Originally Posted by
PaulRivers
I find it kind of sad that this board has an unfortunate tendency to label any off street bike path a "sidewalk" automatically and insist on biking on the street no matter what. Must be an ego thing. I do wonder - looking at the pics, there's what appears to be a bike path smack up against the side of a 2 lane road with absolutely no shoulder. If instead of a "sidewalk" the exact same area was an shoulder marked as a "bike lane" next to the street, would it suddenly be "ok" to bike there?
I won't ride in most cases on a "sidepath" bike lane even if it is so designated because I can't then move to the left of right-turning traffic at intersections. The sidepaths are easy to get hooked at unless you are travelling really slowly.
However if there are few intersections sure. But a shoulder differs from a grade-separated bike lane because I can move further inwards approaching a (rare) intersection.