Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco • Hacker News Board

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#161

Post by revelation » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:38 AM UTC

ubernostrum wrote: post #113

dasil003 wrote: post #84

I've spent most of my life with cycling as my primary mode of transportation, living in Minneapolis, Santa Fe, London and SF/Oakland. I ride fast and generally try to go with the flow to avoid inconveniencing drivers while also being considerate to pedestrians. I think this traffic cone thing is pretty cool, but I have a larger observation to make: Here's the thing about SF: everyone is way too fucking agro. Drivers…

Want some fun? Try being someone who commutes in the Bay area via a combination of walking and public transit. Cars give me very little trouble. Bicycles, though.. at least a couple times a week I nearly get killed by one. At crosswalks, typically I'm in a crowd of people and drivers know better than to try to make a turn through the crowd. Cyclists, though, will blow through, even just flat running a red light, and…

The number of deaths in bicycle - pedestrian collisions is about 1 (one) every few years.

I'm sure there are idiots cycling just as there are idiots driving, but if I get a choice between an idiot on a bike and an idiot in his truck potentially hitting me I'll take the bike every time. These things quite frankly don't compare.

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#162

Post by Doctor_Fegg » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:39 AM UTC

oarsinsync wrote: post #121

m0nty wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> cyclists tend to be more of a menace than cars That must be why bikes injure 60,000 people per annum in the UK, and kill ~2,000. Then there's the ~40,000 deaths from pollution. Oh wait, that's the cars. Maybe you need to rethink what you mean by "menace"? Annoying and inconvenient (even threatening) is not the same as deadly.

> That must be why bikes injure 60,000 people per annum in the UK, and kill ~2,000. Then there's the ~40,000 deaths from pollution. Oh wait, that's the cars. 40k deaths from impact from car, or 40k deaths from pollution? The two are not the same. Cars produce a lot of pollution. So do offices. So do busses. So does the underground tube network. Impact from car I'm sure is cause for a lot of injuries and deaths, use t…

Real numbers on actual collisions (UK urban areas, 2012):

Pedestrians killed by motorists: 253

Pedestrians killed by cyclists: 1

Pedestrians seriously injured by motorists: 4,426

Pedestrians seriously injured by cyclists: 78

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#163

Post by brokenmachine » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:43 AM UTC

staticelf wrote: post #93

Bike lanes in SF: https://www.google.se/search?q=bike+lanes+SF&safe=off&client... Bike lanes in Stockholm: https://www.google.se/search?q=bike+lanes+stockholm&safe=off... Bike lanes in Amsterdam: https://www.google.se/search?q=bike+lanes+amsterdam&safe=off... I guess SF / USA have something to learn from Europeans and that is to build some shit between the bike lane and the car lane. Let it be cones, rails or whateve…

Don't worry, you're not alone.

Australia's bike infrastructure also sucks.

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#164

Post by PeterSmit » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:46 AM UTC

Symbiote wrote: post #99

dasil003 wrote: post #84

I've spent most of my life with cycling as my primary mode of transportation, living in Minneapolis, Santa Fe, London and SF/Oakland. I ride fast and generally try to go with the flow to avoid inconveniencing drivers while also being considerate to pedestrians. I think this traffic cone thing is pretty cool, but I have a larger observation to make: Here's the thing about SF: everyone is way too fucking agro. Drivers…

> to avoid inconveniencing drivers I used to cycle like that, in London. I moved to Copenhagen, and quickly had to change my behaviour. Drivers are firmly at the bottom of the heap here, and everyone knows it. It's inefficient and confusing to others to disrupt this.

And that is how it should be. Cars are great to go between cities fast, but inside cities they should behave like guests. Ironically, most drivers are guests to a city as well, coming from the suburbs. Pedestrians, cyclists and public transportation are the most efficient mode of transportation inside a city, and should be honored as such. In most medium to big Dutch cities this is the case, although there is always room for improvement.

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#165

Post by Doctor_Fegg » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:46 AM UTC

soneil wrote: post #157

gaff33 wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what happens when bikes follow rules designed for cars: http://archives.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2015/07/30/this-is-wh... It's patently stupid to have the same rules for bikes as it is for cars since they are completely different vehicles. Now perhaps this is a case of semantics: The Highway Code has rules for all users of highways, but obviously within those rules some apply to cars, some to pedestrians, and s…

This is the crux of the issue. Many of the laws we're supposed to follow aren't fit for purpose. I do stop at red lights - and I can tell you it pisses people off no end. People want to gun it off the lights, and instead they're stuck behind me. I have been involved in an 'accident' where the driver behind me tried to overtake off the lights, through the junction, and into the traffic island on the other side. At the…

Yep.

I observe red lights in London. I observe red lights in Oxford. Locations where, however imperfectly, the highway authorities consider cyclists in the design process.

I used to work in Burton-on-Trent (ex-industrial town in the English Midlands). My daily commute involved one particular intersection so badly designed that the only way to avoid a dangerous and potentially fatal car/bike interaction, if you were at the front of the queue, was to set off 5 seconds before the lights went green. (It has since been redesigned, thankfully.)

If you build infrastructure and formulate laws to benefit motorists and to potentially kill cyclists, don't be surprised if cyclists break those laws.

