Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

citylab.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 485 posts

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#71

Post by skrebbel »

tomcam wrote: post #64
just_steve_h wrote: post #61

I've lived in Cambridge or neighboring Somerville every year but one since 1989. The cycling infrastructure is much improved and still deadly. Just yesterday, I approached an arterial Street from a side street at 6pm. Cars on the arterial were moving about 8 MPH. I dismounted my bike, and began walking across the arterial in the crosswalk. As I re-mounted on the other side and resumed riding, a white man in a mid-siz…

What does the fact that he was white have to do with it?

To help visualize the anecdote.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#72

Post by RHSeeger »

ahoy wrote: post #62
chadash wrote: post #27

> "Local law now requires the city to erect vertical barriers between cyclists and cars on any roadway that’s rebuilt, expanded, or reconfigured" I'm all for better bike lanes, but it seems kind of extreme to require this for all new roads [0]. I used to live in Cambridge and rode my bike quite a bit. I never felt like I needed a dedicated lane on every side street, just on the main drags (where some of the new prote…

Better bike infrastructure will encourage groups of people who don't currently bike to start. More protected lanes means more kids, more old folks, more women of all ages, will start cycling. And more cycling is a good thing!

There's many things that are good things. However, you need to balance them against the cost (money, space, time, whatever) required to achieve them. For some smaller roads, the cost might not be worth the benefit.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#73

Post by gbear605 »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #31
jdgoesmarching wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there scooter companies in Cambridge? I've been hoping they would spur some major cities to invest in bike lanes but I'm not sure if that's the case here. Either way, solid win all around.

The entire state of MA is highly unwelcoming to anything with two wheels and a motor that is less than a motorcycle (and even then it kinda sucks for them too). You say "scooter" or "moped" and suburban soccer moms and uptight politicians get images of New Dehli in their heads and that's too low class for MA so any organized attempt at doing that gets blocked by the power of arbitrary enforcement. As another commente…

Single party nature of the state? The governor is Republican

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#74

Post by addicted »

amalcon wrote: post #54
mhb wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On a lot of streets, won't the only way to do this be to eliminate parking on one side of the street? Should be interesting.

This is what has happened so far. Retail business owners have... not been pleased (to put it mildly). Overall it's pretty clearly been a net gain, but there's definitely some short term pain there.

I don’t believe there is pain. All the studies in the US have shown that improving biking infrastructure immediately improves retail sales (it’s obvious why...you throw bikes in the mix, and walking is also a lot safer, and everyone who enters a retail store eventually needs to walk, so a nicer walking environment makes it better for all their customers).

The complaints are likely a combination of general aversion to change, the fact that most retailers are likely drivers and identify as such and look at bike improvements as an attack on their group, and media reporting that focuses on those who lie on the extremes.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#75

Post by gnulinux »

As a biker in Cambridge, I have mixed feelings about this. Biking in Cambridge is subpar, I lived in Berkeley, CA 4 years and biking was MUCH more comfortable there. I'm worried this will hinder the progress and slow down constructing new bike lanes. I want more protection BUT I also want bike lanes every where. If they're not gonna construct more bike lanes because now it has more regulation, this is a negative development. If this will not happen, this is a positive development. Time will show. I'm hopeful but skeptical.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#76

Post by wool_gather »

biswaroop wrote: post #55
barrad0s wrote: post #43

There is already barely any parking in Cambridge, driving there already sucks... Let's see how much worse this is gonna get.

Good. Parking and driving are not well-suited to narrow roads in high density cities. There have been tons of studies that show this. This is as a Cambridge resident who struggles to find parking when I occasionally have to. Parked cars are truly a blight on our beautiful streets. Protected bike lanes are definitely [edit: probably] part of the route towards greater livability.

I agree mostly, except that there needs to be a usable non-bicycle alternative to cars too. I love riding, but not everybody can do it all the time, for a large variety of reasons. Reducing in-city car usage is good, but just forcing it to be even more unpleasant is not going to solve anything.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#77

Post by CydeWeys »

amalcon wrote: post #65
strictnein wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't they get snow? With vertical barriers I'm confused how a plow will be able to properly clear the street.

