Originally Posted by
pdlamb
I agree, not all bike lanes are that bad. The problem is that some are (and a few are arguably worse). And that makes intelligent conversation about bike lanes impossible when someone uses broad strokes to refer to all bike lanes.
It also makes me, at least, suspicious when I'm somewhere new to me and see a bike lane. Is a shoulder with a bike logo on it going to go around a curve and stop at a bridge, forcing me into a high speed vehicular (and bikes, presumably, though going slower) lane? Will the lane suddenly be straddled by a storm drain with wide openings parallel to the direction of travel? Will it have a bollard gate requiring me to unload panniers to get through? Been there, done that, took the lane until I got off those roads!
Basically, I take bike lanes on a case-by-case basis as they are definitely not uniform, and the contexts in which they appear also vary like crazy. Like I said before, this is not an ideological issue to me requiring a single answer for all bike lanes. I've found some very useful to maintaining a high speed safely in an urban context, others, like you're describing, I wouldn't ride on on a bet.
I have a problem with the NYC legal approach which requires the cyclist to stay in the lane unless it actually is blocked.