Vehicular Cycling (VC) - Evidence that VC is safer

Ack. That is not a good rule. Every time we let a vehicle pass there is a little bit of compromise. But compromise allows the city to function and allows cyclists to function in the city. The trick is not to eliminate compromise but to learn how to work safely within it. Something that I did not do in this case.

Robert

Thanks Robert for pointing out that in spite of all the "science," however gathered and analyzed, the bottom line is plain old practicality. While "rules" may work in a world of stark logic, the reality is that good old common sense, coupled with experience and a nod to basic rules of the road, equals the right answer. Sounds a lot like "adaptive cycling" to me.

I just want to point out that I'm not taking Brian's post,

Editing it a bit, and responding as follows:

For the record, I did not do that.
I have no idea what you are getting at here. I am making observations by running the numbers on these trips home. So far, I have two trips each way. I plan to do this for quite a while, until I have a decent idea of what the numbers mean. Right now, they are simply "observations," which someone can make on any number of things. I have yet to draw conclusions, although if this were a game with points for cars passing me, the VC route would win hands down. We'll see what it looks like in about July, when a significant number of observations and counts have been made.

When I was in school, taking an invertebrate zoology class, Dr. Gonor, my professor at the time, told us that if we could not put numbers on the observations, they were pretty much worthless (this was the summer of 1973, I believe). But with numbers, we could tell something. This is a an attempt to do that, in a very inexpensive way. It may validate certain VC concepts, and may invalidate others. But to me, at least, it will be interesting. Since it is of interest to me, I will be sharing it with you periodically.

John

Way to go, John!

Let me explain for a minute why the bridge count is relevent and proportional to total bicycle traffic into downtown. Portland is arranged on the bank of the Willamette River. The west side entrance to the city is hilly and somewhat sparcely populated, compared to the neighborhoods on the east side. Most commuter traffic into downtown, and certain most bicycle traffic, is from the east side suburbs. To get into downtown from the east side, there is absolutely no alternative but to cross a bridge. So the bridge counts capture probably 80-90% of all bicycle commuter traffic into downtown.

Hmmm, that is quite interesting. I have never been to Portland.

invisiblehand, that study of Portlands' cyclist counts and indexed rate shows PROOF adding bike infrastructure and civic governments that value bikes as transportation can make cyclists safer as a class of road users. It relies on no special training or proprietary methods to make an entire population of cyclists grow and stay safer as cyclist numbers increased.

just adding my 2 cents to this masquerade of logic.

invisiblehand, that study of Portlands' cyclist counts and indexed rate shows PROOF adding bike infrastructure and civic governments that value bikes as transportation can make cyclists safer as a class of road users.

I added the emphasis to can.

Hmmmm, well as long as we understand that proof of X does not prove X. I am unsure how literal you want me to take your statement.

But if you are writing that having good local government that cares about its constituents (including cyclists) and implements well designed roads/facilities can make cycling safer/better, you won't get any argument from me. It seems somewhat obvious and sort of silly to argue against. Note that from what I gather, one could show that adding infrastructure in a misguided fashion can make cycling more dangerous.

Of course the next step would be to determine what exactly made it safer, how much safer, and at what cost? At that point we can start thinking about an optimum policy and strategy for local governments. For instance, is it better to have bike lanes, sharrows, or wide-outside-lanes? In the link you sent earlier, there was literature that addressed those questions.

Fair enough. Let's see if we can make a "not a good rule" a little better. How about...

Don't give up advantageous lateral positioning in order to be nice, unless you can do so without significantly compromising your own safety.

Any effort to come up with simple principles to govern lane position will be frustrated by what I like to call 'real-world considerations.'

Robert

Thanks Robert for pointing out that in spite of all the "science," however gathered and analyzed, the bottom line is plain old practicality. While "rules" may work in a world of stark logic, the reality is that good old common sense, coupled with experience and a nod to basic rules of the road, equals the right answer. Sounds a lot like "adaptive cycling" to me.


I'm not meaning to start a flame war here, but could somebody point me to objective definition of adaptive cycling and vehicular cycling?

Any effort to come up with simple principles to govern lane position will be frustrated by what I like to call 'real-world considerations.'The principle I advocate for positioning within a marked travel lane is simple: choose the primary position (i.e., center your vehicle where almost every other driver centers theirs).

If 'real-world considerations' (such as being polite) motivate you to move to one side of the lane, wait until the situation is such that you feel comfortable doing so.

