[*BCM*] Bike Lanes Revisited

[Pete Stidman]

I agree!

--- turtle <turtle at zworg.com> wrote:

> I think the main practical problem with bike lanes
> (as opposed to the
> psychological and political problems, which I'll
> spare you all for the
> moment) is that traffic engineers, politicians, and
> other officials
> treat the lanes as being weird, special, and
> not-real-vehicle
> facilities.  So we get weird, confusing,
> unrealistic, and even
> dangerous designs that place bike lanes to the right
> of right-turning
> traffic, in door zones, under piles of snow,
> squeezed between other
> narrow lanes, and so on.
> 
> This leads me to the previously mentioned
> psychological and political
> problems with bike lanes.  I don't think traffic
> engineers and other
> officials are going to be able to properly design
> dedicated bike lanes
> (or special vehicle lanes of any sort) until our
> society starts
> understanding that bicycles (and other small and/or
> human powered
> vehicles) are "normal".  I believe that as long as
> bicycles are seen as
> weird, bicyclists will be treated weirdly.  I also
> think that this is
> why places like Holland seem to be bicycle paradise:
> not because they
> have special bike paths and lanes, but because bikes
> are seen as
> perfectly normal.
> 
> -Turtle
> 
> --------
> "One day we must come to see that peace is not
> merely a distant goal we
> seek, but that it is a means by which we arrive at
> that goal.  We must
> pursue peaceful ends through peaceful means." -
> Martin Luther King Jr.
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