add in the 5,000 kids being dropped off at school and you
end up with 40,000 local car journeys.

BUT unless people feel there is a safe alternative choice this is not going to
change and for some reason the UK seems fixated on strategic networks and hub
centric public transport systems. Not actually fixing local journeys.

~~~
michaelt

      The arguments for segregated cycle tracks (physical
      barriers) rather than cycle lanes (paint) can be answered
      by one question: "Would you let your child cycle here?" 
    

Where I live, when segregated cycle tracks meet T junctions the layout is
often like so:

    
    
                                        |  C  |
      ----------------------------------|  a  |--------  
      Cycles                          ◅ |  r  | ▷
      ----------------------------------|  s  |--------  
                  divider               |     |
      -----------------------------------  Δ  ---------  
      Cars
      -------------------------------------------------
    

This means cyclists using the segregated path have to stop to give way to cars
at every T junction - whereas cyclists who don't use the segregated path can
maintain a constant speed, with joining cars giving way to them.

This leads to a demographic split in cyclist behaviour. For children and
cyclists who aren't in a hurry, the segregated path is more friendly - but for
'serious' cyclists and people in a hurry, staying on the road makes more
sense. Especially if there's a high density of T junctions, which isn't
unusual in some urban areas.

Fortunately, in my country there aren't any laws that force cyclists into bike
lanes, so it generally isn't a problem. But any urban planner who wants 100%
of cyclists segregated from traffic is going to have a difficult time on their
hands :)

~~~
skrebbel
This is solved in the Netherlands, pretty much universally, by making the cars
coming in from the side wait for the bike lane as well:

    
    
                                            |  C  |
          -----------------------------------Δ Δ Δ----  
          Cycles                               r  
          -----------------------------------  s  ---------  
                      divider               |     |
          -----------------------------------Δ Δ Δ---------  
          Cars
          -------------------------------------------------
    

So _if_ there's a bike lane, it counts as part of the car road in terms of
right of way, even if it's separated by a divider.

~~~
FussyZeus
This is how it's done in my area of the US, but I can tell you American
drivers almost universally ignore where you're supposed to stop at a T
junction, especially when turning right. It's maddening, multiple times I've
had to leave the bike lane into traffic to get around a vehicle that isn't
where it's supposed to be. I've never seen anyone get pulled over for this
either because cycling isn't recognized as a "real" thing police need to take
care of.

In short: The issue in the US anyway I think has a lot more to do with culture
than with road safety and structure. If people gave a shit we'd make it work,
but few here do (at least around where I live, northern midwest.)

~~~
phicoh
Vehicles turning right is a big problem in the Netherlands as well. Not so
much that they block intersections, but that bikes going straight have
priority over the vehicle turning right, bikes take priority and then get in
an accident. It doesn't matter who was right if you are dead.

In my experience, separate bike lanes are great for long stretches of road
without intersections. Also quite safe on intersections with traffic lights if
the bikes have their own dedicated time slot. (That's not always the case)

But when bikes going straight are encouraged to pass right turning vehicles on
the right, it becomes a serious risk.

~~~
Doxin
Actually, turning right is _mostly_ a solved problem in the netherlands. If
you ever run into a situation where it's dangerous they just haven't upgraded
that intersection yet. The solution here is to make sure a car has the space
to make the full turn to the right _before_ encountering the cycle lane. That
way the car driver doesn't have to look behind them for bikes, but can see
them clearly out the front window.

------
sideshowb
In my day job I have simulated the effects of segregated cycle infrastructure
on demand

[http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0966692316...](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0966692316307256)

(above is out of date, more recent work under review:
[http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/sdna/european-transport-
conference-...](http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/sdna/european-transport-
conference-2016/) )

So far I have shied away from simulating on-road cycle lanes, e.g. where motor
vehicles and bikes are separated by a line of paint.

Firstly because the quality is so variable - hilarious examples about on the
internet, and many cyclists would argue that a bad cycle lane is worse than
none at all as it creates an expectation they should be riding in it rather
than sharing the road.

Secondly because data on what's there - width, quality, obstructions - is so
thin on the ground. (any time anyone wants to use deep learning to harvest
this from streetview please go right ahead!)

Where am I going with all this? It's heartening to see a case where lines
painted on the road actually made a tangible difference. I wonder how much
came down to the temporary nature though - like some kind of campaign - as
cultural effects are known to have a huge impact on cycling as well.

