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Comment by Doctor_Fegg | Hacker News Reader

Meanwhile our idiot city (Oxford, UK) is spending £1.2m on "Quickways", which are painted lines on existing roads... guaranteed to keep cyclists 0% safe. This in the face of national Government guidance in favour of physical segregation from cars. (Plans at https://letstalk.oxfordshire.gov.uk/quickway-cycle-route-oxf...: the promise of "segregation where possible" in reality means about 5% of the network.)

It is really frustrating how highway engineers, as a profession, are unwilling to consistently learn lessons from the Netherlands in designing cycle infrastructure. Many cities seem to delight in half-assing their own solutions. So congratulations to Milan, who look like they may have got it right.

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In Holland they learned the hard way that you have to physically cordon off half of every road for bicycles. But you have to remember that just putting some paint on the pavement is a lot cheaper so that's what the government tries first.

The reason why roads were taken back by Dutch cyclists and pedestrians is that they never stopped doing it. At some dark moment in the 1970s the number of children run over by cars was too much for society to ignore. It was a battle won by blood.

Americans seem really good at ignoring cyclists being run over. Children don't seem to walk/cycle and rely on being driven around by their parents here so they don't die as much (good, obviously people know its not safe) but doesn't promote infrastructure investment for alternative transit (bad).

Reminds me of this. https://twitter.com/darren_cullen/status/1422550369985605637

This is one of my favorite artists! It's so great to see him referenced here!

And there's plenty of space in the US; most roads can be half as wide and still service most cars. Plenty of space to build in a hard shoulder / fencing and a dedicated two-way bike lane.

But that's only part of the problem, the amount of entitled, and selfish drivers that ignore traffic rules, lights and sometimes even roads is crazy.

In suburbia America, where bike lanes are abound and plenty of cyclists to boot, it is the cyclists that are entitled, selfish, arrogant, and ignore the traffic rules. They've recently resorted to riding 4-5 cyclists wide to take up the entire roadway. They ignore stop signs and traffic lights, trying to pass as a pedestrian whenever it is convenient, and have been responsible for many pedestrian related injuries.

For the record, I am a cyclist. I would love to use it more. But the roads are too dangerous, and town hall meetings are always full of the same two sides talking past each other. It's a perception issue, but hardcore cyclists refuse to acknowledge it. So the situation continues to not improve.

"They ignore stop signs and traffic lights, trying to pass as a pedestrian whenever it is convenient, and have been responsible for many pedestrian related injuries"

No doubt, there are ruthless cyclists as well. Still, are you aware of the difference in numbers and quality of "car driver killed cyclist" vs. "cyclist hurt pedestrian"?

Yes. I am aware. This doesn't change the argument, and more importantly, nor does it change the perception of the situation. Cyclists situation in America will not improve so long as the perception of them are they are smug assholes. Everyone already knows there are smug asshole drivers. But we already have roads for cars everywhere. If you want to try and get more tax dollars for segregated bike lanes, the perception and the argument has to change.

"Everyone already knows there are smug asshole drivers. But we already have roads for cars everywhere. If you want to try and get more tax dollars for segregated bike lanes, the perception and the argument has to change."

So you say, it is ok, that there are some asshole drivers but roads still needs to be build and maintained, but not OK, that there are some asshole cyclists and therefore no cyclist deserves more bikelanes? (Or do you want me to dig up numbers on how much is spend yearly on roads vs bikelanes?)

But for real? Arguments for support of cycling by allowing them to do so safe?

How about cycling is way more energy efficient. Does not poison the surrounding with toxic fumes and noise. Increases the health - studies showed it does so even despite the toxic fumes of their fellow car drivers who often overlook and directly kill or criple them and now want more arguments of why the tax dollar is not only for them?

We were able to find a few cyclists who misbehaved so we are going to justify killing them with 1 ton metal machines because we feel threatened by them?

This is the absolute least charitable interpretation of what I am saying.

Death because you are annoyed is not a good look you know. We shouldn't advocate that here.

Yet the worst is you are annoyed, not dead. Bicycles and cars are not the same.

