berchman

I got kicked off the Facebook group "Cyclists are Drivers" for posting this remark: "I just watched a video of the cycling situation in NYC which made a pretty compelling case for physically separated bike lanes. streetfilms dot org/physically-separated-bike-lanes

My question is whether this fanatical adherence to the party line rather than accepting that one can approve of rail trails and bike lanes (especially those separated by a physical barrier from car traffic) and still defend cyclists' rights to use the roads like any other vehicle without demanding FTR (farthest to the right) is somehow antithetical to the latter cause.

Dan Gutierrez, the group's moderator, wrote:"You are not welcome in this group, since it is clear you don't support bicycle driving. There are plenty of other groups suited to your advocacy."

However, this was preceded by comments I had made fully supporting cyclists' rights to ride in the road without hugging the right side.

Comment history:Bob Sutterfield Marvin - It's good to hear you agree cyclists have the right to use the roads by the ordinary rules of the road for drivers of vehicles. That's a huge step that many don't get past.

When you learn to apply that principle to your own cycling, you'll find it emancipates you from the restrictions you now feel. You'll no longer feel confined to paths. The entire public roadway network (except freeways) will be available to you! You'll be able to go anywhere you want! No need to wait till a path is built, just get on your trike and ride!

I encourage you to stick around here, listen in, and avail yourself of educational opportunities to help you along the way. Read some of the material at cyclingsavvy dot org and iamtraffic dot org and keep asking lots of questions. Even if there's no workshop in your area, you can create opportunities to meet up with experienced bicycle drivers near you, and learn from them too.

Enjoy the journey!

(Marvin writes) I looked at these materials before you suggested them and I found them useful. But none of the videos showed the kind of roads around here that I stay off. These are two lane roads with 35 mph going to 50 mph speed limits (often exceeded), narrow paved shoulders that I see DF cyclists riding on with cars passing too closely. There is enough oncoming traffic and traffic going the same way that if I controlled the lane they would be stacked up behind me waiting quite a while (given my 10 mph average speed) before I could pull into someone's driveway to give them an opportunity to pass. On the low traffic country roads that I do ride on, there are few enough oncoming cars that getting stuck behind me is not a problem except maybe on a long hill that I'm going up at a snail's pace, and then, if I can, I will pull into a driveway and wave the car(s) behind me on. I do not hug the right side, never, because I don't want anyone to think they can pass me without crossing over the center stripe. Almost everybody gives me a fairly wide berth, but there are more than a few who pass me when they cannot see over the next rise or around the next curve, so they're risking a head on collision. Given the impatience that leads to that kind of stupidity, I can only imagine what such a driver would do if I were controlling the lane while a long succession of oncoming cars made it impossible to pass.

(Marvin writes) That's great if release is possible. [Control the lane and release the lane.] When there are no shoulders, high banks or deep ditches on the side of the road, no driveways or intersecting roads to pull into, then it's not possible. I would stay off roads like that which also had enough oncoming cars to make overtaking impossible on the few straight stretches. Also, and I may be mistaken, I think the slow speed and the width of my trike probably influence the situation. I just watched a video of the cycling situation in NYC which made a pretty compelling case for physically separated bike lanes. streetfilms dot org/physically-separated-bike-lanes

It seems to me that many more people would be riding bikes if their fear of traffic could be calmed and the more bike riders, the better. If getting people started riding requires protected bike lanes, fine. After they gain confidence, they might then be persuaded to ride in traffic, especially if they could first take a course in effective cycling.

turbo1889

Its not so much fanatical adherence to the party line as it is the "give them an inch and they will take a mile" nature of the thing. On many low speed roadways (which I define as 25mph or less speed limit roads), especially in in-town block grid stop and go traffic bicycle lanes are not only unnecessary and only serve the purpose of emboldening and aggravating the territorial aggression and hostility of motorist but are logistically and matter of fact physically very dangerous for cyclists. Since more often then not bicycle lanes are installed in such locations and not installed on the the higher speed roads where they might actually serve a useful purpose towards actual safety concerns for cyclists rather then serving simply to segregate cyclists and get them "the hell off the road and out of the way" of motorists, experienced cyclists are very suspicious and "gun shy" of bicycle paths and lanes.

