Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law • Hacker News Board

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#481

Post by btrettel » Sat, Apr 13, 2019, 9:41 PM UTC

TulliusCicero wrote: post #450

btrettel wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I said, I can't recall vehicular cyclists claiming that vehicular cycling will increase the number of cyclists. So don't judge them on that. I think increasing the number of cyclists is important, however. Also, I don't know any place where vehicular cycling is particularly common. It seems to be enthusiastically practiced by a relatively small group of people. As I said, though, those people are the safest cyclis…

> The infrastructure approach seems to implicitly assume that most crashes (or perhaps the most severe crashes) are due to cars rear-ending cyclists, but that's not true. It does? I've never assumed that. When I got hit, once was being t-boned, the other was a right hook. > I'm not opposed to all bike infrastructure, just bad infrastructure, which is the vast majority of what I've seen. Given the choice between no in…

> As you say, a lot of bike infrastructure is bad, but I'm not sure what that has to do with the discussion. If a city really half-asses its bus program so that it's nearly useless, we don't declare that the fault of public transportation generally. You get what you pay for and all.

I'm not anti-infrastructure. I'd consider myself about 1/2 vehicular, 1/2 infrastructural. (See my other posts in this thread; I've repeated this several times now.) Both sides have good points. The problem is that most infrastructure in the US is bad, often considerably worse than no infrastructure at all.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#482

Post by btrettel » Sat, Apr 13, 2019, 9:42 PM UTC

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #424

btrettel wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I said, I can't recall vehicular cyclists claiming that vehicular cycling will increase the number of cyclists. So don't judge them on that. I think increasing the number of cyclists is important, however. Also, I don't know any place where vehicular cycling is particularly common. It seems to be enthusiastically practiced by a relatively small group of people. As I said, though, those people are the safest cyclis…

Getting more bikes on the road makes bicycling safer. Drivers in cars are much more careful when they see bikes everywhere than when they only see them once in a blue moon. Unfortunately most people are not going to ride when they have to mix with cars. I'm willing to do it on low speed city streets, and in unprotected bike lanes at up to highway (55MPH) speeds when I have to, but the great majority of people won't,…

> Getting more bikes on the road makes bicycling safer. Drivers in cars are much more careful when they see bikes everywhere than when they only see them once in a blue moon.

I'm aware of this, but the infrastructural camp tends to assume that it's obvious these effects outweigh the problems with infrastructure. I'm not certain. I think a hybrid between the vehicular and infrastructural approaches is necessary to get the benefits of both with minimal downsides. This means recognizing the problems with infrastructure and avoiding them.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#483

Post by loco5niner » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 4:12 PM UTC

misthop wrote: post #106

just_steve_h wrote: post #68

I also wonder what all our resident PRIVATE PROPERTY enthusiasts think about on-street parking: what other of my 250 sq.ft. objects may I store on public property for free?

how big is your car? Damn....

Remember, this is from a bicyclists perspective.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#484

Post by loco5niner » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 4:19 PM UTC

nicwolff wrote: post #479

apeace wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would never yell at a bicyclist, and certainly would never hope one got hit. But I have to say, as an NYC pedestrian, I actively hate bicyclists. They don't follow the rules of the road-- at all . Red lights? Stop signs? Ignored. Pedestrians crossing in a crosswalk? Probably fine to whiz past them with 6 inches to spare. I almost get hit by fast-moving bikes once or twice a year. A car has never even come close to…

"I almost get hit" – so, you don't get hit? Once or twice a year you get... startled? In NYC in 2017, cars injured 10561 pedestrians and 4397 cyclists, and killed 106 pedestrians and 24 cyclists. Cyclists injured 315 pedestrians and killed one. http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/bicycle-crash-data... In NYC in 2016, cars injured 10775 pedestrians and 4592 cyclists, and killed 148 pedestrians and 18 cyclists. C…

Interesting that you chose to phrase it "cars injured...cyclists" and never "cyclists struck cars" as if it was never the cyclists fault.

Re: Cambridge's Ambitious Protected Bike Lane Law

#485

Post by dsabanin » Mon, Apr 15, 2019, 8:18 PM UTC

CydeWeys wrote: post #288

dsabanin wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have an option to store it a vehicle, it's your choice not to use it. I was just calling out the "free" part of the argument, property owners are definitely not getting anything for free.

On-street parking isn't limited to property owners. Anyone can use it. And no, not everyone can make the choice to use it. There simply isn't enough space, and if everyone drove then traffic would be horrendous. In Manhattan only 1 in 5 people even own cars, for example, and yet on-street parking is always completely full everywhere. So it doesn't make sense to offer it for free given that most people cannot use it.…

Define "anyone can use it"? Most likely it's going to be owners or their tenants, to whom owners right of parking generally extends.

Regarding 1 in 5 people own a car, that I think pretty much works out to full parking everywhere, since the area of the street available for parking is definitely not 1 per capita, but probably way less.

I can also apply your logic to school system. Why am I paying school taxes if I don't have children?