~~~
wiredfool
There have been a lot of lanes going in around Dublin, and frankly, most of
them are useless.

Some of them are grade separated from the main road by a inch high curb. Just
high enough to catch a wheel and cause a wreck.

Most of them just collect road debris like the shoulders.

Some of them are de-facto parking lanes.

Some of them are confusing enough that it's seriously unclear what the lane
actually means. (I say this as someone who had to go through the whole driver
licensing scheme here after 20 yrs driving in the US, so I've seen all the
rules from the POV of an experienced driver.)

For example:
[https://www.google.com/maps/@53.6089878,-6.1934201,90m/data=...](https://www.google.com/maps/@53.6089878,-6.1934201,90m/data=!3m1!1e3)

What the hell are those cycle turn boxes in the middle of the car lanes? They
have a solid border, so they're 'mandatory'. They're unavoidable by cars. And
if you're in one, you better have right of way already, because squishy. (and
fwiw, the one other cyclist I saw at that junction was using the crosswalk).

And then there's the cycle lanes near Greystone where they exist for one
block, then there's something that looks like a crosswalk for bikes, and they
dissappear for a block, then they reappear again.

At some point, you just have to assume that some one with a can of paint is
taking the piss and you just ride in a straight line like any other vehicle.

------
throwaway2016a
Ironically (perhaps?) I think in the US the cities are often doing a good job
but suburbs are awful.

At least where I live, I can bike in my own neighborhood but to get from my
neighborhood to the commercial districts where the actual jobs are I need to
essentially go on a highway and share the road with 40 MPH cars.

When neighborhoods are spread out it makes biking hard. Where I am at least,
neighborhoods tend to be connected to main (high speed) roads like Christmas
lights. Thing is they aren't even far away... work to my house is 5 miles. An
easy bike ride. Except part of that ride is a highway that I'd need a death
wish to bike on and there are no back roads.

~~~
pc86
In my state it is illegal for anything but a motorized vehicle to be on the
highway (and rightfully so as most traffic is 70 mph+ outside of rush hour).
With rare exception I've seen cyclists on most of the busy multi-lane surface
streets where it is 45+ and traffic is going 10-15 faster than that.

What metro area are you in? It seems odd that there are no surface streets at
all between two points just a few miles away.

~~~
throwaway2016a
I'm in New Hampshire. Part of the Manchester-Nashua metro region or the Boston
metro depending on which survey you use.

I think the word highway might have some regional nuance. Around here there
are often open highways (highways with stop lights and connected side roads)
and bikes are allowed to go on them. Although I wouldn't feel safe doing it.
Bikes are not allowed on the kind of highway you are thinking of here either.

The speed limit on those roads tends to be 35 or 40 MPH. Not 65 like it would
be on a large highway.

Edit: Here's an example from Nashua, NH (for privacy I found a place similar
to where I live but not actually where I live).

Notice how the residential on the left is completely separated from the
commercial on the right by "Daniel Webster Highway"... one could easily bike
on that road if there were bike lanes but it is an extremely busy road and
there is no safe way for a bike to take a left hand turn to get to the other
side.

[https://www.google.com/maps/place/Daniel+Webster+Hwy,+Nashua...](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Daniel+Webster+Hwy,+Nashua,+03060/@42.7293831,-71.4611499,2521m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m13!1m7!3m6!1s0x89e3ba75d16d96f7:0x261a0b96112fbe5b!2sDaniel+Webster+Hwy,+Nashua,+NH!3b1!8m2!3d42.7225921!4d-71.4440401!3m4!1s0x89e3ba75d16d96f7:0x261a0b96112fbe5b!8m2!3d42.7225921!4d-71.4440401)

------
jblok
London has been doing a great job lately at improving cycle infrastructure.
There is a new concept of a "cycle superhighway" \- sometimes that means a
segregated bike path, like CS3 that goes from The Tower Of London, straight
through to Westminster, sometimes it is paint on the ground. However it is
much clearer to motorists as they paint the entire line bright blue.

