Do you drive? The whole argument of "not riding because the roads are dangerous" is crazy because YOU'RE the ones driving! everyone always complains about the other drivers. Well, they're saying exactly the same thing about you.

Also if you drive, pay attention when you come to an intersection - you are NOT looking at the sidewalk, you're looking at the traffic, and bikes in the road are traffic. Most cars don't even stop behind the sidewalk to look in the first place, and stop at the road, blocking the sidewalk. My wife and I ride on the sidewalks carefully when we're not sure where we're going, but then quite often we're at almost walking speed anyway. In our home town it's always on the road whether there is a bike lane or not. It does depend a lot on where you are riding though.

A lot of US cities just don't seem to be set up for anything but a car. Sub-divisions that are completely separated from each other, joined together by high speed arterials with no shoulders or bike lanes or sometimes even sidewalks. I could ride 60km to Toronto through sub-divisions hardly ever leaving 40km/hr roads.