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The Economics of Bike Lanes

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Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#91

Post by ww520 »

mrgoldenbrown wrote: post #38
Jun8 wrote: post #7

I totally agree with the idea in the OP (not that we have much free parking left in Chicago). But I have to get something off my chest, although it's tangential to this post. (I know this will be sacrilege to the many HN bikers but here it goes): First a disclaimer: I, at 40+, cannot ride a bike reliably (yeah, I know, it funny, there's a long backstory), in fact I learned how to ride about 10 years ago, not by apply…

Nearly all of what you say is true. However, you neglect to mention that it all applies to pedestrians as well, and drivers of course have their own version of each. I have observed (and swerved to avoid) many pedestrians who don't use crosswalks, ignore crossing signals (it is not OK to start walking when the "don't walk" is flashing") , and walk right in front of bicycles in a bike lane with a green light, all beca…

Does two wrongs make a right? Does pedestrian not using crosswalks give license for a biker to blow pass a red light?

Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#92

Post by pyre »

Jun8 wrote: post #7

I totally agree with the idea in the OP (not that we have much free parking left in Chicago). But I have to get something off my chest, although it's tangential to this post. (I know this will be sacrilege to the many HN bikers but here it goes): First a disclaimer: I, at 40+, cannot ride a bike reliably (yeah, I know, it funny, there's a long backstory), in fact I learned how to ride about 10 years ago, not by apply…

  > And the worst part is you can't say anything, because these
  > guys are living a healthy lifestyle, right?
The issue is one of stereotypes.

A lot of people have very visceral reactions to cyclists:

  I saw some guy on a bike doing something dangerous, therefore
  all bikes must be banned and/or all/most cyclists are evil demons.
On the other hand, I could show you numerous examples of people behaving badly in cars. Car collisions with pedestrians are more deadly than bicycle-pedestrian collisions. Should I move that we ban all cars? Or maybe we should just get rid of all roads, because if people are going to drive cars and be dangerous, we shouldn't have the government subsidizing them?

You argument in general, seems to be about cycle-pedestrian collisions/dangers. If we get rid of bicycle lanes, then we are either advocating that all cyclists use the sidewalk or the street. In this case, you'll either end up with either more pedestrians being hit by cyclists or more cyclists hit by cars. In either case, as the number of cyclists increases, this doesn't scale.

Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#93

Post by pyre »

ww520 wrote: post #88
equalarrow wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have not had a car for over 20 years. I've ridden my bike forever - to/from school since I was in grade school. Currently I live in San Francisco which has, some could say, an aggressive bike culture. Sometimes, I am one of those guys and I used to ride in the monthly Critical Mass rides. The fact of the matter is that we live in a pro-car country. California in general is a very pro-car state. The drive in diner w…

If you want car drivers to respect bikers, stop running red lights and stop signs. Since you want to be reckless and ignore safety rules, others would have less regard for your safety. The conserving momentum is just a BS excuse; stopping is for safety overall for everyone involved, not just you. A car can also run through stop sign to conserve momentum and save on gas but for overall safety sake it stops.

  > Since you want to be reckless and ignore safety
  > rules, others would have less regard for your safety.
Does that mean that I can treat people that ignore safety in cars the same way? Or does this 'if you even step an inch over the line, I will run you over' attitude only extend to bikers?

Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#94

Post by randallsquared »

msellout wrote: post #60
randallsquared wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where's the outrage at these drivers? Is there a contingent of bikers somewhere angry at drivers doing 65 in a 60? If not, what does it have to do with anything? The violations that people get upset about are those that actively endanger or inconvenience them or people like them.

I am a biker that is angry at drivers doing 65 in a 60. It's bad for gas mileage (and thus hurts me indirectly through climate change and trade deficits), it's bad for safety (and thus hurts me indirectly through costs of government service personnel and road repairs), and it promotes an attitude of automobile entitlement that hinders my safe cycling.

I am a biker that is angry at drivers doing 65 in a 60.

I'm not sure what your anger has to do with doing 65 in a 60 -- it seems like you might be angry at drivers, full stop. :)

Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#95

Post by sliverstorm »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #90
sliverstorm wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what does belong on the roads, oh paragon of wisdom?

I think the point is that msellout feels (please correct), and I'm inclined to agree, that the assumption that cars are entitled on highways but cyclists are not is wrong. There is probably more benefit in having less cars and more cycles than the converse.

It rather sounds to me like he just wants all cars off the road, and I'm not sure how you could arrive at a different conclusion without applying liberal amounts of conjecture.

Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#96

Post by afterburner »

Tangurena wrote: post #69
afterburner wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if free means what you posit, it comes to the same: market pressures that make building parking garages so lucrative will provide the need if street parking is replaced by bike lanes. Also, reread the part about how creating a viable cycling path network, which is safe for the cyclist throughout, will attract many more cyclist to the road, as it has in other cities. The current number of cyclists in NYC is not n…

Parking garages are not lucrative. The cost to build a parking garage runs $20k-30k per parking space. Building one underground adds an additional $10k/space. In contrast, a parking stall on a flat slab is going to run only a few hundred dollars (in Denver, the cost for thick slabs you can park semis on runs about $800/parking stall).

