livedarklions

Provocative article:

https://www.citylab.com/transportati...e-lane/559934/

I can't help but make the obvious cheap shot that Vision Zero means total blindness. In terms of working the politics, I think that might actually be the case.

berner

The way this traffic proposal was handled sounds to me like another failure of leadership. We can only withstand so many such failures before the unerlying social structures collapse.

Daniel4

Ask a bunch of motorists "Do you ever...sacrifice safety just to keep your momentum going?" and you'll get a chorus of "Yes".

But it doesn't look like the opposition to bicycle infrastructure is any different from anywhere else.

jimincalif

This is not new here is SoCal. Back in 1976 traffic planners re-purposed a general use lane on the Santa Monica freeway to be a carpool lane. It was a public relations disaster and lasted just 21 weeks. It even spawned a parody song "Driving in the Lane with Diamonds" sung to "Lucy in the Sky" which got quite a bit of play on the old Dr. Demento radio show.

Driving In The Lane With Diamonds by Big Daddy

Since then all carpool lanes were built as new additional lanes with much less opposition.

The road diet implemented in LA got the mayor nicknamed "Gridlock Garcetti". Bottom line, proposals that involve taking away existing auto lanes are political losers. Having to drive in SoCal, I understand the feeling even though I ride bikes. Right, wrong or otherwise, IMO these road diets damage the cycling cause, making us the target of drivers' wrath.

livedarklions

That's a really classic example of interest group politics. The problem with the road diet politically is there's huge numbers of people who've organized their lives around the status quo, and you're quite literally taking away lanes from their use, so it's entirely predictable that their opposition to such projects is going to be intense. There's definitely more drivers than cyclists in SoCal, so beating an intense majority is going to be damn near impossible.

Daniel4

There are other ways without having to redesign the road and take away parking.

One is to keep the road as it is but introduce extremely strict traffic enforcement and penalties that will allow bicycles to drive as part of traffic.

livedarklions

I'm very fond of the sharrows in Boston. I do find drivers more accepting when they get "real" proof that taking the lane is not only legal, but expected.

mr_bill

Well there we have it. Sharrows on the Interstates. Done.

“Provocative?”

-mr. bill

livedarklions

So tell me, do you keep your huge collection of straw men in the garage, or do you have them sit around the living room in life-like poses?

Notso_fastLane

Like Calvin and Hobbes' snowmen.

mr_bill

I'll ask you all what the Santa Monica Freeway diamond lane has to do with bicycles, but that would be a *gasp* strawman.

This isn't a strawman.

You want provocative? These must die.

-mr. bill

livedarklions

I never said anything about the Santa Monica freeway other than it was a classic example of interest group politics. It takes a major failure of reading comprehension to twist that into I was advocating for sharrows on the interstate. I was using sharrows in Boston as an example of a compromise between two interest groups that I had found had some positive impact. So yes, sharrows on the interstate is a classic example of a straw man. I never said anything even remotely suggesting such a clearly stupid idea.

You enjoy talking down to people which you do by taking things out of context and intentionally missing the point of what they have to say. Have fun doing it, but discussion with you on that basis is pointless, and is convincing to no one but yourself.

mr_bill

I never said anything about Santa Monica Freeway other than to note how inappropriate sharrows would be.

FWIW, there is always some guy (always a guy) with a bicycle helmet (always) and hi viz (not always) who comes up to the microphone who explains why they OPPOSE this bicycle facility.

Joining him (it’s always a him) are lots of folks who want a parking space.

-mr. bill

harshbarj

That will only result in more deaths. "vehicular cycling" is what we have had for the last 50+ years and it's proven to be highly dangerous. Look at the Netherlands which has taken the opposite approach. They are now the safest country to ride in. In many cities over 50% of daily trips are by bike. You simply will never get that in a city that treats a bicycle as a car.

mr_bill

Video of riding a bike in Amsterdam, sans propaganda:


I did not die.

-mr. bill

Rollfast

It happened in Boise, Idaho as well. Boise has a lot of traffic, much of it directly fed by Interstate 84 and also coming in from the 'suburbs' I don't think it was about special interest groups there, it was a really bad idea that choked traffic flow and boxed the cyclists in with separators. Not groovy. It too was removed in short time.

Daniel4

That's why I also stated to include extremely strict traffic enforcement. I already know drivers who are opposed to giving up parking for bike lanes aren't going to give up any driving space for bicycles out of the goodness of their hearts.

livedarklions

Strict enforcement? Where are all these traffic cops going to come from? It's a pipe dream.

Daniel4

So give the residences a choice: removal of parking for protected bike lanes or increase taxes for dedicated strict traffic enforcement allowing for bicycles and car to drive together.

There are already many threads where posters state that enforcement and punishment are too lenient.

And in many countries where traffic laws are strict, they don't have the same road death rates as we have in North America.

Everything's a pipedream until something actually gets done.

Who would have thunk that the city of Rob Ford, our most anti-cycling mayor, now has protected or separated bike lanes all over downtown and slowly expanding to the suburbs.

livedarklions

Look,if you have the votes to pass bike lane measures, great! But if you think "making residents choose" between two things they don't want is an actual strategy, I can't help you. Spoiler alert -- if they don't want either, they'll vote neither on your policy choice.

I'm trying to imagine anywhere in the US where people are going to choose both paying higher taxes and having a huge number of traffic cops everywhere. Might work in a country where one of the national symbols is a cop in a red suit, but not so much here.

jon c. 

There are still a lot of areas in my city that need sidewalks before they add bike lanes.

mr_bill

Time to rethink?

Jalopnik of all places, tagline “Drive free or die.”

Vision Zero Is The Wrong Goal

I never knew an op-ed could be so stupid.


“There have been 578 crashes on that stretch of road [Coney Island Avenue] in the last year, or an average of one and a half per day (elected officials have urged the Department of Transportation to expedite a safety study of that corridor).”

I’m with gearhead.

-mr. bill

mr_bill

Rethink?


Will America’s ‘Least Sustainable City’ vote to kill rail transit?

Nothing to do with bicycles.

But then again, it never is about bicycles, is it?

It’s about the lash.

-mr. bill

CliffordK

A number of issues...

We have a road here in Eugene that was put on a "Road Diet".

2x2 (4 lane) road converted to Bike + 1 + Center + 1 + Bike.

At first I thought that it was absolutely preposterous. How could the city possibly think that a 4-lane road could be effectively replaced by a 2-lane road?

However, the reality is that people who made left turns effectively snarled traffic, so it never was truly 4 lanes of flowing traffic. There is at least 1 major shopping center interchange along that section of road which was always a mess. By reducing it to one lane of flowing traffic + a center turn lane / merge lane (merging is legal in Oregon), it may actually make it easier to get in and out of driveways, and the overall traffic flow might be better, or at least not any worse.

The other thing about that road is that there is a semi-parallel road about 2 blocks away with bike lanes, and an off-street bike path. None of the roads go straight through that section of town. But, there would be benefits of encouraging cyclists to hop off the main roads onto side roads.

As a young bike commuter, I rode on the same roads that everyone else drove on. A bit of exploring, but I had struggled with that 4 lane road above.

As an older bike commuter, I don't ride through that section of town as frequently, but I'm also learning all the bike friendly alternatives.

One thing the communities need to do is to encourage cyclists to find the more bike friendly alternative routes.

I don't see cars hopping off the main thoroughfares to go screaming along residential routes. One of the reasons is the cars inevitably get tripped up by stop signs and left turns (which in some cases may be easier for bikes).

mr_bill

Eek! Is reality allowed here?

Isn’t this a place to re-unthink?

-mr. bill