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How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

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Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#251

Post by Cthulhu_ »

underwater wrote: post #120
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Most parking sensors will detect cyclists, pedestrians, small children etc easily enough, it's just that the range is very limited.

Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#252

Post by adrianN »

dgut wrote: post #166

The thing about NL is that it's totally flat and a tiny piece of land. The biking culture is a result of their geography, not anything else. For example, in Norway, where biking infrastructure is quite decent and people are generally positive about biking/being environmentally responsible, biking is simply impossible in most cases because of the larger hilly landmass and the cold snowy winters.

Yeah I'm sure five decades of deliberate city planning have nothing to do with it. Berlin is also perfectly flat, quite dense and has a nice climate and yet in the Netherlands three times as many people commute by bike.

Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#253

Post by Scarblac »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #8
Rainymood wrote: post #2

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…

It's history. In medieval times European villages were an hour's walk apart at most. Then they grew. So now we have towns that are within half an hour relaxed cycling.

The US was still rather empty by the time faster transport came along.

Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#254

Post by adrianN »

erikb wrote: post #95

By having flat roads and the fact that bikes are cheaper than cars? I honestly don't think one needs to do much to create a biking culture. Maybe some investment and biking lanes separated from roads are needed.

Then how do you explain that other flat places don't have a similar number of cyclists as the Netherlands? Paris, Berlin, London are all pretty much perfectly flat.

Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#255

Post by misja111 »

gameswithgo wrote: post #99
ptaipale wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another thing is that Netherlands (most of it) is flat. Much nicer to ride bike on even ground than where there are even small hills.

The wind there is much worse than small hills!

No it's not. As a Dutch person who moved to Switzerland I can say that it's much easier to bike against the wind than to bike up-hill.

Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#256

Post by Scarblac »

soared wrote: post #11
bunderbunder wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an American, whenever I see articles about Dutch cycling culture, the thing that stands out to me is that nobody is wearing helmets. In the US, I wouldn't dream of doing that - it's just too dangerous, because there's too much risk of being involved in a high speed collision. But, after having spent some time in the Netherlands, it's come to feel like a minor injustice every time I put my helmet on. It's a little…

I believe in countries/cities like these its safer to not use a helmet. Drivers see that your being unsafe and give you much more room and are more aware of you. Less accidents and less deaths in total by not wearing a helmet! I couldn't find the study that was posted on hn, but there are lots of articles.

Also making it mandatory to wear a helmet means fewer people use bicycles, so fewer people get the health benefits of cycling.

Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#257

Post by rorykoehler »

adrianN wrote: post #224
rorykoehler wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You only have to drive across the border to Germany to find full-kit alpine hikers (poles and all) walking their leisurely stroll in their local park. This reflects essentially the same attitude as what the GP described.

Maybe it's different in west Germany, but I've never seen anyone wearing hiking gear in a park.

It was a slight exaggeration... but only slight. When I was visiting my bro in Freiburg I was amazed at the number of full-kit w*s walking up and down the relatively flat paved path that hugged the Dreisam river. Half of them were practically dragging the poles behind them too.

Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#258

Post by jillesvangurp »

dgut wrote: post #166

The thing about NL is that it's totally flat and a tiny piece of land. The biking culture is a result of their geography, not anything else. For example, in Norway, where biking infrastructure is quite decent and people are generally positive about biking/being environmentally responsible, biking is simply impossible in most cases because of the larger hilly landmass and the cold snowy winters.

It helps. But a few decades of deliberate infrastructure investments is what has made this a viable mode of transport in the Netherlands. This has been policy for decades and given the success in increasing safety, the policies have only become more pro cyclists over time.

It's a data driven thing at this point. If repeated accidents happen on a particular bit of road, there will very likely be some follow up in the form of infrastructure work to fix things. Any new infrastructure that gets planned, this stuff is designed in from day 1. Much of this work is planned in order of priority based on things like accident statistics.

Many US cities are actually quite suitable for adapting them to cyclists. The roads are wide and there's plenty of room to start fixing the infrastructure to have separate bike lanes, safer intersections, etc. You can start simple with some road markings. It's not rocket science.

Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#259

Post by Scarblac »

KozmoNau7 wrote: post #74
bunderbunder wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an American, whenever I see articles about Dutch cycling culture, the thing that stands out to me is that nobody is wearing helmets. In the US, I wouldn't dream of doing that - it's just too dangerous, because there's too much risk of being involved in a high speed collision. But, after having spent some time in the Netherlands, it's come to feel like a minor injustice every time I put my helmet on. It's a little…

I've broken two helmets over my years of cycling, quite possibly saving me from at least one skull fracture. So a helmet is mandatory to me. However, I don't want it to be mandated by law. That has shown to keep a lot of people from cycling.

But were you on a racing bike, going at speed? In that situation the Dutch use helmets too.

For normal traffic use, people in the Netherlands use bikes where you sit in an upright position, and they don't go very fast (like 15 km/h). You can take quick evasive action away from the road, or put a foot on the ground to prevent a fall. It's hard to imagine breaking a helmet on a non-racing bike here.

Re: How the Dutch created a casual biking culture

#260

Post by Scarblac »

erikb wrote: post #95

By having flat roads and the fact that bikes are cheaper than cars? I honestly don't think one needs to do much to create a biking culture. Maybe some investment and biking lanes separated from roads are needed.

Before all the political action in the 70s to create a biking culture, the car was much more dominant in the Netherlands. It's a direct result of people protesting against cars and car-centric infrastructure starting back then.
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