Fair enough. Let's see if we can make a "not a good rule" a little better. How about...

Don't give up advantageous lateral positioning in order to be nice, unless you can do so without significantly compromising your own safety.
Any effort to come up with simple principles to govern lane position will be frustrated by what I like to call 'real-world considerations.'

Robert For the year or so we've been talking, on and off, I've been trying to identify in words what it is exactly that we disagree about it. I believe this point touches on it.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem resistant to "rules" and "principles" in general, at least with those that apply to cycling in traffic, not just those that apply to governing lane position. I suspect your resistance is based on your belief that reliance on such rules/principles "will be frustrated by what [you] like to call 'real-world considerations.'" Based on this, you seem to dismiss, or put a big handicap on, the value of even attempting to identify such rules and principles upon which one could develop habits and practices. Is that even close?

I'm not meaning to start a flame war here, but could somebody point me to objective definition of adaptive cycling and vehicular cycling? I believe an objective definition of vehicular cycling is simply:

Bicycling on roadways in accordance to the rules of the road actually followed by drivers of other vehicles, including those operating motorcycles and slow moving vehicles.

The implication is that not all drivers follow all the rules of the time, but tend to follow those that are applicable for the circumstances.

This is basically what is stated at Wikipedia, but I don't know if others would agree it's objective.

I'm just trying to figure out into which category I fall and the wikipedia article was very confusing and self-contradictory.

Yes, it needs work.

I'm not meaning to start a flame war here, but could somebody point me to objective definition of adaptive cycling and vehicular cycling?

The definition of Adaptive cycling is a work in progress, an alternative to the stodgy old thinking that the only two kinds of cycling are vehicular cycling and pedestrian cycling. There is a thread called 'Adaptive Cycling Defined' where I attempted to begin forming that definition...without getting into a vc flame war.

I believe an objective definition of vehicular cycling is simply:

Bicycling on roadways in accordance to the rules of the road actually followed by drivers of other vehicles, including those operating motorcycles and slow moving vehicles.

The implication is that not all drivers follow all the rules of the time, but tend to follow those that are applicable for the circumstances.

This is basically what is stated at Wikipedia, but I don't know if others would agree it's objective.

From wiki:

"Vehicular cycling, or VC, is the practice of driving bicycles on roads in a manner which is visible, predictable, and in accordance with the rules of the road for operating a vehicle. Under the international Vienna Convention on Road Traffic (1968), a bicycle (or "cycle", as referenced by the convention) is defined to be a vehicle and a cyclist is considered to be a driver. In a minority of jurisdictions (the states of AZ, CA, IA, IL, IN, MN, NY in the USA [1]) a bicycle is legally defined as a "device" rather than as a vehicle, but in all cases operators of bicycles share a basic set of rights and responsibilities with operators of motor vehicles. Bicyclists, who do not pose an extraordinary danger to others, are not burdened with certain additional responsibilities placed on drivers of motor vehicles — for example, only motor vehicle operators are required to have a driver's license and, in some localities, carry liability insurance."

HH recently added the "in accordance to the rules of the road actually followed by drivers of other vehicles" to his personal definition as a way to justify breaking traffic laws - you know, the old, "well Johnny jumped off a bridge so I can too" defense. :rolleyes:

Hmm, that gets me to thinking. I think I am going to change my driving methods to 'follow the rules of the road as actually followed by vehicular cyclists', which should justify me rolling through stop signs & lights, running in pacelines, sharing lanes with other cars, and using bike lanes.:roflmao:

So, back to the original topic. Can anyone provide any credible evidence whatsover that VC is safer?

So far (in 5 days and over 10 pages), we haven't seen much evidence presented.

We do have the results of a bike forum poll.

That may seem pretty pathetic but a BF poll is actually pretty typical of the kind of thing that that great scientist in his own mind, John Forester, calls 'evidence'. There's not a whole lot of difference between pulling a statistic out of a bike forum poll and the kind of data cherry-picking and "know the answer before you begin" reasoning that John Forester and his followers call "science" (but don't believe me- read Forester's website and see for yourself-- here's a link: http://www.johnforester.com/Articles/social.htm).

The VC view of what passes as evidence was perhaps summed up best in one of the moments of high comedy this thread has produced:


Hey, evidence is evidence. We gotta work with what we've got.
That about sums it up. The VC true believers have to work with what they've got, which ain't diddly squat.