Most of the existing separated bike lanes are incorporated into the sidewalk, and therefore protected by the curb. There are a few that are "protected" by rows of parked cars or bolted-down pylons, but this would seem to not be legal under the new law. I'm actually not sure how they manage to get those bike lanes cleared, seeing as how the sidewalks are always covered in snow, but there seems to be some method.

There are smaller vehicles that are used to plow just the bike lanes in some parts of the world.

It probably doesn't matter so much though because the percentage of people who continue biking even in cold winter and with adverse snow conditions is quite low.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#78

Post by dsfyu404ed »

coleca wrote: post #67
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire state of MA is highly unwelcoming to anything with two wheels and a motor that is less than a motorcycle (and even then it kinda sucks for them too). You say "scooter" or "moped" and suburban soccer moms and uptight politicians get images of New Dehli in their heads and that's too low class for MA so any organized attempt at doing that gets blocked by the power of arbitrary enforcement. As another commente…

MA already had laws statewide mandating bike lanes on new construction and renovation. This has led to the situation near my house where a highway intersection (Route 1 and 495) was rebuilt and a bike lane added for about 1000 feet on a road that has a 55mph speed limit. There is no bike lane on the rest of Route 1, just around the intersection where the construction happened. Now we have a bike lane that will never…

This is what you get when the state government is basically the standard oil octopus with its tentacles into everything and the majority of state decisions are made by people who don't acknowledge anything outside of I95. They could have just passed local laws but doing it state level lets them pat themselves on the back more so of course they do it to the detriment of everyone else.

>eliminates the community’s ability to use common sense

The higher entity telling the lower entity they can't be trusted to think for themselves is a really common theme in MA politics if you're looking for it. I'm not sure how we got here but it sucks.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#79

Post by bluGill »

close04 wrote: post #35
chadash wrote: post #27

> "Local law now requires the city to erect vertical barriers between cyclists and cars on any roadway that’s rebuilt, expanded, or reconfigured" I'm all for better bike lanes, but it seems kind of extreme to require this for all new roads [0]. I used to live in Cambridge and rode my bike quite a bit. I never felt like I needed a dedicated lane on every side street, just on the main drags (where some of the new prote…

It's the perfect time to do it. Building the protected bike lane in the road design from the get go is the most effective way to make both cyclists and drivers happy and safe.

But it isn't the perfect reason. I live on a dead end road (road ends at the creek), it doesn't take much intelligence to realize the pavement is nearly worn out and so will be replaced soon. However because the road doesn't go anywhere, there is no need for any bike lane. If anything it needs a basketball hoop in the middle - all that hard surface is wasted on cars: let the kids play when there isn't a car coming.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#80

Post by otras »

chadash wrote: post #27

> "Local law now requires the city to erect vertical barriers between cyclists and cars on any roadway that’s rebuilt, expanded, or reconfigured" I'm all for better bike lanes, but it seems kind of extreme to require this for all new roads [0]. I used to live in Cambridge and rode my bike quite a bit. I never felt like I needed a dedicated lane on every side street, just on the main drags (where some of the new prote…

Here's a map from the Globe of bike accidents reported to Cambridge police from 2010-2014 [0]. Unfortunately the map no longer loads for me, but the accidents are mostly along major roads and the area is still discernible, especially when compared side by side with a map of the area [1]. As the article says, Cambridge Street, Broadway, Beacon Street, and Mass Ave are all hot spots.

Would love to see data combined with Somerville, since I'm sure the stretch of Beacon between Porter and Inman would be similarly populated. These are also only accidents reported to police, so I would bet they lean towards more serious accidents.

[0]: https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/10/05/map-bike-crashe... [1]: https://www.google.com/maps/@42.3773046,-71.1224085,14z

Post reply on HN