I'm a keen cyclist and I prefer to ride on the road rather than on bike lanes. It tends to be a faster way to get around, especially since roads don't have the same habit of ending abruptly that bike lanes do, and it is rarer that one has to slow down for slower traffic ahead. However, not everyone is capable of cycling fast enough to move safely in the flow of traffic on the road, and not everyone is confident enough to ride in and among cars. I expect, given the demographics of this website, that you (like me) are a reasonably fit and confident young man - perhaps the subset of the population most likely to be undaunted by road cycling. For people like us, it is likely that the road will always be the preferred way to travel. But a cycling culture must be all-inclusive.