Eric F 

I have had a shockingly different experience (for me) with bike lakes over the past few days. I'm currently vacationing in an area of Orange County, CA with a lot of wide, multi-lane streets that also include a generous bike lane. The bike lanes are generally pretty clean, too (how does this happen??). Of course, not every road in the area is like this, but it's a very different experience from my area of So Cal. Very different. There are also excellent paved bike trails that go for dozens of miles, are clean, safe, and have nice scenery.




All that said, my rides that took me on these calm, safe paths/lanes also included segments that were more busy and narrow than the pic in the OP. However, I knew what I was getting myself into, and I'm comfortable in that environment.

Polaris OBark

My sister moved there. I was wondering if it would be a good place to bring my bike if I visit. Thanks for saving me from a PITA.

mschwett 

our bike lanes are swept just like the streets are, once or twice a week. many of them don’t have a divider so the regular street sweeper picks it up. the ones with curbs or other barriers are swept by a smaller sweeper.

Eric F 

In my 'hood, the maintenance part of the equation doesn't happen.

SoSmellyAir

I am fortunate to live and bike here. If I had been living anywhere else, I probably would not have resumed cycling after a hiatus which started in my late teens.

Direct answer: street sweepers; indirect answer: property taxes.

But these excellent MUPs also contain inattentive pedestrians, dog walkers, cycling children, teens on e-bikes, people riding Onewheel // Future Motion while texting, and the occasional peloton. I have had more close calls on these MUPs than out on the on-road bike lanes, and I am fairly sure that I am in the bottom quartile (speed wise) among local road cyclists.

Zaskar

I caught the part where you attempted a politically-biased history of the U.S. transportation system... but I missed the part where you explained my false assumptions.

Note: If you do explain it, remember that quote (since you like Franklin's, I figured you'd like one from Twain) - "I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead."

mschwett 

correct answer - a mix of various taxes and use fees, ranging from the gas tax, vehicle registration, sales taxes, and parcel taxes.

property tax is far from the majority of this funding. it’s hard to find the actual numbers, and they vary by county, but gas and sales tax are generally the largest.

SoSmellyAir

I had not meant to say that property taxes are the sole source of funding for street maintenance.

Orange County, CA Sales Tax Rate - Sales Taxes By County - March 2023 (sales-taxes.com)

But at least in Orange County, gas tax is the same for the entire county (I think?), and sales taxes are higher in the less affluent areas, and the streets are only as well maintained as described by Eric F in the more affluent parts of the county, with higher property values and thus higher property tax. So I had surmised that the better street maintenance are due to higher property taxes.

Eric F 

The city area I live in has street sweepers. I’ve seen them. I’ve never seen them in use on streets with bike lanes. Irvine is doing it right.

Fair enough about the MUPs. My perception is undoubtedly skewed by mid-morning weekday use. I expect weekends are very different.

mschwett 

there are probably some other issues at play there, but i’ve never seen a funding source chart for local transportation in which property tax was a large share, especially since prop 13. sales tax rates only vary by a percent or two across counties, but the actual amounts spent are vastly different. wealthier people just spend more, period.

the majority of property taxes (of which the revenue per capita in orange county is among the lowest of the big counties in the state!) goes to schools.

so, without going too far off topic, those bike lanes in orange county are not paid for in any significant way by property taxes. the differences in quality and maintenance you see from place to place are mostly due to other factors.

merlinextraligh

Marty and Wendy would tell you the risk of road cycling there is vey low compared to other risks inherent to the area.

Robert7659

What is this « dedicated bike lane » of which you speak?

Calsun

When bike lanes first appeared in California in the 1970's they were very unsafe for numerous reasons but the highway engineers did not really care as this was a very low status type of project for them. It has not changed at all in past 50 years with the same kinds of people making the same kinds of decisions that are meant to placate bicyclists without bothering motorists. Half the city area in the USA is devoted to automobiles, both for movement and for parking and for storing them.

American motorists are also far more aggressive and far less likely to consider the health of bicyclists who they view as tresspassers and see no reason to share the roadway (and signage does nothing to change this). Bike lanes give bicyclists a false sense of security and I would not recommend using them to anyone.

Jrasero

Honestly rarely. There are so many trails by me that it be stupid to cycle on the road like that.

Eric F 

IMO, it's situational. As I have commented in this thread, some bike lanes I've come across are dangerous and a bad idea. Some have been really good. That said, my awareness of what is going on around me doesn't decrease if I'm in a bike lane alongside car traffic.

merlinextraligh

Come on man? No Ozarks fans, what is this place coming to?

merlinextraligh

I’m just p’od that this thread is a page ahead of my parody thread.

bruce19

I never ride on highways if I can help it. One thing I have recently bought that is invaluable is Garmin radar.

Roypercy

I started riding seriously in the 70s when I was living in East Tennessee. 99% of my riding was on two-lane highways with little shoulder. I never had a wreck, although once in awhile a local who'd never seen a (young) adult on a bicycle - wearing a helmet of all things - might holler something at me as they sped by in a pickup truck. I'm a pretty cautious rider and at the time my hometown was more rural than it is now, so traffic was never too bad.

Now I live in New York City and ride on the streets all the time. Like some others here I avoid the protected bike lanes that are popping up on city streets, because they tend to be full of debris, pedestrians, car doors opening, jackasses going too fast or riding against traffic, and - thank you New York! - storm drains. I feel much safer riding out in traffic where I have more options to avoid obstacles.

Calsun

It comes down to exercising ones own judgment as to when and where it is safe to bicycle. Bike lanes alongside parked motor vehicles are inherently dangerous but city and county engineers do not really care about bicyclists in this country. We also have more aggressive drivers who are distracted by their cell phones and not paying any attention to what is happening around them.

I avoid taking risks that would be fatal and this includes hoping that a motorist is paying attention and exercising good judgment which is very rare in the USA.

bbbean 

And yet the statistics show that "something bad" rarely happens. Ride predictably, visibly, and legally, and use common sense about how high volume a road you're comfortable on. But rest assured that millions of us ride millions of miles daily on roads with cars and do so without incident.

Imaginos

I gotta ride the two lane,55 mph relatively low traffic highway to go anywhere outside my tiny town. State law says I’m supposed to ride the shoulders and fortunately there are decent shoulders,although flats are more frequent from road debris.

Typical shoulder

Clyde1820

Around my area, there are many roadways that were built pre-everything ... back when horse-drawn carriages were the thing. And so, many roads are simply too narrow to have specially-painted zones for bikes, parking, etc. Lots of bad spots. But, thankfully, the town's doing what they can via turning key roads into one-way routes, thereby opening up space to craft (painted-in) bike lanes on many of them. Which helps.

I mostly ride along MUPs, sidewalks (in the most-risky areas, when I can), and the larger through-ways that have bike lanes. Whenever I can, I head to MUP-type areas, though there aren't nearly enough of these in my area. Many cyclists gang-up as small groups and thus end up much more visible. If I go out solo, though, I take advantage of every light and dayglo-colored article of clothing I can in order to be seen. Haven't been struck yet, thankfully. But, yeah, on some roads, it's likely to be a matter of time (so I spend as little time transiting through such zones as possible, or head through them at the low-traffic times of the day).