I was very fortunate to raise kids in low density exurbs. My son completely wore out a bike going to school and visiting friends, often miles away. Dozens to hundreds of serious cyclists visit town on weekends to ride here. We also have people on roller skis and longboards on our roads. It seems really shortsighted to exclude these people in favor of cars.

Are there bike paths, or does he ride on the road alongside cars?

No bike paths, just rural roads. Generally without any center line, even. We gave our kids mobile phones early on so they could stay in touch while being independent. It is common for kids in town to go fishing or sailing small boats on their own on a large pond in town. Lots of autonomy.

Were there lots of other children doing the same? Living in eastern Canada I've never really seen what you're describing.

Yes, this was, and still is, normal. Some people do drive their kids to school. But kids are still very independent. It's a small town with spread out houses. The general store, library, after school sports, and the town beach, in warm weather, are the choices of things to do. Things have changed a bit. It's more upscale. Farm dogs don't roam about. Hidden fences are installed most places. That makes life easier for cyclists.

In America you just get social services called on you if you let/make your child walk or cycle anywhere.

Yes! I bike with my kids to school daily and if one of them gets out ahead of me inevitably a car stops to ask if they are alright

> It was a battle won by blood.

This is the current battle in Toronto, Canada.

Last year, there were more people killed by cars than gun violence, but you wouldn't know it by the media coverage.

The city, largely due to strong local advocacy, has started to respond with physically separated lanes, but we're talking double digit KM/year, if we're lucky, when we need 100s of KM to link the city together like this Milan proposal.

> Last year, there were more people killed by cars than gun violence, but you wouldn't know it by the media coverage.

Same thing in the Greater Seattle Anarchist metro area, but we don't get screaming Nextdoor or city subreddit posts every time there's a fatal automotive crash.

but you wouldn't know it by the media coverage.

Yeah, it doesn't help that the media used to almost exclusively refers to car crashes as "accidents", falsely implying there was nothing that could have been done to avoid the situation, putting zero fault on any drivers involved. At least nowadays you see headlines about "car crashes", although you'll still find ledes like "person struck by dies of complications". No need for passive voice, a driver struck and killed that person.

..and on that note, they are doing much of the same with gun violence, too. "A 14-year-old girl has died after she was struck by a stray bullet shot by police while in a North Hollywood department store. [0]" Passive voice, putting the intent on the bullet, not directly saying the girl was shot to death. To read that quote, you'd think the bullet took it upon itself to strike the girl, who died of her own volition.

0 - https://people.com/crime/14-year-old-girl-killed-by-stray-bu...

A driver should certainly be at fault, but also how much blame should be put on the engineers designing our roadways? They have built an environment that is hostile to anyway not in a car. I get that they have "standards" that have to be followed, but when you're implementing a bad design that likely will result in any number of deaths greater than 0, shouldn't those design standards be questioned?

DOTs around the US measure vehicle traffic regularly, but very few measure any kind of other traffic, so they don't even know how many travelers are on roads that are not in a car.

I lived in the NL for a year. Their road ways are a work of art. I can go on and on about their beauty, utility all day long. I mean look at this [1] and this [2] for instance.

[1] https://imgur.com/aEwTSm0

[2] https://imgur.com/4Lreaar

Those are pictures of a Cambridge roundabout, trying to imitate a Dutch roundabout. However except for very light traffic situations all (as far as I am aware) roundabouts newly constructed in the Netherlands are so called turbo-roundabouts [1]. Other than that, I agree that the standard of roads and infrastructure in the Netherlands is a fair bit higher than anywhere else I know of. Of course there are nice roads in every country, but in the Netherlands, there are almost no really bad roads, and every freeway is properly designed and maintained.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roundabout#Turbo_roundaboutsle... turbo-roundabouts.

> Those are picture of a Cambridge roundabout,

I realised it minutes after posting it when I noticed the driving was on the left (as opposed to right in NL) :-). The architecture is very close to those in the NL though which fooled my lazy eyes. Pedestrian islands, enabling free movement of cyclists with clear markings etc.,

How does right of way with this wide separation work though? In my experience (not Dutch) it always goes like this when a car and a cyclist approach a point where their paths cross and the cyclist has right of way: cyclist slows down to be ready for an emergency stop knowing full well that right of way won't be of any help when bones are crushed, driver takes it as an invitation to "slip" through.

