KingOfTheApes wrote:

I may be excused from not interpreting your long answer but are not
from not interpreting my short worded solutions...

BIKE FACILITIES (bike lanes and bike facilities) AND/OR TRAFFIC
TAMING.

You can shout all you want, but that isn't the key to safety. The key
to safety is mutual respect between road users.

This side of the Atlantic we are sort of in the Wild West when it
comes to traffic safety: NO LANE DISCIPLINE, NO CONTROL OVER CELL
PHONES, UNREGULATED VEHICLES (SUV'S with deadly bumpers)... and LOTS
OF SPEEDING TICKETS.

The bike facilities doesn't get you out of accidents happening at
junctions because if you want your "facilities" to go anywhere useful
they'll have to intersect with the roads, and so when the bikes are on
the roads the lack of awareness drivers have of bikes will be
exaggerated by their being fewer bikes /except/ at the junctions.

SUVs with deadly bumpers... well, even with "safe" bumpers the real key
is not colliding with vehicles at all. The key to that is mutual
respect, and you don't get that from bike lanes, and any "taming" of the
traffic you otherwise do is coloured by bikes being out of the equation
except at the most dangerous points (junctions).

You think Obama will change that?

No.

I'm also pretty sure that ghettoising cyclists onto half-baked
"facilities" (and experience suggests that outside of places with
existing bicycle culture like NL, Denmark, Germany etc. they *will* be
half baked) won't help either.

No great shortage of "facilities" round here. It's usually quicker and
safer for me to take the roads.

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/