DavidLee

Of my 7.5 miles to work 6.5 of those are on a 8-10 foot wide bike lane on a highway with a 55 MPH speed limit. Makes for a real nice ride, without that bike lane I would have never considered commuting by bicycle. Around town there are no bike lanes but the occasional small shoulder. Those occasional shoulders are so bad though that its better for me to stay with traffic on the roads.

billh

I could count on one hand all the striped lanes in the entire St Louis metro area. I'm perfectly fine without them. I've arranged my commute to minimize the nasty high traffic routes. The 10% nasty high traffic routes, I use VC techniques successfully to take the lane, merge into traffic, and make left hand turns. Fortunately, only one of my left hand turns lacks a dedicated turn lane. Bike lanes, I'm fine without them. That said, I think the EC folks spend WAY too much time demonizing BL. If they are present, then they should be used in order to reduce confusion with motorists who expect us to be in them. I like the idea of BL on high traffic arterials like genec says, might make those streets more bikeable.

DavidLee

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bbonnn

There are lots of so-called "bike lanes" on the streets I ride, but 1) There are cars parked throughout long sections of the lane, and no space within the bike lane to pass them (I'm talking inches of space); or 2) The bike lane is a thin strip (18-24 inches-ish) of clear space to the left of blocks of parked cars. I don't really consider them bike lanes, in the functional sense, and I tend to avoid them if it looks like I could possibly get doored (thank you, Bike Forums, for making me cognizant and now paranoid of that possibility, hee hee).

So: very few actual bike lanes in my area, even though the county's transit map says they abound. And I'm the type that would happily ride in a reasonable bike lane any day, all day, with a smile on my face.

Cycliste

There are two bike lanes on a wide two way street passing by a high school near where I live. I often ride by there. The BLs of course are on the parked car doorway and sometime cars are even parked in them so it's safer to ride out of the lanes.

I hardly see any kids riding their bikes to this high school which is sad. I believe the BLs were implemented for this very purpose. Another typical example of BLs as ill advised solution.
City Hall and the High School have been debating for the last couple of years whether or not to keep the lanes.

Some have suggested that the needs of cyclists and pedestrians been looked at and an infrastructure designed accordingly along with an educational and informational program for cyclists, peds and motorists. Sounds like a step in the right direction.

Helmet Head

Hmm. The only ones who "need" bike lanes seem to be the ones who have grown to be dependent on them.

"Bike lanes are the heroin of the cycling masses" (with apologies to Mr Marx)

genec

Could that be simply an offshoot of the comfort that one may feel while in a BL vice the "pressure" of a shared lane?

This of course is a question posed to everyone else, not to you, as you simply "ignore motorists."