The usual cooperative approach of "I have right of way, I can help my peer by accelerating a bit so they don't have to wait so long" seems to only work with participants in roughly the same weight class.

Car drivers get trained when doing driving lessons. There are so many roundabouts that you have to cooperate as a car driver. Also, it is well-known that when an accident happens, the car driver gets the financial damage, and yes, the insurance will pay, but he/she will lose a big percentage of the no-claim decrease in insurance fee.

Recently, local governments are moving away from the real small roundabouts like this one because in the dark, when it is raining, with cyclists who are without lights, these are still somewhat unsafe: https://www.telegraaf.nl/images/1540x866/filters:format(jpeg...

These are much more modern, and car drivers can more easily see cyclists and mopeds come: https://www.denhaag.nl/upload/0690e94f-f7ac-43a3-8c1e-4fb768...

Oh, and yes, car drivers can sometimes be aggressive. The same counts for cyclists though. I guess both kinds of people are just like normal people. And by the way, a lot of people are one day car drivers, the next day cyclist, there is a lot of sympathy.

I simply don't understand why roundabouts aren't just shared. Do separation as much as you like 10m away from them, but in the roundabout, there's exactly zero excuse for a speed difference between motor vehicles and bikes. When drivers are expected to let segregated cyclists pass on leaving the roundabout, they actually have to go slower than they would merged behind even the laziest cyclist. I really don't get it.

(yes, the answer will be "but children!", but I'm a believer in "treat cyclists like children and only children will ride bikes!" and I'd be a firm believer if the Netherlands didn't have this annoying habit of proving me wrong ;))

Blind spots. The driver turning right doesn't see the cyclist planning to take the next exit if the bike lane is right next to the car lane.

With a segregated bike lane the driver turbing right has the bike lane in front of them.

Basically, the bike always has right of way and cyclist act like it as well, cyclist don't slow down and assume the any cars will stop, on the other hand, car drivers are drilled to always be on the look out for cyclists and give them all the space required, you get drilled on this and don't get a license untill you fully understand how to keep cyclists safe, that in practise means you need about 40 hours of driving lessons before you have any change of getting a driver's license. On the liabity side of things, the law basically assumes the driver of the car (more generally a motorised vehicle) is always at fault. Aside from some extremely reckless behaviour bordering on intentially throwing yourself in front of a car, any damages to your own vehicle as well as the cyclist you hit, is coming out of the motorists insurance.

Cyclists have unilateral priority over everything else. I suppose first few years a few cyclists' bones did get crushed. However through training, stringent laws etc., it's drilled into everyone to make way for cyclists. At the roundabouts there's no negotiation etc., Motor vehicles dare not slip through. They patiently wait lest they invite the wrath of authorities.

I suppose there's a better way. However, as a society, Dutch have decided to go whole nine yards to being a cycling friendly nation. And it shows and has its benefits.

In the US far more people have died of COVID-19 than we’ve ever seen of dead bike riders. The bar for the US to change policies because of a “dark moment” is going to be in the millions of deaths, which just isn’t going to happen when bike riding has such a small mode share here.

9/11 was an anomaly and the aftermath was that we are now comfortable with constant surveillance and a region that hasn't known peace in decades.

9/11 policy changes had barely any long-term impact on civilian Americans. Taxes didn’t have to go up. Airports already had security lines, TSA was largely a management change. And the constant surveillance is largely transparent (unless you lived near a government or military installation).

I’m talking about policy changes that require a massive change in daily life. Wearing masks. Street redesigns that reduce parking or slow down cars. European-style gas taxes.

Road safety measures would benefit all road users, not just cyclists. Around 40,000 Americans are killed each year on the roads, and 1% of the population are injured seriously enough to require medical attention. Those are scary large numbers, and the fact that the country has gotten accustomed to this is really unbelievable.

Vulnerable road users have a disproportionate share of crash fatalities. And the commonly accepted safety improvements might reduce crash frequencies for drivers, but it doesn’t do it enough (and have enough impact on major injuries death) to overcome their complaints of slower traffic and less parking. If it did, America’s traffic safety numbers would look more like Western European countries.

