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Google Wants to Make Silicon Valley as Bike-Friendly as Copenhagen

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Re: Google Wants to Make Silicon Valley as Bike-Friendly as Copenhagen

#41

Post by nkassis »

stbtrax wrote: post #18
Florin_Andrei wrote: post #7

I just biked last evening from downtown San Jose to the southern vicinity of the Google campus. There are two main options: Central Expressway or something close and parallel to it, which I've declined. Or trails near the bay shore, which is what I chose. Bad choice. The trails are for the most part unpaved. Riding my sleek, rigid road bike on those things was torture. Never again. If those trails were paved, that wo…

This sounds like it could be easily solved by you riding a more suitable bike for commuting. It seems people in the US fetishize road bikes with drop bars and skinny tires as the 'best and fastest' kind of bike and then complain about how uncomfortable biking is. Even in the tour de france they don't use 23mm tires anymore. Going to a wider tire won't affect your speed adversely and to an extent will actually speed y…

"It seems people in the US fetishize road bikes with drop bars and skinny tires as the 'best and fastest' kind of bike" I don't think that true. The general opinion I've seen where I live is that bikes are toys and paying above a few hundred for one is ridiculous.

I do agree that you probably don't want a race oriented road bike if your goal is to commute to work a few miles but if you enjoy the sport and know what you are getting into then go for it get as awesome a bike as you can afford. It's better than wasting it on some huge car. Bike value should be > car value ;p

Re: Google Wants to Make Silicon Valley as Bike-Friendly as Copenhagen

#42

Post by dogma1138 »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #32
dogma1138 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are still talking about an area much smaller than SV with a much lower population density.

Rural areas in Denmark have awesome cycling infrastructure and a much lower population density than Silicon Valley. Urban areas have awesome cycling infrastructure and a much higher population density.

Lower population density areas are easier to make bike friendly, less people which means that taking off road lanes or making sidewalks slightly narrower has a smaller impact. It also means that other bike infrastructure like parking is easier to build (need less of it). Construction is also easier when you either do need to move buildings at all, or you are moving 2-3 story buildings instead of huge complexes.

Fixing public transportation is more important than fixing biking at this moment, especially in California. When more people move with cars than with public transportation it's harder to allocate the needed resources for bikes, the impact of public transportation improvement is also quicker and bigger than improving bike lanes. Not saying that having a bike / walk to work alternatives isn't important, but jumping straight to it when everything else isn't even remotely close to being right is a foolish mission in my book.

Re: Google Wants to Make Silicon Valley as Bike-Friendly as Copenhagen

#43

Post by ChuckMcM »

jmhain wrote: post #37
TulliusCicero wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sunnyvale has been adding protected bike lanes that cross it east/west to aid that effort. Have they? Where? I'd love to see some on Evelyn. Really anywhere there isn't street parking, changing painted bike lanes into protected bike lanes seems like a no-brainer. Much more (perceptual, at least) safety, without any significant change to how the road space is divvied up.

> Have they? Where? I'd love to see some on Evelyn. Me too. I was actually hit on Evelyn a few months back.

Remington has full size bike lanes, Mary and Bernardo are in the works to get them, and I don't know where the proposal for Homestead is these days.

Re: Google Wants to Make Silicon Valley as Bike-Friendly as Copenhagen

#44

Post by lukeschlather »

buckbova wrote: post #36
dkhenry wrote: post #14

I applaude this effort. I think many people discount how capable they are of making the switch to commuting via bike to work. Almost any commute less then 10 miles can easily be done via bike, and making a "safe" route to connect the metro area is a great first step. The unfortunate situation is that if you are over 10 miles to your office ( which many are ) you will have a hard time making that commute in a acceptab…

I don't want to show up to work sweaty. And I want the utility of a vehicle if my plans change. So I'll drive regardless.

That really depends on your speed. Like dhenry says, if you're going at a moderate pace, a 5 mile commute ends up being about 30 minutes door to door, and you don't really work up a sweat, definitely not in the winter, maybe sometimes in the summer. If you're going full-tilt you can get that down to 20 minutes door-to-door and then you sweat and you have to take a shower. So really it's a question of if you're trying to get some aerobic exercise during your commute or not.

I am of course speaking for Seattle where it's usually cool but not cold and damp but not really raining.

Re: Google Wants to Make Silicon Valley as Bike-Friendly as Copenhagen

#45

Post by TulliusCicero »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #43
jmhain wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Have they? Where? I'd love to see some on Evelyn. Me too. I was actually hit on Evelyn a few months back.

Remington has full size bike lanes, Mary and Bernardo are in the works to get them, and I don't know where the proposal for Homestead is these days.

Two things:

Remington & Homestead don't connect to Stevens Creek Trail, and Mary & Bernardo aren't East-West streets.

You said they were adding protected bike lanes, are any of those protected? Off the top of my head, I can't think of any protected bike lanes I've seen in Sunnyvale.

Re: Google Wants to Make Silicon Valley as Bike-Friendly as Copenhagen

#46

Post by shas3 »

dogma1138 wrote: post #2

Good luck, SV is what 4-5 times (if not more) larger than Copenhagen and consists of spotty urban, suburban, industrial areas, connected by high speed motorways and highways.

Minneapolis-St. Paul, which is as sprawl-y as it gets has done a pretty good job of connecting most of the area with paved bike-only paths. I am not sure how bad the situation in Bay Area is, but it is not easy to get too many people to bike to work 20 miles each way, every day. So I don't know how this helps unless most people live within a 10 mile radius of the work place.

Re: Google Wants to Make Silicon Valley as Bike-Friendly as Copenhagen

#48

Post by packetslave »

jrockway wrote: post #28
dogma1138 wrote: post #2

Good luck, SV is what 4-5 times (if not more) larger than Copenhagen and consists of spotty urban, suburban, industrial areas, connected by high speed motorways and highways.

Downtown Mountain View (like the Caltrain/VTA station) to Google is quite bikeable distance-wise, except for a few poorly-designed sections. You basically have to go over the freeway somehow, and to do that, you have to merge with traffic cutting over the bike lane to get on or off the freeway. I did this exactly once, people are not looking for bikes so you just have to stand and wait for a break. Good luck during c…

Note that SCT is technically closed after sunset, although the rangers have said they're lenient on enforcing it due to all the commuters.

Re: Google Wants to Make Silicon Valley as Bike-Friendly as Copenhagen

#50

Post by packetslave »

nostrademons wrote: post #29

There's actually a lot of low-hanging fruit that could make Silicon Valley a lot more bike-friendly with virtually no real-estate investment: Put up better lighting on the Stevens Creek Trail, enough so that you can see the full trail and surrounding woods after dark. This alone would've doubled the amount of trips I spent biking to work when I was at Google: the limiting factor was that after daily savings time ende…

The section of the Bay Trail behind Moffett Field apparently can't be paved for environmental reason (the legendary "burrowing owls"?) There is a plan to improve the quality, though (hard-packed/sealed dirt instead of loose gravel)
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