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Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

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Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#31

Post by edwinjm »

ptaipale wrote: post #29
EliRivers wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you wear a helmet when you walk somewhere? If not, why not? If you've decided that the risk of head injury when you walk somewhere is so little that you'll take the risk and not wear the helmet, you've made the exact same decision as the cyclists. In the Netherlands, because they have a sensible traffic system, the risk has been reduced so far that many, many people make that same decision that you do when you wal…

No, I don't wear a helmet when walking, but I do when cycling. That is because my speed is much higher when cycling, and because it is easier to fall. And I've experienced that a cycling helmet is good to wear. There was this child that appeared from a bush to the bike path. I hit the brakes and went over the bar. A slight bumb in the head but no injury there; broke a radix bone though.

As you can see in the video, all cyclists drive quite slow. In the Netherlands, cyclists who use their bike for sport, do wear helmets and go outside town.

Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#32

Post by stinos »

ptaipale wrote: post #29
EliRivers wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you wear a helmet when you walk somewhere? If not, why not? If you've decided that the risk of head injury when you walk somewhere is so little that you'll take the risk and not wear the helmet, you've made the exact same decision as the cyclists. In the Netherlands, because they have a sensible traffic system, the risk has been reduced so far that many, many people make that same decision that you do when you wal…

No, I don't wear a helmet when walking, but I do when cycling. That is because my speed is much higher when cycling, and because it is easier to fall. And I've experienced that a cycling helmet is good to wear. There was this child that appeared from a bush to the bike path. I hit the brakes and went over the bar. A slight bumb in the head but no injury there; broke a radix bone though.

because it is easier to fall ... I hit the brakes and went over the bar

Please do not be offended, and by all means keep on wearing a helmet if you want (after all it is safer, no denying that) but maybe there is room for improvement in your cycling? Those two things I quoted seem to indicate you haven't completely mastered cycling, or your bike isn't properly setup, or a combination of both. I see them for instance as well with foreigners who never owned a bycicle and then come to a country and are given one. For an experienced byciclist riding is usually a second nature, like walking, and falls don't happen more often then they do with walking. Note I'm talking 'normal' cycling here, not for instance downhill or bmx where not ever falling sometimes means you're not pushing yourself hard enough :]

Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#33

Post by pm24601 »

DanBC wrote: post #20
Nux wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. Helmets for cyclists should be mandatory, just like seat belts are for drivers.

Mandatory helmet laws kill people, and possibly more than are saved. This happens in two ways: car drivers drive more dangerously when they see a helmet; less people ride a bycicle and so there is more pollution and more deaths or more lack-of-exercise related death.

> car drivers drive more dangerously when they see a helmet

In the U.S. and U.K.. sadly this is true. ( http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/somerset/5334208.... )

"Dr Walker thinks the reason drivers give less room to cyclists wearing helmets is because they see them as 'Lycra-clad street warriors' and believe they are more predictable than those without."

"To test another theory, Dr Walker donned a long wig to see whether there was any difference in passing distance when drivers thought they were overtaking what appeared to be a female cyclist.

"While wearing the wig, drivers gave him an average of 14cm more space when passing."

However, allowing this to remain true is victim blaming. A driver should be forced to respect a cyclist and give them room.

In California, (yeah California) there is now a 3 foot minimum passing distance ( https://calbike.org/advocacy/giveme3/give-me-3-faq/ )

"The law is invaluable when a bicyclist is injured in a collision. It establishes a clear basis for citing motorists for unsafe passing."

"How do motorists give three feet on narrow roads?

"State law has never guaranteed motorists a right to pass whenever or wherever they want. Motorists may only pass when it’s safe to do so. This doesn’t change with the Three Feet for Safety Act.

"The new law requires motorists to slow down and wait to pass only when it is safe to do so. Motorists have to be prepared to demonstrate that three feet were NOT available and the slower, closer pass was done according to the law. This is a higher burden of proof for drivers than we have under the current law, which places no conditions on how to pass at a “safe distance.”

So hopefully, the police will aggressively ticket motorists acting in a way that is unsafe for cyclists.

Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#34

Post by ptaipale »

stinos wrote: post #32
ptaipale wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I don't wear a helmet when walking, but I do when cycling. That is because my speed is much higher when cycling, and because it is easier to fall. And I've experienced that a cycling helmet is good to wear. There was this child that appeared from a bush to the bike path. I hit the brakes and went over the bar. A slight bumb in the head but no injury there; broke a radix bone though.

because it is easier to fall ... I hit the brakes and went over the bar Please do not be offended, and by all means keep on wearing a helmet if you want (after all it is safer, no denying that) but maybe there is room for improvement in your cycling? Those two things I quoted seem to indicate you haven't completely mastered cycling, or your bike isn't properly setup, or a combination of both. I see them for instance…

Well, I have been riding bike well over 40 years and I do about 4000 km per year on bike, and I don't think I will master it any better in the future than I have so far. I don't fall often, but it happens more often than when walking and is definitely scarier. I mostly don't do "sports", I just commute.

And since bikes don't have ABS, I either have brakes that are not powerful enough, or I have brakes that throw me over the bar if I a mistake in a surprising situation (such as in the case I mentioned). Most falls I have are due to ice. Every winter morning is a decision: do I take the bike with studded tyres, or the one that is much lighter to ride? Sometimes I make the wrong assessment.

Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#35

Post by agumonkey »

pm24601 wrote: post #30
agumonkey wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Younger I used to do the same, that was before I learned to drive. I'll never ride that way ever again. It's dangerous for everyone, as a driver I have to anxiously check every bike because they may cross streams at any point in the future.

Yes as a driver you should anxiously check for cyclists - just like you should check for kids and other people that can be killed by your driving. I teach my kids that their number one job when driving is to not kill anyone.

Pedestrians don't really use the road, they cross it from time to time (of course we should all be extra careful about them). Bikes can be everywhere, pass you from behind, between lanes, pass red lights at high speed etc etc. I don't want to bump one into incoming traffic.

Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#36

Post by stinos »

ptaipale wrote: post #34
stinos wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

because it is easier to fall ... I hit the brakes and went over the bar Please do not be offended, and by all means keep on wearing a helmet if you want (after all it is safer, no denying that) but maybe there is room for improvement in your cycling? Those two things I quoted seem to indicate you haven't completely mastered cycling, or your bike isn't properly setup, or a combination of both. I see them for instance…

Well, I have been riding bike well over 40 years and I do about 4000 km per year on bike, and I don't think I will master it any better in the future than I have so far. I don't fall often, but it happens more often than when walking and is definitely scarier. I mostly don't do "sports", I just commute. And since bikes don't have ABS, I either have brakes that are not powerful enough, or I have brakes that throw me o…

I still have a couple of years to go to reach that number of years, and doing roughly 3000km/year commuting. So I guess we just look at it differently then; I also ride bmx/dirt jumping, less in the last years because it can be quite harsh on the body, might be that it teaches you more control over a bike in general. Ragarding the brakes: there are types which can bring you to a sudden halt if needed, but with a lever that still has lots of travel to allow for fine modulation. Usually the more expensive disc/rim brakes with oil instead of a steel cable are fine. Though I agree that if it's your instinctive reflex to completely squeeze the lever in a perilous situation it's either all or nothing. Regarding ice: completely agree, even with proper equipment it's a struggle. And probably does lead to more falls then walking.

Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#37

Post by wolfgke »

jules wrote: post #6
rertrree wrote: post #3

The future of transportation is; separate different modes of transportation as much as possible. When I was younger, I was regularly biking in between the car lanes( sometimes very risky ), skipping the bicycle paths since they were much slower or simply missing. I would almost always get there before I would with a car or a bus, and parking wasn't a problem. If the lanes were completely separated this could be done…

Just as important as junction design is driver education. In the Netherlands they focus very hard on driving safely with respect to cyclists. A big part of that is indeed roundabouts. An average driving course will make you practice driving safely on different types of roundabouts many many times, and the main focus is on avoiding accidents with cyclists. This is important because on most roundabouts the cyclists do…

Rather off topic, but have you already considered that the obligation of a driver's license is against the hacker ethics and thus hackers should campaign for an abolition of driver's licenses?

Let me explain: In Levy's hacker ethics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_ethic#The_hacker_ethics) it is formulated as the first point:

"Access to computers—and anything which might teach you something about the way the world works—should be unlimited and total. Always yield to the Hands-On Imperative!"