What I've noticed too is you get increasing returns the more you build. Given
a scenario where a chosen route is covered 50% by acceptable infrastructure,
it makes you think if it's worth taking a bike. Improve some strategic
junctions and roads, and the coverage of acceptable infrastructure may
increase to 90%, at which point it's a no brainer taking the bike.

~~~
sidlls
In SF there are plenty of bike lanes that are painted a vivid green (the whole
lane, with a white lane marker line). I think it's fantastic. It's really very
difficult to not notice that the bike lane exists.

------
mvitorino
That hypothesis does not seem to apply to Lisbon, Portugal so far. We have now
around 60km of dedicated bicycle paths in Lisbon (not just cycle lanes, but
actual separated paths) all built in recent years (and plans to double that
very soon).

But, simply put, they are barely used.

A few things are different in Lisbon from a lot of Northern Europe cities:
it's very hilly and windy, it has temperatures close to 40 degrees in the
summer (we have AC throughout the tube network) and in the winter, when it
rains it really pours (not that drizzle that you get in London for example).

I may be too early to call it, but not all cities are alike and many people
here are very skeptic about whether general adoption will ever be reached.

~~~
cpursley
I was just in Lisbon (lovely city). Hills aside, the metro is so good, it
seems like a bike is just unnecessary (you have to store a bike, can't easily
walk into shops, etc etc).

~~~
kristofferR
That's a problem that can be solved easily just by having a good and cheap
city bike system. Oslo is also really hilly and the weather isn't the best,
but since the city bike system was revamped in 2016 biking has exploded here.

[https://oslobysykkel.no/en](https://oslobysykkel.no/en)

One thing I really like about the Oslo system is how startup-like it is,
unlike a lot of other systems which feel arcane.

The apps are flawless (there's no card), the design profile is fantastic [1],
the bikes are good and light and they do a good job of communication [2].

[1]
[http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/new_logo...](http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/new_logo_and_identity_for_oslo_bysykkel_by_heydays.php)

[2]
[https://www.facebook.com/bysykkeloslo/videos/144834624185549...](https://www.facebook.com/bysykkeloslo/videos/1448346241855498/)

~~~
rorykoehler
Cheap bike sharing schemes usually don't have gears. If you've ever been to
Lisbon you'll know that will be an issue. Lisbon needs electric assist bike
for a bike sharing scheme to work.

~~~
kristofferR
The Oslo city bike system costs 249 NOK/3 beers for a year and has 3 gears.
More gears could likely be implemented if needed for not much more.

I don't see why city biking would be any different than other biking.

------
yourapostasy
Interesting. For the cyclists out there, would you pay out of pocket for a bi-
directional elevated bike/walk-run track, with access from every street
intersection, Japanese-style underground bike garages and automatically-
cleaning showers/toilets at public transit intersections? If so, how much? I
would, at $0.25-0.50 per mile, $0.25 per hour storage, and $2 per use of
showers. I don't know if that would pencil out even in heavy cyclist commuter
traffic, though.

I envision a high-tech track that uses redox batteries around its foundations,
replaceable solar panels around the sides, is very brightly-lit, uses every 10
meters PTZ lenses on fiber optics leading back to a centralized, multiplexed
bank of 2K and 4K video cameras backed by a deep-learning vision system, and
easily-accessible emergency boxes every 20 meters to put female customers at
ease. Emergency boxes vend bike repair kits (tire, chain, hex wrench, _etc._
), vend first aid kits, have an omnidirectional microphone listening for calls
for aid, and of course a Big Red Button. Water is captured, filtered and
stored for a cleaning robot to use later to maintain the track, solar panels,
and awnings. Clear awnings automatically come out of housings, then raise and
lower to shield from excessively-hot sun and inclement weather. Cleaning robot
runs along a high-speed rail hanging on outside of track, multi-purposed to
perform simpler replacement-style maintenance duties (replace vending
supplies, replace awning, _etc._ ).