We have been burned way too may times and we do not trust the motivation and intent behind the push. And we are by no means paranoid, laws in some states and many local ordinances mandating that cyclists are required to use the bike lane/path when one is available is more then enough proof of how things work. First they put in a dangerous bike path or lane that the whole thing is entirely designed towards treating cyclists as second class road users and every effort is made to get them out of the way and make sure they are always the ones yielding and cars never have to yield to them then you make a law that says where-ever there is a bike lane/path along a road then cyclists cannot use the road and must use only the bike lane or path.

It has happened way too many times, we know the game they are playing, we are not fooled by it. People like you (and me as well) who do believe that properly constructed bike lanes that treat cyclists as equal road users and is properly routed through intersections so that the bicycle lane has the same right of way as other traffic lanes do have a place in our infrastructure, specifically on high speed roadways where there is a large speed differential between cycle traffic and motorized traffic get caught in the cross-fire. Push comes to shove I'll side with the hard-line VC crowd that is totally anti- bicycle lane/path almost every time. Because I know that for every mile of bike lane that is prevented from being installed where it is actually useful and needed a hundred or more miles of dangerous bike lanes that should not exist on low speed roads that are designed to treat cyclists as second class (or lower) road users will be prevented so it is more then worth it.

Good bicycle lanes are very rare, bad ones are the norm so if it must be an all YES or all NO answer for bike lanes then I choose NO. I would prefer to keep the good and not throw the baby out with the bath water. Problem is that the bath water is a couple hundred gallons of toxic radioactive waste and the baby is probably already dead.

turbo1889

For more specific details of my exact feelings on bike lanes and how they can be integrated into our road infrastructure to the advantage of cyclists while avoiding the usual problems with them. I've already laid all that out in detail in another thread in this section. Here is a link:

https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...1#post15123890

corrado33

So you got kicked out of a facebook group run by 18 year olds who are not open minded enough to consider other opinions of the subject. Big deal, move on.

berchman

Your argument is quite convincing. My home town experience bears you out. They installed a bicycle lane on the main street which forces the cyclist to ride in the door zone *and* to invite being right crossed.

genec

Of course the odd irony is that you are likely to be treated as a second class road user by the other road users, whether a BL exists or not. It is quite common for Motor Vehicle drivers to believe that bikes just don't belong, and that "sharing the road" is done as a favor to cyclists.

turbo1889

Yes, but when there is a narrow dangerous door zone bike lane and a smart cyclists chooses to "take the lane" in the right most main traffic lane instead of use it hostilities against that cyclist by motorists tend to run a lot higher then if there were no marked dangerous door zone bike lane and instead that was just part of the parking lane to allow clearance for people getting in and out of their parked cars and the cyclist was riding in the exact same position on the exact same road in the exact same traffic conditions around the exact same crowd of motorists.

The presence of a bicycle lane aggravates and increases the already existing hostility and territorial aggression by motorists against cyclists even if the cyclist is only out of the bike lane to get ready to make a left hand turn using a dedicated left hand turn lane which even when bicycle lane use is mandated is still a legal maneuver.

Along a high speed highway with a bicycle lane that is not built into a door zone and there is actually a good reason for it to be there due to the large speed differential between motor vehicle traffic going like 55 to 70 mph and bicycle vehicle traffic going like 15 to 20 mph the occasional raising and aggravation of existing hostilities when a cyclist merges across the main traffic lanes into the left hand turn lane is an acceptable risk (although still one that can be mitigated through education and road markings).

On low speed roadways though installing dangerous door zone bike lanes is not only dangerous because the bicycle lane itself is dangerous but because in those situations (such as in-town and residential traffic where such low speed roadways generally are anywhere) where cyclists will much more often need to use the other lanes for passing and left turn maneuvers makes the aggravation of existing hostilities a generally un-acceptable risk besides the bicycle lanes themselves being done badly and being dangerous in and of themselves. Much less for those cyclists who are smart enough to recognize the danger and use the main traffic lanes rather then risking their neck in a dangerous bicycle lane which will get an extra heavy dose of motorist aggression and abuse against them due to the presence of the dangerous bicycle lane which they are not using.

turbo1889

I'm not apposed to bicycle lanes, I'm apposed to dangerous bicycle lanes, and bicycle lanes set-up and installed in such a way as to reinforce and further entrench motorists view the bicycles do not belong on the roads and should "Get the hell off the road", "Get the hell out of the way", and "Get the hell out of their sight".


