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novia

If use_roads is set to zero, will this optimize for roads that include sidewalks?

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I'm guessing it will optimize for dedicated bike paths since you shouldn't be riding your bike on the sidewalk.

If we added bike lanes to sidewalks rather than roads I think it would solve a lot of the complaints motorists have.

But it wouldn't solve many of the complaints that bicyclists and pedestrians have.

And raise an even larger amount of complaints from pedestrians.

That's done in Europe, where sidewalks are wide enough. Most sidewalks in the US aren't wide enough to include a bike lane.

Riding a bike on the sidewalk (or a divided bike path) is actually pretty dangerous. Cars aren't expecting there to be 15-25 mph traffic when they pull in to driveways or make turns.

The most common type of bike accidents are cars failing to yield when turning or using driveways, and divided bike paths and sidewalks only make it worse.

I try to be super vigilant when crossing crosswalks and driveways when using the sidewalk, but pretty much all of the close calls I've had have been because I was riding moderately fast on the sidewalk.

We should take land away from motorists, not from pedestrians.

Yeah, but that's a separate matter, you can simply widen the sidewalk into the road to add the cycling lane.

Yeah, sure, that's cool

Good god, please no! The most harrowing pedestrian segment of my commute isn't crossing the 8-lane highway with poorly timed lights (though that's a close second). It's the one block where the bike lane is officially marked as being on the sidewalk.

That's how it is in Berlin. I'm surprised people think it is so weird.

Bikes are more like pedestrians than like cars.

It might solve the complaints motorists have, but then you'd have the complaints of pedestrians to deal with. In two major cities in my country, bike lanes have been added to the pavements as a bright red stripe on the side of the pavement closest to the road. Local pedestrians shouldn't walk on that portion of the pavement, but they still do, and if you ring your bell or shout for them to give way, they either ignore you or yell at you. It’s actually much faster to simply cycle on the road with the cars.

The legality of riding your bike on the sidewalk varies by state, county and town. In a couple of places in Portland there are signs specifically directing cyclists to use the sidewalk because of streetcar tracks.

Where I am located it is legal, and honestly there is not much alternative.

The roads google maps instructs me to take for their bicycle directions are not bicycle friendly. I am directed to take a narrow road with just one lane on each side with motorists going 55 mph, even though there is heavy traffic and no room for motorists to safely pass.

It seems like google maps is optimizing for road incline instead of safety. I resorted to using their pedestrian routing to get a route with sidewalks, but of course then it doesn't take road incline into account. No E-bike here. And then oddly enough, the other day their pedestrian routing sent me through A CONSTRUCTION ZONE. That path was definitely not bike friendly or pedestrian friendly.

Google maps' bicycle directions never send me down a greenway, it always wants me to be right beside cars. If I have already biked 10 miles, you really don't want me to be right beside cars, as my bicycling becomes more unsteady as I become more tired.

Likely not as many (most?) sidewalks aren't officially open to bikes (Regardless of enforcement on the one hand and regardless of some people preferring to use them on the other).

I remember as a 12 year old a cop swore at me and told me he was going to take my bike if he saw me ride on the sidewalk again. So then 2 blocks later ANOTHER cop is swearing at me calling me crazy and going to drive me home for riding on the road when there was a sidewalk to ride on. I laughed and said the other one told me to get off the sidewalk. He called him and they got in an argument and hung up on him. I just rode my bike on the sidewalk.

Heh, that's awesome. I think it illustrates how confused people are in general about where bikes are supposed to be, which I think is a complicated cross of law, culture, cycling ability, and infrastructure.

The police have never hassled me for being on any road on a bike. But man, do the dudes in pickup trucks with truck nuts love to tell me to get off the road.

Yeah, it even happened to me in progressive utopia Olympia, WA.

Within the downtown area of Washington, DC, bikes are not allowed on the sidewalk. (This is roughly the area bounded by Massachusetts or Florida Ave. on the north, Georgetown on the west and the Capitol on the east.) Couriers, tourists, and a lot of others disregard the regulation.

It really varies by the city. Some prohibit bikes on sidewalks, others allow them at least in some areas, and some only allow children under a certain age. There's no consistency.

Hi! I'm with Mapzen. Setting `use_roads` to zero means a preference for using roads tagged in OpenStreetMap that have bike infrastructure, as opposed to roads without bike lanes.

We don't route on sidewalks, and will avoid paths that are tagged `bicycle=no`. You can get a sense of these on our bike map. https://mapzen.com/bikes/

Where is your bike lane data from? For example, the chicago loop detail on the linked page is incredibly (years now) out of date, and would send people down routes that have replaced bike lanes with dedicated high speed bus lanes.

We use data from OpenStreetMap, meaning you can edit and update information wherever you are, and changes will appear on the map in a matter of days.

Have you considered using data from the California Statewide Integrated Traffic Records System (SWITRS) in your routing algorithm? You can filter traffic collisions for those involving bicycles in order to identify roads or intersections particularly dangerous for cyclists.

http://iswitrs.chp.ca.gov/Reports/jsp/userLogin.jsp

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