~~~
tbihl
What are you talking about? Can you define some of the problems you're trying
to solve? It feels like you're writing a parody of something. The post is
about keeping bike lanes simple and cheap so we'll just build them already.
Yours is the opposite, no?

~~~
yourapostasy
In the US, obtaining right-of-way to build bike lanes in metropolitan areas is
infeasible. I've sat in neighborhood meetings with my state's Department of
Transportation engineers and planners discussing main artery expansions, and
they explained that there isn't sufficient demand for bike paths to include
them in any new planning funded by taxpayers; whenever they've tried to
include dedicated bike lanes in the past, they were shot down first by
politicians looking to curry the fiscal conservative votes, then by special
interest groups protecting a car-based culture (housing developers, chambers
of commerce, _etc._ all see dedicated bike lanes as yielding less traffic to
their planned projects). However, obtaining right-of-way to privately build an
elevated path, they conceded, while not easy, was more feasible because
someone else foots the bill. The problem is no one has figured out a design
that can feasibly pay off.

If you can obtain the right-of-way for an elevated path, then what would you
design for it that makes it pay off at least a little above break-even?

Generally, I take this as a sign that in the US, unless you deliberately
attract a demographic to a specific concentrated area that consciously chooses
biking as a major transportation mode, namely, a master-planned community/town
built around biking and public transit, cyclists are SOL to comprehensively
expand biking for the foreseeable future in most US metro areas outside of
"bike ghettos" where there is a strong cycling culture. I'd love to see as
much biking for normal daily activities as we saw in mainland China before
they opened up to the West, but in the US in many areas it is legitimately
risky to bike (despite the actual risk of fatality on a bike gradually
dropping over the past three decades).

So a related hypothetical is, if you were in a high-density (say, 30K per
square mile scale density) city designed from the beginning for
walk/run/bike/public-transit transportation, what kind of bike paths would you
want?

The article describes intra- and inter-neighborhood scale at best, but doesn't
address efforts to solve US commuter distances, which invariably involve
highways. That seems an insoluble challenge at the moment in the US.

~~~
tbihl
I hope this isn't too unfair an analogy, but your idea reminds me of trying to
get wealthier people to ride buses with wifi and frills, when it's consistent,
frequent, reliable service that they want (just like everyone else; the
difference is the poorer people on the bus don't get to fall back on anything
else.) In the same way, the staples for biking are probably safe/moderately
convenient access to many places (not a single or even a couple of linear
paths) and safety from negligent drivers.

Like buses, I'm afraid that you're just throwing yourself at a wall as long as
our development pattern provides such an enormous subsidy for cars. Also like
with buses, I would love to be proven wrong.

------
mattnewport
This doesn't really prove anything. My observations from Vancouver where a lot
of time and money has been spent on bike lanes over the last few years: (I'm a
non car owner, mostly pedestrian)

\- Pilot projects are not representative of actual long term use. When Burrard
bridge lost a footpath to a temporary cycle lane, as a regular pedestrian
commuter I saw a brief spike in cycle traffic but then a big drop off again.

\- Cycle lanes have a negative impact on both car and foot traffic. The
Burrard cycle lanes increased the length of my commute on foot (footpaths were
converted to cycle lanes that went empty much of the time) and disrupted car
traffic causing delays to drivers.

\- Expensive but poorly thought out physically separated bike lanes made
intersections more dangerous for cyclists (who would go faster and slow down
less for cars) and pedestrians (cyclists are silent and frequently ignore
traffic lights)

\- On street parking is frequently lost to new cycle lanes that frequently sit
unused.

\- There are a lot of 'fair weather cyclists' who only ride in good weather.
Pedestrian traffic seems much less weather dependent.

A pilot project like this doesn't necessarily reflect actual long term usage
and also ignores the many negative effects and costs associated with cycle
lanes. Existing cities that grew up around mixed pedestrian and car traffic
are not necessarily well suited to increased bike traffic. Bikes are
dramatically more dangerous to both cyclists and pedestrians and take up
disproportionate space relative to their contribution to transport options.

~~~
gregwtmtno
You don't cite a single source for any of these propositions.

Frequently sit unused? Brief spikes and big dropoffs? How do you know? I'll
bet your local department of transportation is conducting traffic counts
though. I know mine does.

"poorly thought out physically separated bike lines made intersections more
dangerous"? You really need a cite on that because this study--conducted in
Canada--says the opposite:
[http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2012.3...](http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2012.300762?journalCode=ajph&)

"Bikes are dramatically more dangerous to both cyclists and pedestrians"
Really? How many pedestrians were killed by cyclists in your city last year?
How many by motor vehicles?