If my word was law as far as how bicycle infrastructure was set-up it would:

----- Be a criminal act to even attempt to install a bicycle lane "in the door zone" on any roadway with on-street parking.
----- Be a high felony criminal act to even attempt to install a bicycle lane in a 15-mph or slower school speed zone where the bike lane is a narrow door zone lane which tightly sandwiches bicycle riders between a narrow tight lane of parked vehicles including buses and a narrow tight lane of moving vehicles including buses. Anyone who tries to sandwich a kid riding his bike to school in-between two school buses so he gets squashed between them when the speeds are so low that cyclists can easily break the speed limit themselves and there isn't hardly a chance of a cyclist impeding traffic and if they do its a good thing traffic is slowed down because its a school zone for goodness sake, is a vicious sadistic pervert. (This actually happened in my area, including the squashed kid.)
----- Bike lanes would only be installed on 25-mph or less speed roadways on hill climbing zones or areas that often had high head winds and it would be a combination bike lane and heavy vehicle right turn lane of full 9-foot width so heavy vehicles wishing to turn right would merge into the bike lane before turning right with a right turn only arrow with a car symbol in the right half of that lane and a straight through arrow with a bicycle symbol in left side of that lane every 10-20 yards along its length (to strongly indicate to cyclists that they should pass right turning vehicles in the left edge of the lane and not try to pass them on the right when they are turning right) and there would be no on-street parking on that side of the street (no need for a bicycle lane on the other down hill, or tail wind side of such a 25-mph or slower roadway).
----- Where-ever there was no bicycle lane on a roadway the right most main traffic lane would be marked with sharrows indicating cyclists could take that lane. Vehicular right hand and left hand turn lanes would also be marked with sharrows and where there was a lane or more between the right most through traffic lane and the left hand turn lane those lanes would be marked with left tilted sharrows indicating cyclists could and should be expected to merge across to the left hand turn lane.
----- On all high speed roadways (45-mph or higher) there would be a reasonably good, and reasonably safe paved bicycle lane marked as such with arrows indicating direction of travel (with traffic, no salmon-ing) and bicycle symbols and this lane would be properly routed through intersections to the left of the right hand turn lane with both left and right hand turn lanes marked with sharrows and again left tilted sharrows in the main traffic lanes between the bicycle lane and left turn lane indicating cyclists could and should be expected to merge across to the left hand turn lane. At major intersections infrastructure provisions for cyclists to two step a left by crossing the cross street straight across and then lining up to cross again at 90-degrees with cross street straight through traffic would be made if a cyclist wanted to take a left that way instead of merging over to the vehicular left turn lane so that cyclists would have their choice of either method of making a left hand turn.
----- On all medium speed roadways with a speed limit faster then 25-mph but slower then 45-mph where there was no bicycle lane installed (not mandatory to install one on these medium speed roads) and not at least two main travel lanes in one direction there would always be a paved shoulder edge of at least two feet width to the right of the white lane or to the right of the rumble strips if such are installed immediately to the right of the white line for cyclist to ride on using the shoulder edge as a bike lane if they so desired and it would be marked with small sized sharrows (small enough to be noticed by cyclists close up when they were on the shoulder edge but not large enough to be readily visible to motorists speeding along in the main traffic lanes) and the right most main traffic lane would still be marked with full size sharrows as well so cyclists could choose either to use the main lane or shoulder edge ride at their own discretion and it would be very clear to the motorists in the main traffic lane that cyclists didn't have to use the shoulder edge if they chose not to do so.