For example pedestrian bulb outs and daylighting reducing on-street parking while making pedestrians more visible. Bike lanes remove travel lanes or parking, making traffic slower. Lower speed limits make crashes more survivable, but slow down traffic. When used for safety (and not cash) speed and red light cameras increase safety, but make driving costlier.

Uhm, don't the Dutch separate cyclists and motorists only where the speed limit is >30km/h? At ≤30km/h there's no separation at all IIRC.

Good news about Milan, though. That'll be such an improvement.

30km/h is very low speed. Majority or roads are faster.

Majority by road count, road length, road surface area, number of trips travelled or what? The answer varies. And BTW, 30km/h isn't very low speed in a country where bicycles are common.

30km/h is not an uncommon speed in European urban areas. For example, in France within towns 50km/h is the default speed limit for main arteries, but it is 30km/h for areas where pedestrians are expected. Most of Paris has made the switch, so has Brussels. I would go as far as saying they are a majority of streets, while yes, roads are always faster, but that would be playing semantic games.

All streets are roads, no? While not all roads are streets.

I'm going off of Strong Town's differentiation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZ1HhLq-Huo, also tackled by Not Just Bikes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORzNZUeUHAM.

Have the roads been taken back though? Segregated trickle-lanes have been taken, but in the process the roads themselves have become effectively limited access down to tertiary level. I'm not saying that the Dutch method is bad, the results speak a very different language, but "taken back" is not what happened.

But apparently your Danish counterparts to the north are doing just fine without?

I'm a road biker and would love fully separated bikeways wherever possible. The scheme in Milano sounds exciting and full of the right spirit.

That being said, painted lines, in reality, do positively affect safety, both perceived (at least by me) and in accident statistics. Rethinking our cities towards multi-modal transportation will take time.

I believe maximalist positions ("only physically separated bike lanes are acceptable!" probably don't lead to better results, faster.

I do have some sympathy with your latter point, but there comes a point where you have to say "if not now, when?". Oxford built one world-class segregated track in the 70s (Marston Ferry Road) and has basically regressed since then. I'd be a bit more forgiving if it were Piddleton-on-the-Marsh, but Oxford has "A Cycling City" signs at every entrance to the city...

Casey Neistats video about painted bike path obstructions in New York comes to mind: https://youtu.be/bzE-IMaegzQ (2011)

> That being said, painted lines, in reality, do positively affect safety [...] in accident statistics

Could you cite any studies to that effect? Some studies suggest painted cycle lanes are actively dangerous:

https://findingspress.org/article/18226-cycling-injury-risk-...

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00014...

I have the opposite opinion of painted-line bike paths: I'd rather they not be there at all. If they are there I feel forced to use them by drivers punishment passing me, despite the fact that the so-called bike lanes are full of glass, potholes and cars.

If they aren't there I feel like I get treated with more patience when I ride in my normal road position, about 75 cm from the kerb.

I feel like I must be in a distinct minority because I personally prefer painted bike lanes over any other alternative. It's pretty rare in my own experience to have cars ignoring or being impatient with them (maybe because I like in a fairly bike-friendly city) I also don't like getting stuck behind really slow people in physically separate lanes where there's no room to pass.

We have 200 m total of segregated bike paths in my city so I don't have too much of an opinion on them.

My complaint is the feeling of being forced to use them when they are the dirtiest and most dangerous part of the road. They are just dashed white lines that were designed by someone who drove down the street in a Transit van once.

Since I've been moved to WFH I exclusively cycle on country roads, I feel like if we had more segregated bike paths in the city I wouldn't mind being stuck behind people, I feel like commuting or cycling into town is a different thing from cycling for exercise or as a sport.

I live in a country where cycling as a mode of transport is basically non-existent, 95% of the people I see on bikes are on road bikes and wearing lycra, so it's possible I'd feel differently about segregated lanes if there more of a cycling-as-transport culture here.

My issue is that painted bike lanes are also de facto loading, waiting, and short term parking zones. The bike lane existing makes car drivers more hostile when I'm forced to enter "their" lane because of cars blocking mine.

Yes sure this is an enforcement issue I guess. Why not just build a physical barrier that doesn't require enforcement though.

I both agree and don't agree, having recently cycled across the US and experienced areas with no cycle paths, painted cycle paths and separated cycle paths.

