Between my own bike and Citi Bike I can get everywhere I need to without relying on any form of mass transportation. Biking is frequently the fastest form of transportation, depending start/end point of the trip anyway. It certainly is for my daily commute.
I think this is partially because bicycles are not that popular here, but there are provisions for bikes that go above and beyond cars. Having seen Bruges in Belgium, The bike queue can be comparable to a car queue (narrower, but none the less). I imagine other cycling heavy countries are similar.
Years ago, I used to bike from Sunnyvale to Menlo Park once or twice a week, and 85% of the route was away from traffic. The delay was in crossing Embarcadero.
As you said, it's more of a cultural problem, that can be solved. If we accept that motorbikers need lots of specialized equipment to ride, we can accept that cyclists need a couple bits of extra clothing every now and then.
There are days when the weather should preclude driving too.
Given that I've seen car users complain about using public transit because they have to wait for a few minutes or sit next to someone they don't know, needing to buy specific clothing is likely to deter them even more from biking.
It's a cultural problem.
Biking is not viable for about a 1/3 of the year. Ice, snow and low temperatures make biking extremely dangerous.
My city is known as being extremely biker friendly, yet virtually nobody bikes for 4-5 months every year.
http://vancouver.ca/files/cov/walking-cycling-in-vancouver-2...
Canada is big but most of its population lives in the south. If you're in Yellowknife that could be different, of course.
However, the reality for most Canadians is that above all we need public transport that can be used year round. Most Canadians don't live in B.C., and pretty much everywhere else we have harsh winters (yes, even in the south).
The obvious counterexamples are the highly successful bike routes in northern European cities.. plenty of rain there.
Although this is probably dependent on your local laws and how much you abide by those laws, as I know lane filtering and such is illegal in a lot of the US.
But yeah, this is more of a special case than generally applicable to most places. On your typical suburban commute you can definitely save time by filtering between rows of parked cars at lights. That just doesn't work here very well.
IIRC only California allows lane splitting. So this is a legal issue as well.
And you're forgetting the double parking, bad parking, standing cars, building construction, street construction, etc. Streets of Manhattan are chaotic. Trust me when I say that there is often not any room for motorcyclists to filter past cars, especially not when bicycle lanes are present.
It being legal or not isn't the issue; it's not possible.
On the other hand, you have a history of adding comments like this. Good luck with that.
Edit: I noticed you are editing your comment. When I replied it read "This comment, as nice as it may have sounded to you, doesn't contribute anything to the conversation - in fact, it amounts essentially to bragging."
And, no surprise, a lot of my coworkers who also bike to work similarly choose where they live in order to be within cycling range of work. A monthly bus/subway pass is $116.50, whereas Citi Bike is an annualized $14/month. So you can save $100/month by not needing to take transit, which isn't nothing.
Don't underestimate the much bigger monthly savings of not owning a car, though. I moved from the suburbs in MD where having a car was essentially required to here, and that saved at least $600 per month. All told I haven't found it much more expensive to live in NYC; yes, rent is more, but transportation costs are way less.