Originally Posted by
beebe
It's both. People are breaking the law, but I don't believe that most of them realize it. The proposed solution of having street markings indicating where bicycles should be traveling sounds good to me. Possibly also accompanied by signs or paint on the sidewalks indicating that you shouldn't be biking there. I think if you get most of the bikers going the correct direction, it'll make the potential salmon more likely to follow suit.
I think the latter suggestion is interesting, since people seem far more likely to comply when they are being called out. That is, if nothing expressly says "No bikes on the sidewalk" or what have you, people are more likely to either a) be ignorant of the fact they aren't supposed to or b) even if they do know, they'll be more likely to try doing it anyway if they're more comfortable. People seem to be more uncomfortable doing something when there is a sign right next to them saying not to do that something. Another example is smoking: At least at my campus, even though the law is no smoking within 20 ft of a building, people are more likely to ignore it unless they are standing right next to a sign that expressly says "no smoking". Guessing it has something to do with worry about societal judgment, or something like that.