gunadai

https://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandsty...ork-calderdale

Good article about cycling research in the UK. Some interesting excerpts:

"Struck by the Dutch success, a group of British MPs has just returned from a fact-finding trip to the country. There, along with reams of information about bike lanes and secure parking, they were let in to a less well-known secret for spurring a national cycling culture: throw out the Lycra and the helmets."

"...Dutch riders enjoy car-free bikes lanes, secure parking at every train station and an automatic presumption of innocence in any collision with a car...."

How do we get that here?

uke

For starters, we'd need law enforcement to start prosecuting drivers who kill bicyclists.

https://hamptonroads.com/2009/05/no-c...each-bicyclist

As long as cyclist lives aren't worth anything under the law, few people will risk riding.

pacificaslim

The key is to stop doing things that make cycling seem dangerous (like promoting helmet usage for example).

crackerdog

Make driving a privilege instead of a right. Get bad and aggressive drivers off the road.

bicyclerampage

create manditory no cars on the road days (aside from emergency vehicles) maybe people will fall back in love with riding.

genec

OK, Done.

Driving is not now, nor has it ever been a "right."

daven1986

but people believe it is their right to drive which is why the punishments for driving related offences are so low and why people who have their license taken away continue to drive and why driving bans are so short.

genec

People also "believe" that bikes don't belong on the streets.

IbikezLA

make gas prices skyrocket?

PaulH

Do nothing. As congestion grows, more people will find that cycling is more convenient than driving. Worked for me.

Paul

John E

Reduced speed limits and traffic-calmed intersections which force motorists to slow down would help immensely. This means no more high-speed free turns, merges, diverges, and unions, except on limited-access turnpikes and freeways, where and only where they belong.

chriswnw

I don't like Dutch-style cycle tracks. I favor:

Bike boulevards -- traffic-calmed low-speed thoroughfares running parallel to all major arteries. In the suburbs, where potentially good low-traffic routes often inconviently terminate, add bike/ped shortcut paths to allow passage to the next street. This might entail that the city buy out some people's side yards, which could be politically difficult.

On major streets, I could do with either sharrows or bike lanes, provided that the latter isn't poorly done. However, I doubt that either would increase the number of cyclists. Most people won't want to ride on major streets regardless of whether they have sharrows or bike lanes, while vehicular cyclists and other assertive riders will ride on them even if they have neither.

I think that traffic calming measures in general would do a lot to encourage cycling, even if they aren't done for that purpose. Some measures might include reducing the in-city speed limit to 30 mph, installing speed humps, chopping 5-6 lane roads down to 3 lanes, etc.

dirtyhippy

I would agree with you, except that this plan would make road tripping impossible during the "no car" days. Planning trips across the country around when you could/couldn't drive would suck.

genec

Oh, I dunno... the country seemed to manage just fine when you could only buy gas on certain days depending on your license plate... back in the '70's.

Really what it all boils down to is smart use of limited resources. We can just keep on moving blindly forward and until such resources are so limited that they are priced out of reach for the average person, and at that point we will "suddenly" become smarter and learn to cope... or we can plan ahead, and invest in a diverse transportation plan that will not leave us short in the near future.

Now it seems to me that in certain areas in Europe they have done the latter... planned well ahead and built a system that is more sustainable and more flexible, whereas in America, we are addicted to oil and tend to only address transportation with a single minded solution. Perhaps it is time for use to re-examine our goals and plan accordingly. (BTW I don't think flying cars are just around the corner, either)

chriswnw

Next, you're going to say that we won't have teleportation either

genec

Oh we will, but my darn patent keeps getting rejected...

dirtyhippy

Restrictions on buying petrol would work, but a restriction on driving on off days would be too much. I agree that we must start planning a departure from oil now, rather than later.

dexeqex

From the research I've seen, the best way to encourage cycling is traffic calming. While there is a correlation between more miles of bike lane/path etc. and the number of cyclists in the area it's difficult to determine which direction the causation runs. Traffic calming has been shown to lead to lower motorist speed which increases the number of cyclists on the road. The more cyclists there are, as the OP says, the more aware motorists are of them, and the safer the road is for everyone.

Personally, I think speeding and red light cameras are a big part of the solution. I've heard the privacy arguments against them, but I don't understand how a picture of your license plate taken by a traffic camera as you speed down a road or blow through a red light is a violation of privacy.

gunadai

Agreed, traffic sure was easier to deal with when we had $5/gallon gas... ok, so who wants to start a petition for the oil companies to raise prices?

ItsJustMe

Step one: completely evacuate the US, level it and rebuild it from scratch.

Seriously, though I know there are a lot of areas where cycling makes a lot of sense, where I live it takes a lot of commitment. Even though the stats say most trips in a car are < 5 miles, in the area where I live, there is NOTHING that I get in a car to go to that is less than 5 miles away.

There's a heck of a lot of our country where people have to travel 5 or more miles to get to even the nearest store or place of work. I live in such a place. I ride daily regardless of weather but I don't expect any of my neighbors to do it.

We've built a country around cars. It's going to take a long time to change, and it'll probably have to happen one city at a time.

JT52

Teach tolerance.

There's an article on 9News.com that our guv, Bill Ritter, will be signing a bill today making it a law that drivers have to give cyclists a 3 foot cushion when passing them on the road. Looking at the comments, I was astonished at how much anger and hatred there is towards cyclists. It's as if we were the devil incarnate on two-wheels when in fact it's vehicle drivers that are the real danger. After perusing 9 pages of hate-spewing, narrow-minded, suv-driving, beer-slurping, text-messaging, cell-phone using, self-righteous bs'ers commenting on the new law, I'll be extra careful when I'm on the streets.

But it won't keep me off them.

annc

You don't need oil companies to raise prices; the government can increase gas taxes. That way motorists pay more for the construction and maintenance of roads and less money will be taken from general funds.

JusticeZero

I've been pushing for bike parking and lower car parking. Seems like relatively low hanging fruit to get bike racks sprouting up all over the place.