141–150 of 391 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Amsterdam is one of the worst cities to bike in (on a Dutch scale). It only get's better in other cities!
I didn’t know that, I’ve only been to Amsterdam, what is different in other cities?
> What is the speed threshold?
> Anything where cars are traveling faster than 30 kph. So, what’s that, 19 mph?
As a Dutchman, this is so obviously wrong that it makes me doubt everything factual in the book they wrote. 50 roads without physical separation are the default, and 60 roads are often back roads where there is not enough traffic to warrant the space (=money) required for a separated cycling lane so those typically also have no physical barriers.
I guess the limit is 70km/h, as I can't off the top of my head think of any 70-80 road where cyclists don't have separate infrastructure, though I'm sure one can find an exception.
I was very surprised to learn that in Germany, they have no trouble with having people drive without even an indicated bike lane (I'd feel unsafe driving on a 50 road if people drive 50, there is no space left over, and there is no bike lane outlined) on 100km/h roads.
> Cycle tracks are all paved with this easily identified red pavement, an inch-thick top coat of dyed red asphalt
Inch-thick? 2.6cm? Have they even been to the country at all? Never have I ever seen the red paint so thick that you'd notice it when driving onto it, I'm fairly certain that doesn't exist anywhere in the country. The only tactile paint we have is the white lines on the sides of highways, which I assume is to wake dozers up.
It isn't all fun and games. I had to ride the bike to school for 5 years. Over in the neighbouring city. A 45 minute ride. Alone. Through wind, rain, wind and wind. And rain. That's also part of the culture, because it's safe and ok to send kids, 12 years old, on their own, in the dark over unlit forest roads. Through the wind. Also wind. Saves on bus fare. Which is also typically Dutch. I don't own a bike any more.
I would have loved that kind of independence at age 12, but with the fear of traffic, paedophiles, kidnappers and whatever, I wasn't even allowed to walk to the end of the road unsupervised.
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Unfortunately I don't get the economics of lime ebikes. You pay $6/hr to ride one, which, assuming a very generous average speed of 14.5mph (the maximum of the bike), is an end user cost of $0.41 per mile minimum. It costs me ~$0.35 per mile to drive a car. I also don't have to bother with any apps or worry about the battery being charged, both of which are inconveniences. Also, just to set the record straight, I own…
You completely ignored all the other costs of owning a car: insurance, parking, maintenance. You're paying much, much more than $0.35/mile my friend.
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I’ve stopped peaking over my shoulders ever since I’ve gotten a car with a bunch of sensors and cameras. Now it seems like it is more dangerous to take the time to look back and instead just rely on the fairly reliable sensor indicator in the side review mirrors. It’s not even like you can do both, unfortunately, since you either look here or there. I wonder how much driving will change with technology before we get…
What car has sensors that can detect bikes or pedestrians? My Subaru has rear radar, which is great at detecting vehicles that I literally can’t see, but I would never trust that to alert me to bikes or people.
It wasn’t always this way. There’s an interesting clip from a documentary in 1972 about the neighborhood De Pijp in Amsterdam, when it was still very much a car-centric city. At the time children in the area protested how dangerous the streets had become and how they lacked safe areas to play. https://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2013/12/12/amsterdam-chil... Compared to the situation now, it’s vastly improved. Fortunat…
It was the same with Denmark. And especially Copenhagen. They went from a very car-centric society to a remarkably bike-centric one. Despite bad weather. All due to the Oil Crisis. Unlike other governments in the rest of EU, it seems that both the Dutch and the Danes understood a change was needed. I've read urbanism brochures from the 1960s, when the Technical University was getting moved from central Copenhagen to…
Another way in which biking in (some parts of) the US isn't casual: pretty much every biker you see in Silicon Valley has bike shorts, a jersey advertising a race or energy drink, clip-in shoes and is riding at VO₂ max. I feel out of place tooling around in street clothes.
Where and when are you looking? That's more or less how I look biking past Portola Valley on the weekends (on the rare occasions I get out anymore). But on the weekdays during commute hours, you'll find me on the Stevens Creek trail or Mountain View's bicycle boulevard instead, wearing normal work clothes, biking more slowly, and pulling a two-kid trailer. Most cyclists I see there don't look anything like what you're describing.
As a Dutch person I am pleasantly surprised by this article, it gets basically everything right. One thing though is that our geography works well with biking. I visited the US recently and you can drive for 30 minutes in a car and you are still in LA, if you drive for 30 minutes in the Netherlands you're in a completely different city. Everything is just closer and hence more bike-able. As a dutch person I would abs…
> One thing though is that our geography works well with biking. I visited the US recently and you can drive for 30 minutes in a car and you are still in LA, if you drive for 30 minutes in the Netherlands you're in a completely different city. That's not geography, that's urban planning, or a lack of it. America's geographic size meant that we could sprawl, not that we had to. And indeed, especially in the post-WW2 e…
Aside from this , it's overall pretty repuslive to see how my hometown continues developing with the expectation that people will just drive out and drive back.
I once drove my bike through The Netherlands, Germany, Luxembourg, France and Belgium. They all have bike lanes (well France sometimes have them) but what is different is that most bike lanes in The Netherlands are separated from other lanes. So you are and feel mutch safer. So I believe that bike lanes are not enough. They should be realy separated from other trafic.
The other thing is that Europe doesn't have nearly as many huge SUVs as America. Helps a ton with visibility, driver awareness, braking speed, and less momentum in collisions.
My 2016 VW Golf was very difficult to see out of, and that's a small(ish) box on wheels! I barely even bothered to look out of the mail slit rear window, I just use the backup camera.
Our Tesla 3 is even worse; the rear 3/4 view is virtually impossible, and the trunklid is so high you'll only see the roof of the car behind you. Again, you're far safer relying on the camera at that point. The car also has huge blind spots due to the insane US side mirror laws that require flat glass on the driver's side. I'm anxiously awaiting the 3 going on sale in Europe so I can buy an aspheric replacement that allows me to see more than the grille of the car on my left.
https://newworldeconomics.com/the-problem-with-bicycles/
Bikes are expensive personal transportation, compared to not owning any, they take up space in every home with muddy, oily mechanisms, they take up a lot of space in bicycle parks outside every desirable destination serving to push everything further apart for humans on foot, they don't mesh well with pedestrians (in a collision with a pedestrian and a fast moving metal bike, the pedestrian loses), they require equipment you might need to carry (locks, helmets, other), they need ongoing maintenance, they don't go well with nice clothes and tend to require places to change, carrying a change of clothes, or even showers, after any but short journeys in mellow weather.