I feel that one of the problems of “bike urbanistas” is lack of utilitarianism. There is no realistic road map to make modern cities in the most of the world to look like Amsterdam/Copenhagen. That is my major problem with all this proposals. They try to see the problem in a vacuum and don’t take any real situations in to an account.
As for me, I wish it would be possible to choose bike to get to work (i have 5 of them already). But even with ideal conditions and electric bike i still live 15 miles/25km from work and the trip will take at least 1 hour. It rains and it snows from time to time here and there is no way that it would be possible to get rid of car infrastructure in any even the most idealistic dream.
25 KM is a decent ride but definitely doable and even if people would only do it 50% of the time (and let's be honest, if people in Stockholm chose to bike during the winter months we can probably up that 50% a bit) that would still be a huge reduction in traffic, freeing up valuable city space for more productive endeavors.
I live in Philadelphia and it’s absolutely feasible here. Our density is roughly comparable to European cities like Amsterdam. The vast majority of trips are under 3 miles. With a few relatively small tweaks we could be an excellent bike city.
As for me, I wish it would be possible to choose bike to get to work (i have 5 of them already). But even with ideal conditions and electric bike i still live 15 miles/25km from work and the trip will take at least 1 hour. It rains and it snows from time to time here and there is no way that it would be possible to get rid of car infrastructure in any even the most idealistic dream.