They do get built, though, so they are profitable enough apparently.

It's funny, neither article nor any comment mentions the subways in NYC, which are excellent. That would seem like the no-brainer choice for navigating Manhattan; it certainly is when I visit. That this guy must visit Manhattan locales by cars is... I dunno, perhaps being too picky? Anyways, if people want to keep doing it, parking will surely pop up at prices the market can bear.

Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#97

Post by rbranson »

Jun8 wrote: post #7

I totally agree with the idea in the OP (not that we have much free parking left in Chicago). But I have to get something off my chest, although it's tangential to this post. (I know this will be sacrilege to the many HN bikers but here it goes): First a disclaimer: I, at 40+, cannot ride a bike reliably (yeah, I know, it funny, there's a long backstory), in fact I learned how to ride about 10 years ago, not by apply…

One thing you miss here is the asymmetry of risk. Cyclists are at highest level of risk while on the road. They're moving at enough speed to cause serious injury to themselves, but they're still usually about half the speed of cars. Modern automobiles have excellent safety characteristics and pedestrians have more of an ability to take evasive action.

A mistake on a bike is going to almost always be a life-or-death situation as just falling onto the road puts them at extremely high risk for injury. The cost of errors made by car drivers has a huge impact on the morbidity of cyclists, while the opposite doesn't hold true. Even if cyclists were an order of magnitude more dangerous than car drivers, their poor decisions would have negligible impact on car drivers.

Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#98

Post by PaulHoule »

hugh3 wrote: post #65
sliverstorm wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bias in both these comments is so thick I could cut it with a knife. One can barely ride a bicycle; one wishes he didn't own a car.

My perspective: I both cycle and drive quite a lot. When I'm driving, I hate cyclists, and when I'm cycling I hate drivers. Both groups are filled with complete freaking idiots who shouldn't be allowed onto the roads under any circumstances.

Cyclists don't just conflict with cars, they conflict with Pedestrians.

I've been hit by cyclists more than once. (And OK, I hit a pedestrian when I was riding a bike back when I was a teenager too.)

Walking in L.A. I experience near-misses with cyclists riding illegally on the sidewalk about as often as I experience near-misses from people running red lights when I'm in a car.

Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#99

Post by hyperbovine »

joebadmo wrote: post #26
rjprins wrote: post #2

This discussion about the value and use of bike lanes keeps amazing me. It seems many people hold a negative view without having good arguments, almost religiously. Living in the Netherlands, the benefits of separate bike lanes (to point of a separate transit system) are so incredibly obvious. It's not some cultural particularity, it's because cycling has been made easy, nice (most of the time) and safe here. (see ht…

I'm a daily bike commuter and I would love to see a Netherlands-like biking network in the US, but it's hard for me to imagine anywhere that's not as flat as most of the Netherlands. I could see it here in Portland or maybe Philly, but I don't think it would really increase the numbers of cyclists that much in, say, Seattle, where I used to live (and bike).

Those cities are the exception, not the rule. Just off the top of my head, Manhattan, Chicago, Denver, Miami, Boston, Dallas, LA, San Diego, Atlanta, D.C., Phoenix are all flat enough for a person in decent shape to get around by bike. I think the winter is a bigger issue than the terrain, but overall I think most Americans could be biking most of the time (given a lot of changes in infrastructure, policy and public health).

Re: The Economics of Bike Lanes

#100

Post by pyre »

lazerwalker wrote: post #57
equalarrow wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have not had a car for over 20 years. I've ridden my bike forever - to/from school since I was in grade school. Currently I live in San Francisco which has, some could say, an aggressive bike culture. Sometimes, I am one of those guys and I used to ride in the monthly Critical Mass rides. The fact of the matter is that we live in a pro-car country. California in general is a very pro-car state. The drive in diner w…

I think you're mistaken in dividing it up into a cars vs. bikes/pedestrians binary. There are motorists who act completely inappropriately towards bikers, and there are bikers who act in a manner that is equally unbefitting. Both are a big problem, and the one doesn't justify the other. Personally, as a non-car-owning biker, it really upsets me when I see fellow cyclists acting like dicks. It makes it that much harde…

  > it really upsets me when I see fellow cyclists
  > acting like dicks
Too many people that drive cars ignore cyclists, and I think that the 'dick cyclist' to some extent stems out of the need to be seen on the road. I've heard people say that it's better to have a driver think you're an asshole, because at least that means that they see you.

In general, I find it really odd that people in cars think that cyclists need to watch out for cars and not the other way around. The person driving the car is the one holding the deadlier weapon, why are they not held to a higher sense of responsibility?

As an anecdote, one of my friends was hit by a car, and ended up in the hospital. She had the right of way, but that didn't stop the lady that was driving the car from calling her up to complain about the fact that her insurance was going to be more expensive after the accident.

Let that sink in. Someone driving a car, disobeyed the law, and put someone in the hospital, then called up that person to complain about their insurance increasing. I'll bet you that the driver wouldn't have called up to complain if the person she hit had been in a car rather than on a bicycle.

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