That about sums it up. The VC true believers have to work with what they've got, which ain't diddly squat.
Not exactly. Sometimes they manufacture new "evidence" of safer cycling "results," i.e the new poll referenced in this thread. Or maybe a new, even vaguer (if possible) definition of "vehicular cycling" incorporating the revised interpretation of being "lawful" bandied about recently on this list. Sometimes a few new ingredients have to be stirred in to the pot to keep the smokescreen going.

Anything but an identified population of vehicular cyclists with a documented safety record to compare against a documented safety record of non vehicular cyclists.

The principle I advocate for positioning within a marked travel lane is simple: choose the primary position (i.e., center your vehicle where almost every other driver centers theirs).

If 'real-world considerations' (such as being polite) motivate you to move to one side of the lane, wait until the situation is such that you feel comfortable doing so.


That is simple. Is it really that simple?

I also advise a "centralish" position as the "default position," but this advice is surrounded in several pages of caveats.

I would say with respect to your lane positioning principle that beginning cyclists may be obligated to do all sorts of things they're not comfortable with, including moving right, or left, within a lane, and just because they're uncomfortable doing that doesn't mean they shouldn't; and even if they shouldn't have to, it doesn't mean they won't have to. And those real-world considerations which might lead a cyclist to adjust lane position are numerous, perhaps endless, and ever-changing. The result is that, in dense traffic, the best possible line shifts on a near-constant basis. These shifts can be quite subtle, but they're significant.

There are a few principles that we can safely throw out there. We can tell folks to ride on the right side of the road (that is, with traffic and not against it), not to ride in the door zone and to use destination positioning through intersections. But the question of lane position is subject to a never-ending stream of inputs and thus eludes encapsulation by bullet points.

"The intricate art of positioning is downloaded into cyclists' brains by experience...highly experienced riders gain a feel for what is easiest and safest in different situations. They ride where they are most comfortable, and the details are based largely on personal preferences." (me, p. 76, 2nd edition)

Robert

The result is that, in dense traffic, the best possible line shifts on a near-constant basis. These shifts can be quite subtle, but they're significant.
There is no telling how much grief I have gotten for basically saying the same thing on this forum.

I believe in rules for traffic cycling.
Rule 1: These rules are made to be broken.

Seriously, I think it's good to have good rules to provide general/default behavior guidance.
(a "good" rule is one that does not lead you astray when you follow it).

Having good rules is also useful because you know every time you break a good rule you're taking a calculated risk - having rules, rules that you break form time to time, helps you tune your sense of how much risk you're taking.

Software is the same way, really. So is business. So is life, come to think of it.

Whether you're traffic cycling, driving in traffic, SCUBA diving, writing some code, making a business deal, writing a book, or doing anything in life, breaking a rule here and there is usually not an issue. But if you start breaking a bunch of rules at once, all kinds of alarms should be going off.

If you don't have good rules to follow by default, then you're operating without that alarm system.

For me, VC is a set of rules, practices and habits that I generally follow, and often break. The system forms a baseline that I use to let me know, among other things, how I'm doing.

This is why I believe clear and specific rules are important.

AND I KNOW, from statistical analysis of cities around the globe that have added bicycle infrastructure and seen indexed crash rates of cyclists decrease,

that the ireffutable positive benefits of cycling infrastructure IS safer for ALL cyclists in a community.

Copenhagen, Portland, Bogata. three continents, three large cities that have added quite large bicycling infrastructure, ALL show increases in cycling and reductions in indexed crash rates.

Now, I'm a high mileage, adaptive, traffic jamming cyclist that rides 'messenger' style on crowded arterials and downtown and more sedate out in the countryside,

but I KNOW the EVIDENCE shows cities that vigorously support bicycling via infrastructure, with civic governments that place value on cycling as transportation are PROVEN to make cycling safer- for ALL cyclists.

I also advise a "centralish" position as the "default position," but this advice is surrounded in several pages of caveats.What I wrote was from the viewpoint of an instructor who believes strongly in the KISS (Keep It Simple for the Students) principle. Assuming that I'm teaching some folks to cycle as traffic in a jurisdiction where the government doesn't require cyclists:

to use paths to the side of the marked travel lanes (BLs, shoulders, etc.) or
to stay right within marked travel lanes,then the only basic modifying detail which the students have to consider initially is that they may need to move from the primary position (i.e., center of the marked travel lane) when destination positioning. IMHO, other caveats should not be taught initially in order for the lesson to be consistent with KISS.