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Comment by nickbauman | Hacker News Reader

I live in Minneapolis, which regularly wins awards for US bike infra. I used to cycle to work. It was great in some ways, but I never felt safe because even with the supposedly great bike infra we have, drivers were a problem. In fact I felt safer on my motorcycle, which shouldn't be the case.

"Car culture" generally brings out the same primate programming you see in the "comments section". There's a level of pseudo-anonymity that brings out the aggressive asshole in all of us and make it unsafe for the most vulnerable.

I believe only dedicated bike infra is the way to solve this in the US. Dedicated bike infra is a fraction of the cost of car infra.

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Its night and day when you are on a bicycle versus a car. I get conversations and interactions with people while biking that makes the experience so much more "human" (for lack of a better word).

I have been preaching car-free downtowns for years, and continue to believe it is the correct next step for healthy city and town life.

> I get conversations and interactions with people while biking.

Never happens for me. Probably because I'm about twice as fast as the average cyclist and basically pass them like they are standing still.

The guys that go head to head with me or that I can't keep up with tend not to be conversationalists, which suits me fine.

Riding side by side and chatting, in traffic, would be impractical, even if either of us wanted to.

The stops at intersections are brief. Plus you get separated; one just makes the green light, the other stops and that's it.

And then, what's there to say?

"Hi, I know everything about bicycle maintenance and fitness". "Wow, me too!" "`Kay, see you later".

> I'm about twice as fast as the average cyclist

A TDF winner then?

One article I read suggested that the helmet de-humanizes the cyclist in the same way a car de-humanizes drivers. This is one reason pedestrians are treated better than cyclists. This is not a suggestion to not wear a helmet, although there is ample evidence that you're better off without one.

That said, I'll take my chances and wear a helmet :)

> there is ample evidence that you're better off without one.

Not anything that can be called rational evidence.

I've suffered several falls in which I heard a very loud crack: that of helmet hitting pavement, hard. That would have been my head, each time.

http://www.howiechong.com/journal/2014/2/bike-helmets

It's not enough for me; I wear a helmet each and every time I ride (well, except on recent bike-shares in Paris, Stockholm, Vienna, and Munich, where none were available). But I've crashed bicycles a number of times in my life, even once crashing into a car as a teenager (flipped, bounced off the car, hit the ground) and still never hit my head.

Anyway, it's just interesting to read about what causes head injuries and what makes a cyclist prone (or not) to them.

That seems dubious to me. I think that pedestrians are viewed more favorably than cyclists mainly because everyone spends a lot of time as a pedestrian. By contrast, most people aren't cyclists, which means that drivers tend to view them as an out-group, and therefore an object of contempt. This also helps to explain why people are often more incensed by traffic violations by cyclists than by drivers or pedestrians.

I was recently the victim of an attempted mugging, while walking. This occured on a busy road with dozens of cars driving by in the short time this took to happen, but with no other pedestrians around. No car stopped, no driver offered any assistance. I am convinced that, instead of cars, if cyclists or pedestrians were going by, someone would have helped me (even just by calling the police).

I've cycled for years, and gotten all the physical abuse, verbal abuse, horn-blowing, being cut-off, etc. that goes with it. I think a lot of drivers really aren't functioning members of society when they get in their car. They're in their own little world, not connected with reality.

> I am convinced that, instead of cars, if cyclists or pedestrians were going by, someone would have helped me (even just by calling the police).

Cyclists and pedestrians turn a blind eye and avoid involvement with crimes they witness, too.

Of course, they are more likely to actually be around long enough to recognize what's going on, but that's no guarantee of willingness to get involved.

Being around long enough to recognize what's going on increases the chance of some intervention. Casual criminals usually try to avoid areas with a lot of pedestrians (more chance of a do-gooder I assume), whereas roads with a lot of cars seem to be less of a deterrent.

I think that's a big part of it. A driver might have gone by the attempted mugging and even if they noticed it, might have only seen half a second of the incident; not long enough to process it.

While biking to work yesterday, I saw a collared/tagged dog run across an arterial, almost getting hit by a large semi-truck. I stopped and followed the dog. I was eventually led to what turned out to be its house -- it barked at me and was standoffish so I couldn't get to its tags, but eventually the owner came out and the dog snuck back under the fence.

I definitely would not have stopped had I been in my car.

I would have helped you. But I'm categorically insane.

In fact I felt safer on my motorcycle, which shouldn't be the case

I feel the same way, but it makes some sense. You've got better brakes, fifty horses on tap, and you're fully armored.

Like, I don't know, how an armored knight might feel compared to a leather-clad foot soldier.

It's especially poignant when I first hopped on a mountain bike after dirt biking for years. I felt naked and powerless.

At urban traffic speeds, a motorcycle driver can use their engine power and acceleration to have almost complete control over their position relative to other vehicles. So most of their driving time can be spent in positions that feel safe. They can feel in control.

A bicyclist does not have this degree of control over speed, so they spend much of their time in positions, relative to other vehicles, that do not feel safe.

I don't know about motorcycles, but once you learn to control your bike beyond steering on flat ground (hopping curbs, maintaining balance at a stop or at low speeds, recovering from skids) you can get your bike out of sticky situations.

I feel much more at ease on a bike than in a car. Not to mention you aren't gridlocked in a huge box when the traffic gets bad.

Right but with a motorcycle you're matching traffic speeds, and in fact, usually going faster, so everything comes from in front of you. On a bicycle you're at the mercy of everyone behind you seeing you and recognizing the speed differential and so on.

I guess what I'm talking about is more relevant when riding in a tight urban core like say NYC. In that case the traffic is not actually moving that fast making a bike much more efficient.

I moved to Minneapolis a few years ago from Boston.

I felt a good deal safer biking in Boston, where the infrastructure is terrible, drivers are generally much more aggressive, and yet, I felt, more accepting of cyclists.

In Minneapolis cars seem to be frightened, angry, or just not paying attention with regard to cyclists.

The dedicated bicycle infa that does exist (greenway) somewhat mitigates this for me. You can't get everywhere via dedicated bike path - but it's better than most midwestern cities, in my experience.

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