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Things people blamed on bicycles

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Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#371

Post by Bluecobra »

mauvehaus wrote: post #363
antihero wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just need a way to deal with bike theft. My number one concern is parking my pretty decent bike within view of where I’m sitting or not leaving it unattended for over five minutes. I’m insured, but I have a bond with my wheels! If anyone has recommendations for stealth theft detection/tracking devices I’m all ears.

In my experience it's mostly a matter of not having the most desirable bike or the shittiest lock. Put a $100 u-lock on a $300 bike, and you can almost be assured that you'll have neither. Put a nice enough lock on yours, and you can be pretty sure you won't have the most easily stolen bike either. At least in the US, road bikes are pretty much immune to being stolen because they're seen as terminally uncool by the l…

Having a dumpy old bike helps. I have accidentally locked my cheap u-lock to the bike itself instead of the bike rack a few times at a train station and nobody took it. The worst thing that has ever happened is that someone stole my quick release skewer, so I have a screw on one now.

Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#372

Post by slingnow »

seszett wrote: post #187
piokoch wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's my impression to. Bikers apparently think that those funny white stripes on the roads and bike roads are some kind of decoration, not passage for pedestrian. Many bikers think that they have priority there...

Well... I'm both a pedestrian and biker (and I generally use a car when outside my city) and honestly, I find it normal for pedestrians to give priority to bikes. It's just a lot more energy expensive to stop and start again for a bike, while it is essentially free for a pedestrian. As a pedestrian I always try to avoid making bikes stop unnecessarily, and most people seem to do the same here, even if pedestrians tec…

Well if energy output is your reasoning: then it's orders of magnitude more energy for a car to come to a full stop and re-accelerate than it is for a pedestrian to let it pass.

Should cars then have priority over people in a crosswalk?

Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#373

Post by pjmlp »

soco wrote: post #317
grardb wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you get too drunk to ride a bicycle every time you go out for drinks?

The good thing is, "too drunk to ride a bike" happens much earlier than "too drunk". And while with a car some push it and still drive drunk (sometimes with horrendous consequences), a bike has this safety mechanism where they simply cannot be ridden when drunk.

Somehow the bycicles in Germany seem to lack such mechanism, given the state of some examples I have witnessed.

Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#374

Post by throw0101a »

antihero wrote: post #310
DoubleFree wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem of dangerous interactions between drivers and cyclists is much smaller here in the Netherlands, mainly due to two reasons. The first reason is the infrastructure, both visible and invisible. Separated bicycle lanes are commonplace and in the few places where they intersect with car traffic, care is taken to make crossing safe and comfortable. This visible infrastructure is complemented by the concept of "…

Just need a way to deal with bike theft. My number one concern is parking my pretty decent bike within view of where I’m sitting or not leaving it unattended for over five minutes. I’m insured, but I have a bond with my wheels! If anyone has recommendations for stealth theft detection/tracking devices I’m all ears.

> Just need a way to deal with bike theft.

Vehicle registration works, but takes a bit of effort:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=el1Xznv5ge4

Vancouver had a 42% drop in theft after joining this program:

* https://project529.com/garage

Created by X-box co-founder:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J_Allard

Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#375

Post by tokai »

LtWorf wrote: post #325
goethes_kind wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would agree with all of those points, except for one. I do not think it is less dangerous to pedestrians. I remember when I used to live in the Netherlands, it was uncomfortable being a pedestrian because there were so many cyclists. They are still going fast enough that if they crash into you, you can expect a concussion or even worse. And they do not respect the traffic laws in the same way that cars do. And beca…

I agree. In Copenhagen multiple bas stops just go onto bike traffic. And they DO NOT CARE that a bus just stopped and people are about to come out.

You know that there is a difference between the stops right? If there is pavement on the side of the bikelane going out to the road, its on the bus passengers to stop and let the cyclist pass. So many pedestrians don't know this and think they can just throw themselves out on the bike lane.

Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#376

Post by spaetzleesser »

DoubleFree wrote: post #194
montebicyclelo wrote: post #114

Cycling is cheap, often faster than driving (in my city), healthy, less noisy, creates vastly less pollution, less dangerous to pedastrians... And I'd guess that about 95% of drivers that I come across are respectful of the danger they present - overtaking with enough space, and not at too high a speed (my city doesn't have great bike lanes). Unfortunately, a typical journey involves passing more than 20 cars, which…

The problem of dangerous interactions between drivers and cyclists is much smaller here in the Netherlands, mainly due to two reasons. The first reason is the infrastructure, both visible and invisible. Separated bicycle lanes are commonplace and in the few places where they intersect with car traffic, care is taken to make crossing safe and comfortable. This visible infrastructure is complemented by the concept of "…

"The second reason is that here, everyone is a cyclist. Going for groceries? Five minute bike ride, much easier and quicker than going by car. Kids cycle to school alone from a young age. Going out for drinks? Bike. Because everyone is a cyclist and there are cyclists everywhere, cyclists are equal participants in traffic and are treated with care and respect."

that's how I felt in Munich. Bikes were everywhere and drivers were used to them. In the US in most places bikes are rare so drivers (including me) stop looking for them.

Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#377

Post by stinos »

kuschku wrote: post #349
LtWorf wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bah, in my experience bicycle users behave really badly on average. Certainly no better than car drivers. For example they will be ready to crash on a pedestrian who is walking on a bike lane for good reason (most common ones are: an excavator made a trench on the sidewalk, the snow clearing machine took all the snow from the road and made a mountain on the sidewalk). However when there is no bike lane available, the…

I wonder where they’d get an electric bicycle going 50, considering it’s impossible to buy or import ones going more than 20 km/h in most of the EU.

Electric cycles reaching 45km/h are regulated in most of EU, no? On the most powerful ones it takes not too much effort to push to 50 (from experience). That being said, where I commute I practically never encounter anyone doing that (they just do the maximum they can do with assistence, like 42-45 depending on brand and model, or less to save battery/effort) except downhill, where you can reach 50 with a normal cycle as well.

Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#378

Post by slingnow »

goethes_kind wrote: post #223
piokoch wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's my impression to. Bikers apparently think that those funny white stripes on the roads and bike roads are some kind of decoration, not passage for pedestrian. Many bikers think that they have priority there...

Here is the issue. As you can see from my previous comment I agree with you, that cyclists are a danger from a pedestrians perspective. The problem from a cyclist's point of view is that having to stop every block to let pedestrians cross, would really really really suck on a bicycle; just losing all momentum and having to start from a stop. It would also probably be bad for the knees after a while.

It also really sucks to have to constantly stop in a car for all of those annoying traffic lights, stop signs, and of course crosswalks. It would be much much much easier and faster to just continue driving without stopping to my destination. It would also probably be bad for the environment with all of that extra idle time waiting and acceleration.

The argument sounds ridiculous when framed from a drivers point of view. And it's the same from the cyclists. Either you want traffic laws to be obeyed or you don't. Offering up that "really sucks" isn't a valid reason to ignore the laws.

Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#379

Post by WesolyKubeczek »

throw_a_grenade wrote: post #70
ginko wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to be under the impression that bikes are like cars where you're essentially guaranteed to be dead of at least maimed when they hit you. In reality the most likely thing to happen to you is that you maybe get so nasty scratches and dirty clothing.

Not OP, but this your "reality" is wrong. For example, three days ago in Warsaw, a cyclist ran over a child (ER took the child to hospital) on a busy promenade on the bank of the river. The cycleway is temporarily moved there because of the roadwork and the space is designated as shared between cycle and foot traffic. For several days pedestarians complained that cyclists drive like crazy and it's "when" not "if" som…

There's a rule that says that if you have (and have a right to at all) ride or drive anything on wheels in an area designated primarily for pedestrian use, you have to move at pedestrian speed. It doesn't matter if you are on a bicycle or an electric scooter, or on a garbage truck, 5 km/h it is.

And yet people seem to promptly forget about it as soon as they get onto their killing machines. Must be something in the wheels or saddles causing them a selective amnesia.

Electric scooters on crosswalks are surely a plague. Teens on them tend to ride out of the bushes at their maximum speed and cross roads without ever slowing down, making it quite hard for drivers to anticipate. Yes, you have right of way, dolt, but so has a car that just turned right, after making sure it's clear to go. There is no way to tell that a crazy kid is going to jump out in the next 300ms.

Re: Things people blamed on bicycles

#380

Post by sebazzz »

rocgf wrote: post #259
moffkalast wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Going out for drinks? Bike. As long as you don't actually drink anything hah. Everyone's a designated driver with bikes.

Cycling drunk is technically illegal, but often unenforced in the Netherlands. You should see the thousands of obviously 'drunk' people leaving festivals on bikes, under the eyes of the police.

Fun fact: you can lose your car driving license if you are drunk when cycling. But you can't lose it if you don't have one!
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