Since today's cars are computers on wheels (source: transcript of "The Coming War on General Computation" of Cory Doctorow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUEvRyemKSg from https://github.com/jwise/28c3-doctorow/blob/master/transcrip...):

"We don't have cars anymore, we have computers we ride in; we don't have airplanes anymore, we have flying Solaris boxes with a big bucketful of SCADA controllers [laughter]; a 3D printer is not a device, it's a peripheral, and it only works connected to a computer; a radio is no longer a crystal, it's a general-purpose computer with a fast ADC and a fast DAC and some software."

this rule should also apply to cars. Also for point 3 of Levy's hacker ethics

"Mistrust authority—promote decentralization"

it is clear how an mandatory driver's licenses violates it, since there is a central authority which allows/disallows driving.

To state one thing clear: If you want to drive a vehicle, I strongly recommend taking some driving lessons. But making a driver's license madatory is a clear violation of the hacker ethics and any hacker or supporter of the hacking scene should make in no uncertain manner clear that they espouse an abolition of mandatory driver's licenses.

Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#38

Post by krapp »

wolfgke wrote: post #37
jules wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just as important as junction design is driver education. In the Netherlands they focus very hard on driving safely with respect to cyclists. A big part of that is indeed roundabouts. An average driving course will make you practice driving safely on different types of roundabouts many many times, and the main focus is on avoiding accidents with cyclists. This is important because on most roundabouts the cyclists do…

Rather off topic, but have you already considered that the obligation of a driver's license is against the hacker ethics and thus hackers should campaign for an abolition of driver's licenses? Let me explain: In Levy's hacker ethics ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_ethic#The_hacker_ethics ) it is formulated as the first point: "Access to computers—and anything which might teach you something about the way the wo…

You're arguing against trusting authority while insisting we all should do exactly what Steven Levy tells us to do.

Also, a drivers' license doesn't deny one access to a car, nor does it deny one the ability to drive (except perhaps legally.) So I fail to see how requiring a license to drive limits a hackers' access to the computer in a car in any meaningful way.

You could just as well argue we should all steal anything with a chip in it because stores are limiting access to electronic goods by requiring people to pay for them. Or that every network in existence which employs any privileged access (passwords, sudo, etc) violates that ethic because by definition, they're denying someone access to some part of the code.

The hacker ethic is fine and all, but like anything, once you take it too far it just becomes another form of fascism.

Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#39

Post by [deleted] »

krapp wrote: post #38
wolfgke wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rather off topic, but have you already considered that the obligation of a driver's license is against the hacker ethics and thus hackers should campaign for an abolition of driver's licenses? Let me explain: In Levy's hacker ethics ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_ethic#The_hacker_ethics ) it is formulated as the first point: "Access to computers—and anything which might teach you something about the way the wo…

You're arguing against trusting authority while insisting we all should do exactly what Steven Levy tells us to do. Also, a drivers' license doesn't deny one access to a car, nor does it deny one the ability to drive (except perhaps legally.) So I fail to see how requiring a license to drive limits a hackers' access to the computer in a car in any meaningful way. You could just as well argue we should all steal anyth…

[deleted]

Re: Junction design in the Netherlands [video]

#40

Post by DonHopkins »

Hans Monderman was a famous Dutch traffic engineer who hated traffic signs, which he considers an admission of failure.

He said: "The trouble with traffic engineers is that when there's a problem with a road, they always try to add something. To my mind, it's much better to remove things."

Wikipedia: Hans Monderman: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Monderman

Project for Public Places: Hans Monderman http://www.pps.org/reference/hans-monderman

Urban Design London and Urban Design Group Multimedia: Hans Monderman: http://www.urbannous.org.uk/Hans-Monderman-Presentation.htm

Roads Gone Wild: http://archive.wired.com/wired/archive/12.12/traffic.html

Hans Monderman on the Importance of Human Interaction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOH9-DgJdTo

His philosophy reminds me of the premise of "Magic Ink: Information Software and the Graphical User Interface": "I argue that interactivity is actually a curse for users and a crutch for designers, and users’ goals can be better satisfied through other means."

Interactivity is a failure state of user interfaces that could have predicted what the user wanted by context and history, and presented it to them without demanding so much of their time and attention.

Magic Ink: Information Software and the Graphical User Interface http://worrydream.com/MagicInk/

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