John Forester

Vehicular cycling was the principle for all the major cycling nations of Europe and, at least, those elsewhere with roots in British tradition, right from the early days of cycling. It never had to have a name, because it was the same as driving any vehicle and had no distinguishing features. America was different because it was the first major nation to do most of its personal transportation by automobile. Right from as early as anyone could tell me, American policy was as cyclist-inferiority as was practical. The traffic-law experts knew that we must not have conflicting rules of the road for motorists and for cyclists, but they managed to discriminate against cyclists by simply prohibiting cyclists from having all the rights of drivers of vehicles. However, American social practice then resulted in such monstrous instruction as having cyclists ride at the rightmost edge of the roadway, stick out their left arms, and, without looking, turn left. I had (don't know where it is, now) a poster by the AAA showing the rear view of a child cyclist and a child tricyclist doing just what I have described, as instructional material of what should be done.

As I have repeatedly written, American club cyclists, who until about 1970 or so had quite a leavening of cyclists who had learned in Europe, largely had the vehicular viewpoint and rode largely in the vehicular manner. We recognized the difference between our methods and the dangerous "bike-safety" methods of the rest of American society with respect to cycling, but there wasn't much we could do about that. The rules of the road protected us from most of the discrimination; while 38 states had the mandatory side-path law, there were very few sidepaths and the law was rarely enforced.

Then, when California government became serious at imposing the cyclist-inferior style of cycling on all cyclists through the means of bikeways, it became necessary to describe the differences between proper cycling in accordance with the rules of the road for drivers of vehicles and the cyclist-inferiority laws and facilities being imposed.

The name "vehicular cycling" just came rather naturally in that situation.

Helmet Head

Thanks.

I find it perplexing how folks like Chipcom seem to not get this. Chip has long argued that you did not invent vehicular cycling - it existed long before you - as if that needed arguing. But at the same time he objects to giving it a name (a "trade mark" as he says), as if there is no need to distinguish between what is meant by vehicular cycling and the way the vast majority of cyclists in the U.S. actually ride their bikes. I used to call it "out-of-the-way" cycling, because the governing principle seemed to be: stay out of the way of cars. But "cyclist-inferiority style" certainly means the same thing.

But I think that a lot of members here still don't fully understand and appreciate the difference between vehicular cycling and cyclist-inferiority cycling. I suspect this is because some are practictioners of cyclist-inferiority cycling, and resent being told they're doing something wrong and there is a better way. But guys like Chipcom are something else again. Short of a slip here and there, cyclist-inferiority thinking does not seem to be predominant in his words, and I suspect it is not manifested in his riding either. Surely he sees how most other people ride, and how different it is from his vehicular style. I guess he doesn't see a problem with it, or how that style contributes to causing most bike-car crashes. Or he just doesn't care.

Don't mean to pick on Chip, he's just probably the best example out there of what I'm perplexed about.

I-Like-To-Bike

First under the bike advocates control (with the aid of our co-conspirators, the motorists) our society and our governments; Next the Universe!!!

rando

or maybe he believes in letting people ride the way they are most comfortable, and not trying to force them into a mold that doesn't fit. maybe he doesn't buy your "evidence" of how riding in any but the most buttoned-down, preconcieved VC style "contributes to causing most bike-car crashes" what a load of bull****.

zeytoun

And here I thought HH was a libertarian...

noisebeam

I don't think anyone is forcing anything. Its only discussion about different ways, including asking others to consider their own and the other possibilities, which is very different than telling someone they need to change.

rando

maybe I overreacted.

Helmet Head

Indeed, that is libertarianism.

The fact that no one can force anyone to do anything does not preclude anyone from trying to persuade others to freely choose to do one thing or another.

I, for one, try to persuade others to be good to each other and respect each other. But I don't presume to think that I could force anyone to do that, nor would I care to if I could.

joejack951

I don't think Steve was saying that he wants a WOL in the inner city, but rather that he would prefer that type of accomodation over a footpath/sidepath, assuming an accomodation was going to be added. I'd agree. I also agree with you that no extra road width is necessary in such low speed situations, unless of course traffic was very dense in which case it would be nice to be able to filter.

How do bike lanes keep passing friction to a minimum on slower speed arterials any more than wider pavement would? Or do you mean that motorists will feel more comfortable passing as higher speeds due to the bike lane line seperating lanes?

Your first sentence seems to be at odds with what you just wrote above and at odds with where most cyclists seem to prefer bike lanes (on higher speed roads). I do agree that WOL help with lane changes as the cyclist is already in the lane and thus not being ignored (I prefer this type of treatment on all roads). If I was going to have a bike lane on any road, it would be a road with few intersections of any type. My idea of few would be at least a half mile between intersections of any type (no driveway, small side streets, parking lots, etc.), and the bike lane would disolve into a WOL at intersections to allow traffic to mix and destination position as necessary. In my area, there is only one road I can think of that meets this criteria.

Again, how is the traffic seperation a good thing for cyclists and motorists? In my experience on rural highways (and I ride these quite often) if you stay out of the way the entire time as the motorist approaches, you will get passed at full speed and without the driver shifting in his lane at all. While riding in a 3 foot shoulder which may or may not be consistent in width or quality, this is the last thing I'd expect cyclists to prefer. If I'm riding these types of roads, I am at least in the right tire track to start and move right as necessary to allow faster traffic to pass, unless it's a passing zone with no oncoming traffic in which case I'll let them use the other lane. A WOL would be nice simply to have a wider section of debris free pavement (important on coastal roads where sand build up becomes significant if the pavement is not regularly swept).

sggoodri

If there is only one lane of traffic in each direction, and the road carries significant traffic in both directions, I think a wide through lane will make slower cyclists more comfortable by making them feel that they are not delaying motorists.

Downtown Raleigh is in the process of converting some one-way two-lane roads to two-way with narrow lanes, with the result creating more difficulty for automobile drivers passing bicyclists. If the purpose of the road is low speed local access over a short distance, this is no big deal, but when this treatment is applied to longer roads that are more useful for mobility and carry significant traffic, it creates undesirable social conflict.

If a passing facility is to be developed in a downtown area, I prefer that it be implemented as a wide outside lane, possibly with sharrows outside the door zone if parking is present, rather than a door zone bike lane or designated two-way bicycle sidewalk.

Here is my article on designing wide outside lanes:
https://www.humantransport.org/bicycl...sing/index.htm

Here's a picture of a perfectly fine wide lane on an urban/suburban collector street.



Here are some distances to consider when designing wide outside lanes next to parallel parking:


And if passing by buses is to be considered:
https://www.humantransport.org/bicycl...g/parking2.gif

Again, if there are multiple lanes in each direction on a downtown street, then motorists can change lanes to pass. If there is only one lane in each direction, it takes a considerable amount of room to allow same-lane passing by wide vehicles. However, leaving inadequate total width for passing by a bus unstriped is better than building a door-zone bike lane like this one:



-Steve Goodridge