On 4/28/2019 10:33 AM, sms wrote:
On 4/28/2019 2:21 AM, db wrote:
On Fri, 26 Apr 2019 15:58:42 -0700, sms wrote:

https://www2.bostonglobe.com/metro/2...e-putting-red-
cups-road-show-how-drivers-often-invade-bike-lanes/fskNwwciZ5I793zvL7hUWN/

story.html

“We ... need connected protected bike lanes to accommodate everyone from
age 8 to 80 to ride stress free to school, work, and to the store,” he
said. “We also need to educate drivers that cyclists are legally
entitled to ride on the road and for drivers to share the space and be
courteous.”

Come to Denmark; we have that here. Having cycled many
years in Australia, I am still amazed when a car lets
me go through an intersection while they wait to do a
turn, wow.

It's a different mindset in the U.S. than from Denmark, unfortunately.
But it varies by community, and there can be big differences between
cities very close to each other, based on the demographics, and even
within large cities. Palo Alto and Berkeley are more like Denmark. Parts
of San Jose are like Australia, parts of San Jose are okay. Towns with
big universities like Palo Alto, Berkeley, Davis, etc. have high rates
of cycling
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_most_bicycle_commuters.

The U.S. has a different mindset than Denmark's (and Netherlands', and
Germany's) primarily because so many characteristics of the U.S. are
very different than those countries. Aside from the history and culture
(Netherlands and Copenhagen have always been bicycling hotbeds), there
are the matters of terrain, climate and density. These have tremendous
influences on a population's willingness to ride a bike instead of drive
a car. Even more important is dissuading car use by taxes, fees,
restricted parking and provision of alternatives like mass transit.

In almost all the U.S., having a car is a practical necessity. The
average commute is roughly half an hour by car. Waiting for a bus
instead would make it into an hour commute or more. Waiting for the
subway or train would make it into a decades long commute, because there
are no trains serving most people.

Once you buy a car, it becomes your default mode of transportation
unless some powerful factor intervenes. For almost all people, that
powerful factor would have to be some strong disincentive to driving -
impossible parking (as in NYC), huge traffic jams (as in Portland's or
LA's rush hour freeways), loss of a license due to DUI (although even
that's usually not sufficient disincentive).

And if driving a car does become too onerous, only a small portion of
Americans will choose a bike as an alternative. Why? Because even by
car, it's a half hour to get to work. By bike, it would be 90 minutes or
more each way. And there will be hills, which for most people are
impossible - or so they think. And there's weather, because most of the
U.S. doesn't have mild winters or moderate summers like parts of
California or Oregon. Winters are blustery, brutal and icy. Summers are
hot and humid - hence the "I'd need a shower when I got to work" excuse.
(The Dutch are baffled by that. They don't realize that in the U.S.,
work is not just 3 km away and the temperature is 32 Celsius, not 17
Celsius.)

So very few Americans are going to figure out how to ride a bike to
work. They're beyond disinterested. They don't love bicycling, and they
are quick to see the real problems it would present.

(I don't recall hearing how many readers here bike to work more than,
say, twice per week - or did before they retired. I bet the percentage
is small. In my bike club, the percentage was certainly below 5%.)

One thing the people who keep repeating "danger danger" don't understand
is that in economically vibrant areas like Portland, Seattle, San
Francisco, and Silicon Valley, there is a need to try to mitigate
congestion by multiple means.

.... and it's working so wonderfully? No! Traffic in Portland and Seattle
are worse than ever even though their bike commute mode share is "high"
by U.S. standards. (Yes, in this country, 5% is "high.") You simply
cannot coax enough Americans out of cars to make an observable difference!

You certainly can't do it by providing bike cattle chutes. As I just
pointed out, the count of bike lanes ("protected" or not) continues to
rise. Why isn't the mode share of biking rising in response? Yes, there
was a period when those rose in parallel in some places. But fashion
trumps bike lanes, and apparently biking is beginning to go out of
fashion in Seattle and Portland. And it's never been in fashion in the
vast majority of America.

A good article about this is at
https://www.betterbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Making-Cycling-Irresistible-Lessons-from-Europe-Pucher-2008.pdf
which examines how the Netherlands, Denmark, and Germany have succeeded
in increasing cycling. Pay attention to table 1 on page 512.

Again, those started with initial conditions wildly different from
America. Hell, compare gasoline prices!

And BTW, that paper's figure 10 lists the "Danger! Danger!" of bicycling
in America. 5.8 fatalities per 100 million kilometers of bicycling!

Why, that's one fatality every 10.7 million miles! That's terrible! The
average American bicycle rider would hit 10.7 million miles and a 50/50
chance of dying in ... oh, let's see... maybe 4000 years of riding?


--
- Frank Krygowski