~~~
mattnewport
The original article is also entirely free of statistics or sources which was
kind of my point. My comments were intended as a counterpoint to the
unsupported assertion in the article that the increased cycle traffic observed
in a two week trial would translate to a sustained increase and to the
unspoken assumption that increased cycle traffic is clearly and obviously a
good thing and worth the costs and negative impacts on other road users.

The dangers of cycling itself are pretty well known I thought, it is far more
dangerous than driving, e.g. [http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-
england-39856219](http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-39856219)

I don't know of any figures comparing the relative risk to pedestrians of
cyclists vs cars. I would expect that pedestrians are less likely to be killed
if hit by a bike than a car but I would also guess that adjusted for relative
miles traveled you are more likely to be hit by a bike as a pedestrian than a
car. Certainly as a pedestrian in Vancouver I am more concerned about bikes
than cars due to the silence and lack of respect for the rules of the road I
mentioned.

If the changes made here were based on solid research, I never saw it
presented to the public. It was just 'Cycling is great! And green! Yay
cycling!' and PR shots of the mayor on a bike to justify the money spent and
disruption to other road users caused.

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BigIQ
For anyone who has even read a bit on infrastructure, this is a no brainer.
The problem with alternative transportation is you have to go all in to see
the benefits. Half assing it won't work. But half assing it is what a lot of
places do, and then they say "see, ridership didn't increase, going further is
just a waste of money."

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rorykoehler
Anecdotal I know however my wife only learnt to cycle properly this year. She
is (rightly) terrified of riding on the road. If we had a better dedicated
cycle road network (not paths but actual bicycle dedicated roads) she would be
able to use it as a mode of transport. She has expressed interest however the
network, while pretty good in Singapore (the park connector network is a good
safe cycling option), is not continuous enough to allow commuting as an
option.

~~~
ghaff
As someone who didn't bike as a child and won't bike on a road, I suspect that
there isn't just about anywhere one can commute on a bike and totally avoid
roads with cars on them. Including places like Amsterdam or other cities with
a lot of dedicated lanes.

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kennydude
They could have at least made a better effort to keep cyclists and cars
separate.

In the photo a cyclist is still on the road which should not happen.

I also remember seeing a video where a guy got some kind of ticket for not
cycling in a cycle lane, so he made a point by cycling only in the cycle lane
and deliberately crashes into a police car because they were parked in the
cycle lane...

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maaaats
MVP-infrastructure, interesting. There are always pilot-projects, but they
cost a lot of money, takes a lot of time, and are set in stone.

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cbhl
What was the temporary bike lane made of? Chalk?

~~~
IshKebab
Road marking paint, looks like.

Normal white lines etc are made by melting plastic onto the road. They're very
thick.

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Piccollo
That cheeky Field of Dreams reference

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dsfyu404ed
One of the problems with more bicycle infrastructure I see is the current
regulatory environment promotes the extremes only.

A nice intermediate step would be if states would make moped registration less
onerous. As it stands most states require a motorcycle license ($), insurance
($) and registration ($) for anything more than a bicycle with an engine kit.
If more people rode those parking would be less of an issue and it would be
easier to get support for bike infrastructure since bike infrastructure is
common with moped infrastructure in many cases.

Edit: I don't care how the moped is powered. I'm just pointing out that a
moped that can keep up with 30mph traffic is a huge increase in utility over a
bicycle while not taking up appreciably more space.

~~~
rorykoehler
Having been in Taipei where mopeds were illegal until ~20 years ago and then
unleashed on the city like a plague I can only hope that if any city were to
do this they would add the caveat that the mopeds must be electric.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
Or just incentivize electric by discounting public transit passes for people
with electric mopeds, etc and let attrition of old stuff run its course.

