That answers a bunch of the questions asked in this thread. Another relevant answer to why biking is useful is that it extends the range of accessible daily activities around 10x compared to walking. You can bike further than you can walk in a given period of time.
So one of those hidden externalities you like to account for @jodrellblank, of walking vs biking is that walkers require more food consumption to sustain a daily commute of a given distance compared to bikers commuting the same distance.
This is the kind of thing I'm talking about with unmentioned externalities.
Biking is the most energy-efficient form of transportation, if you ignore the fact that to get such a result you have to make bikes and make steamrollers and concrete mixers and tarmac and roads first.
> Another relevant answer to why biking is useful is that it extends the range of accessible daily activities around 10x compared to walking. You can bike further than you can walk in a given period of time.
But not 10x compared to walking + bus or walking + taxi or walking + train, and not without added inconvenience of biking; and also not if you've built your environment so plenty of daily activities people want are close enough to comfortably walk to.
> So one of those hidden externalities you like to account for @jodrellblank, of walking vs biking is that walkers require more food consumption to sustain a daily commute of a given distance compared to bikers commuting the same distance.
And walkers require paying more taxes for the infrastructure to subsidise bikers.
> You’re arguing that we should use motorized vehicles instead of bikes??
Are you going to bike 100 miles to the next city? Are you going to bike to work with a broken ankle? Are you going to bike furniture home from the furniture shop? Are you going to bike everyone's garbage to the dump? Are you going to bike building materials around?
Given that you're going to have motorized things, they should be for optional, occasional use as an assitance for walking people who then don't need a bike or a car.
Because otherwise, you're going to have motorized things, and walking people, and bikes on top, for no particular reason except a bike obsession.
> Bullshit. Nobody is paying walking taxes. You are enjoying the very same “externality”.
? Nobody is paying explicit sidewalk taxes in the same way nobody is paying explicit streetlamp taxes. People are still paying taxes for infrastructure in the environment they live in, and that covers paying for sidewalks.
> People are still paying taxes for infrastructure in the environment they live in, and that covers paying for sidewalks.
Yeah, I agree, that's right. The bikers are paying for sidewalks & roads, just like everyone else. You've nicely summed up exactly why bike infrastructure is not being somehow "subsidised" by drivers and walkers.
Despite your wish to call sidewalks your own and not share them, and despite the fact that I agree with you about separating pedestrians from cyclists, sidewalks are multi-use infrastructure that everyone pays for and everyone can use. It doesn't matter that you don't like it, the intent has always included bikes as well as pedestrians and wheelbarrows and dogs and children, among many other uses.
Thus settles the red herring non-issue of externalizing taxes to pay for pavement. It's not a real thing.
> Despite your wish to call sidewalks your own and not share them
I don't mind sharing them with things moving at walking pace. Dogs, wheelbarrows, ice cream carts, wheelchairs, maybe skateboards.
I no more want to share them with bikes doing 10-15mph than with mopeds doing 10-15mph or sprinting people.
> The bikers are paying for sidewalks & roads, just like everyone else.
Bikers are paying diesel and petrol tax and road vehicle tax? Not in the UK they're not. Pedestrians aren't either. If they're not, that isn't "just like everyone else".
I'm going to back-pedal just a little bit. Pun intended :P I love walking as a means of transport, but...
Biking is the most energy-efficient form of transportation by a long way. https://www.exploratorium.edu/cycling/humanpower1.html#:~:te....
That answers a bunch of the questions asked in this thread. Another relevant answer to why biking is useful is that it extends the range of accessible daily activities around 10x compared to walking. You can bike further than you can walk in a given period of time.
So one of those hidden externalities you like to account for @jodrellblank, of walking vs biking is that walkers require more food consumption to sustain a daily commute of a given distance compared to bikers commuting the same distance.