There would be a few different types of cyclists from kids to commuters to recreational cyclists to MTB riders.

Cycle commuters are somewhat tied to gas prices, and the economy. I think they're doing OK around here, just not a huge chunk of the population. There are groups of teenagers who are actually delaying learning to drive, so that may be good for bicycles.

Raise the gas prices by $10 a gallon, and you'll get quite a few more people out on their bikes.

There may be a bit of a fear thing. We get about 2 fatal bike accidents a day in the USA. And many of them make the news. On the other hand, people seem to ignore the 92 fatal car crashes a day. Lots of non-fatal bike wrecks which can be traumatic too, but even those would be on a scale with relatively few being extremely serious.

Personally, I think the public health benefits of riding bikes far outweigh the dangers.

In many places, one can ride around the local neighborhoods without much danger. Perhaps that is one advantage of having no through streets in neighborhoods.

MUPS are great for recreational riding.

Perhaps the streetside bikepaths are only for the commuters.

One of the problems with MTBs is that nobody likes them on their favorite hiking trails. There would be benefits of actually investing in the sport, rather than pushing MTB riders further and further from the population base, There are many places that are large enough to support parallel hiking/biking exclusive trails.