Long story short:

----- Motorists would get really used to seeing sharrow markings all over the roads.
----- Bicycle lanes would only be used for where they are really needed.
----- Bicycle lanes would always be installed along high speed highways.
----- All bicycle lanes would be safely set-up as much as possible and none would be door zone lanes.
----- Even where there were bicycle lanes there would still be sharrow markings to clearly and strongly indicate that cyclists could move out of their lane and merge over to the left to make left hand turns and could make full use of right hand turn lanes as well.

genec

Gotta agree with you there... and really if you think about it, the root cause of the issue of DZ BL is due to all the free state support for the motor vehicle... once again showing how cyclists are treated as second class users of the road.

genec

Too bad the standards folks just tell you what width of line to paint and how tall the letters have to be...

turbo1889

Sharrows are a way of saying to motorists, "Yes, yes cyclists do belong in the road riding down the center of this lane."

More often then not bicycle lanes, especially on low speed roadways, are a way of saying to motorists "Bicycles do not belong in the road they have to stay way over in their own lane, if they don't then chase them back over to where they belong."

turbo1889

Since when do they actually follow the standards when they don't want to when it comes to bicycle infrastructure already? The existing standards already require bicycle lanes to be routed to the left of right hand turn lanes. How many have you seen that didn't follow that standard?

If they can get away with not following that standard then I think I could get away with making little mini sharrow markings for the shoulder edge that were too small for motorists speeding along in the main traffic lane to notice while putting big full size sharrow markings in the main lane so that you can mark the shoulder edge for use for cyclists if they so desire to use it while keeping that "under the radar" of motorists. They marginalize us all the time and violate the standards to do it, why not. Or better yet just have the "mini mark" added to the standards to be only used on shoulder edges in combination with the full size mark used in the main lane.

genec

Good point... the oddest bad bike lane I ever saw was so narrow that the BL symbol did not fit between the two lines (this was a BL for straight though, so not at the curb).

So much for standards.... and yes, I ran into exactly the same problem a number of years ago... new freeway ramp was being installed just a 1/2 block from my office... and I watched them put the BL to the right of the on ramp entrance... cyclists would have been routed right to the freeway, or right hooked every time. I went to the contractor trailer in the area and asked about it. The contractor waved the standards manual at me and said it was right in there. I contacted the local advocacy group and within 2 weeks the BL was changed. Hard to believe that the contractor stood right there with a AASHTO standards manual and still did it all wrong.

AngeloDolce

Actually, from what I've seen in MD and PA I'd say it's great that the bike lane was fixed, and quickly at that. The sharrows I've seen in Baltimore are partially covered by parked cars. Someone from the MD SHA said sharrows another town were also placed next to/under parked cars. In none of these cases were the sharrows changed.

The MD bike lanes I've seen were all in the door zone - I think this is why MD needs such a strict Mandatory Bike Lane law. There is no exception for traveling at the speed of traffic, so bicyclists going 15mph in 15mph rush hour traffic would never use the door zone bike lanes if they were not mandatory.

In Philadelphia, the advocacy groups support any and all facilities, to encourage beginners and create "safety in numbers". The South St. Bridge was planned for years, but when finally built the bike lanes are to the right of RTOL lanes on to I-76, a problem many bicyclists have complained about at Spring Garden St. for 30 years (and still not changed). The advocates privately admitted the new bike lanes had problems, but did not want to criticize them publicly, to encourage the city to put in more bike lanes (subject to equally low standards).


I've seen a few good marked bike lanes traveling on vacation, namely on the Coastal Highway in DE. Note this is a 50mph road with no intersections, so the shoulder would be just as good without the bike lane markings.

The other bike lanes seem to be forced onto city streets by planners that do not bicycle. They do not seem to expect bicyclists to go faster than 6-8 mph or farther than 3-5 miles, so the door zones and turn lanes don't permit faster speeds safely. Traffic is often congested and no faster than bicycle speed, but I find drivers are far more hostile now if I leave the bike lane (parked cars, left turns, ...) Frankly, I now try to avoid most of the streets with bike lanes.

I have no problem with pedestrian/bicycle cut throughs that let pedestrians and bicyclists use short cuts that avoid 40-50mph roads. I do have problems with 98% of the bike lanes I've seen locally, since they seem motivated more by a desire to get bicyclists out of motorists way than to make bicycle transportation easier, or safer if I want to go faster than 6mph.