Originally Posted by gcl8a
Practically no one wears a helmet, and people commute in all styles of clothing: jeans, skirts, high-heeled boots, suits and ties, you name it (it's quite fascinating, really). The vast majority of cyclists obey the traffic laws -- many will not turn right on red from bike path to bike path, almost no one runs red lights straight across.
Gee this sounds much like the transportational cyclists of China... who also rarely (ever?) wear helmets, ride (on the wide arterials) in their own lane to the left of peds, and the right of motor traffic and wear regular clothes. Although the issues regarding traffic laws are quite different there.
Speeds of these transportational cyclists are slow... Perhaps twice walking speed. There are no "racers" of bright lycra clothing speeding about at 20+MPH.
It sounds as if transportational cycling, where the population readily rides bicycles, tends to involve lots of bikes, moving at speeds that are far less than that of the recreational and club riders in the US.
I want to make an observation here. It seems to me that a certain sect of "fast" riders, who actually represent a minority of cyclists in the US, are the the ones clamoring the most for "no bike lanes" and a strict VC style. Meanwhile riders that are transportational seem to have little problem with moving at a slower pace than the "fast" set, AND seem to enjoy cycling facilities, and tend to represent a greater number than the "fast sect." Go figure.
I know a certain cyclist that constantly complained about how dangerous it was to ride in a bike lane at 20-30MPH, and actually prefered to ride out of the BL with the 50+MPH motor vehicles. The irony is he chose not to slow down himself, but to slow down others instead, as it was "safer". Is this a general reflection of "fast riders?"