Originally Posted by
Steely Dan
i've been using ~$20 front and rear blinkies for "night" riding on chicago's streets for the past 8 years with great success.
if you find that you need more lighting in cities than rural areas, that's cool. i find the exact 100% opposite to be true, at least in the case of chicago's extremely over-illuminated streets.
strokes and folks.....
It depends on the $20 (or less) light.
But you are missing the point. Every urban area is over-illuminated...although there are still plenty of places where you need a light to actually "see" where you are going. The reason you need lots of lights in cities is
because urban areas are over-illuminated. It's not about seeing where you are going but being seen
while you are going. A small "be seen" light simply isn't going to be "seen" in a sea of other lights. Bright lights of similar output to the other light sources around (see link) are really the "be seen" lights. You need to catch the attention of the motorists with lights that make them question whether that light coming towards them is attached to something large enough to worry about.
Now if Pugs has a magical bike path that runs from door-to-door, a "be seen" light will probably work, although there are places where having more illumination is helpful even on bike paths. But I doubt that any bike path system is that comprehensive. All of us have to spend a little bit of time on roadways and it's a very good idea to actually be seen, instead of thinking we are seen.