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#166

Post by Doctor_Fegg » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:48 AM UTC

dagw wrote: post #133

gambiting wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> bicyclists should have to follow exactly the same rules as drivers I mean....where the hell do you live where they do not? Everything about giving priority, obeying traffic lights, one-way streets, should absolutely apply to bicycles, how can it possibly not?

Well it technically does apply in a purely legal sense. However many cyclists don't really care and I've never heard of a any cyclist suffering any legal consequence because of this.

Over 11,000 fines were issued to cyclists for breaking traffic laws in the UK in 2013.

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#167

Post by pricechild » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:50 AM UTC

bigiain wrote: post #148

tempestn wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe this is directly contradicted by the statistical evidence. I'll see if I can find a reference... Edit: you are correct that at high speeds (over 50km/h) bike helmets become less effective when hit by a car. However, many car/bike accidents occur at speeds below 50km/h, in which case helmets can and do save lives. [1] One could make a similar statement to yours regarding any safety device. A seatbelt probabl…

I'm not exactly Lance Armstrong, so I can barely make it to 25km/h on my bicycle (without a good tailwind or a downhill run) and I certainly can't maintain it for long. What's the bottom end of that effectiveness curve look like? It's 100% clear that helmets have zero effectiveness at 0km/h[1] - I bet the "effectiveness" of helmets is statistically the same a zero at 1km/h and 3km/h as well - where's the data that sh…

I suspect the speed is the closing speed between the cyclist and whatever they hit? Reading the article, it is unclear and might even be solely the speed of the car.

Maybe best to try and find the original paper to clarify that one.

EDIT: http://bast.opus.hbz-nrw.de/volltexte/2013/692/pdf/41_Than.p... looks relevant, but I can't see the claims repeated in e.g. the Mirror article.

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#168

Post by cerebellum42 » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:50 AM UTC

cmarschner wrote: post #95

Here is an outside view, fwiw, the official recommendations for bike lanes in Germany. In German, but lots of pictures! http://www.kompetenzzentrum-radverkehr.de/fileadmin/redakteu... Question: Is there an association like AAA is for cars that represents bikers in the US? That could take on the discussions with the government.

After reading some of that, it contains some recommendations that lead to annoying and sometimes dangerous situations for cyclists that I recognize from my everyday cycling experiences in Germany.

Just one example:

They seem to encourage usage of pedestrian paths with "bikes allowed" signs on medium traffic streets with ~50km/h speed limit, think main road of a small-ish town. These have become waaay too popular, especially in small towns and some areas of bigger cities too.

They make the cyclist choose between these two options:

* share the pavement with pedestrians, but with barely any separation from the pedestrians; so you're either really really slow or you endanger pedestrians

* use the road and share it with drivers who think it belongs solely to them and endanger cyclists

So either way, it's a bad experience and potentially dangerous.

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#169

Post by LeifCarrotson » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:52 AM UTC

jrockway wrote: post #126

dasil003 wrote: post #84

I've spent most of my life with cycling as my primary mode of transportation, living in Minneapolis, Santa Fe, London and SF/Oakland. I ride fast and generally try to go with the flow to avoid inconveniencing drivers while also being considerate to pedestrians. I think this traffic cone thing is pretty cool, but I have a larger observation to make: Here's the thing about SF: everyone is way too fucking agro. Drivers…

The thing we need in the United States are traffic tickets. A lot of people get tickets on freeways (where there is a dedicated highway patrol that exists only to write speeding tickets), but nobody gets ticketed on surface streets, no matter how badly they drive. I see garbage trucks barrelling through red lights at 45mph. I see taxis driving the wrong way down one-way streets. I see black cars driving 60mph down na…

>There was an interesting pilot program to give $50 tickets to people exceeding the speed limit by 30mph in school zones. Tons of opposition.

This is already present. School zones already have reduced speed limits during certain times and often increased fines, just like work zones. Was the backlash against automated ticket cameras that target the owners of vehicles? Against lengthening the times of enforcement?

30mph over is already a ticket for much more than $50.

Re: Guerrilla Bike Lanes in San Francisco

#170

Post by luca_ing » Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 10:59 AM UTC

adrianratnapala wrote: post #56

brokenmachine wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In NSW it is illegal to pass within 1m of a cyclist. I ride to work, and every single day people ignore that rule. I have never seen anyone fined for it. Our police/government just doesn't care, and attitudes like yours don't help. Cycling on the road is legal and until it isn't, just saying, "I don't see how it's safe" is irrelevant. I also drive, but I'm capable of not losing my mind and putting other people's live…

Now I cycle to work and recently let my drivers license lapse. But the 1m rule sounds draconian to me. It means drivers have to keep about two metres from the kerb. That's not always possible on Sydney roads. Sure, if the cars are moving fast then I would like a wide space. But in heavier / slower traffic (which was the common case when I lived in London), then I only need a "lane" wide enough for me to ride through.…

> But the 1m rule sounds draconian to me.

Germany has even stricter rules in practice: courts have regularly decided that a minimum of 1.5m ... 2m is necessary, depending on the situation. In special cases, even up to 2.8m have been deemed necessary.

BTW, even if cars don't actually touch a cyclist, but merely frighten them and cause them to react, it's already a traffic offense. Difficult to enforce in practice, of course.

Details for German-speakers: https://www.adfc-nrw.de/kreisverbaende/kv-bottrop/radverkehr...