Obviously separated paths are the safest, although unfortunately in the US they often aren't maintained as well as the road surface, so for long trips it's usually more comfortable to cycle on the road anyway.

But when it comes to painted lines, the situation is a bit hazier. You're right that drivers tend to be ruder and more obnoxious when you - as a cyclist - leave the painted cycle path for some legitimate reason, like to avoid an obstacle or poor road surface... On the other hand, at least drivers who drive in places with painted cycle paths know how to share the road, even if they resent doing it.

For example, I can't count the number of times in the US where I cycled straight ahead in the straight ahead lane after the shoulder abruptly turned into a "right turn only" lane, only to have ignorant drivers beep and hurl abuse at me for doing what I was supposed to be doing. In areas with painted cycle lanes, the drivers understand that in this situation they are supposed to watch for cyclists, give way and then cross into the "right turn only" lane on the cyclists' right, instead of fuming and raging because a cyclist dared to follow the signage.

In places where drivers tend to be more educated about how to share the road, it might be the case that painted lines are more trouble than they're worth, but in the US I think it's still useful as a way to teach drivers how to handle having cyclists on the road.

> In areas with painted cycle lanes, the drivers understand that in this situation they are supposed to watch for cyclists, give way and then cross into the "right turn only" lane on the cyclists' right, instead of fuming and raging because a cyclist dared to follow the signage.

While this works to some extent when a right turn only lane is present, this actually sets the cyclist up for a right hook when the right most travel lane can be used to proceed straight through the intersection or turn right. In that case, the bike lane is still painted to the right and leads to the situation where a motorist making a right turn is to the left of cyclist traffic going straight through the intersection.

> [I]n the US I think [that painted lines are] still useful as a way to teach drivers how to handle having cyclists on the road.

The problem in the US is that they paint lines in such a way that there's insufficient lateral space between the cyclist and motor vehicles. Most US states have passed laws requiring motorists to leave at least 3 feet between their vehicle and a cyclist.

In the case where a general purpose lane is 10 feet wide and the adjacent bike lane is 4 feet wide, you end up with a siutation where it's not possible to leave 3 feet of distance between the motor vehicle an and the cyclist. A typical larger vehicle is about 7.5 feet wide from mirror to mirror. Centered in a 10 foot wide lane, they have 1.25 feet on each side.

A cyclist is about 2.5 feet wide. 2.5 feet centered in a 4 foot wide bike lane leaves 0.75 feet on each side.

0.75 feet and 1.25 feet add up to 2 feet, which means that the distance with both the motorist and cyclist centered in the lane they're in is not sufficient. This doesn't account for moving side to side within the lane for either the motorist or cyclist.

I think your calculation of car sizes is a bit wide. I think most cars in the US are around 6 feet wide. Even large minivans are only around 2m. Granted, the mirrors add width and some drivers add excessive dongles on the edge of that, but conscientious drivers of wide vehicles should already be accustomed to passing slow moving vehicles more carefully. In addition, in the places where there are proper dedicated cycle lanes, the lanes are painted inside a full-width shoulder, with space to spare on both the left and the right.

I found there were quite a few stretches of road in Florida, for example, where there were 3 or 4 lanes of high speed traffic going parallel to a painted cycle path in the shoulder. It wasn't the most relaxing place to ride, but it still felt safer than going down some of the highways and arterial roads in other states where there were few (if any) cycle paths, simply because the drivers had more visual aids (signage plus lines) to tell them what to do when they saw a cyclist. I felt more confident cycling even in other parts of Florida without the cycle lanes because despite the drivers being fairly inconsiderate, at least they didn't visibly panic when they saw me there.

It is important to compare like with like, though. A "cycle path" which is just a bit of different-colored paint in the gutter of an existing traffic lane is pretty much useless. But if the painted cycle path is explicitly painted in what would otherwise be a full-width shoulder, I agree with other commenters here that it allows more flexibility to the cyclist than a separated lane (e.g. in turning left without needing to do a pedestrian-style hook turn) and it has the side effect of teaching drivers how to more carefully consider other traffic.

I really think a lot comes down to driver education. For example in areas where there is frequently slow farm equipment or horse and buggies on the main road, drivers have learned how to share the road, so it feels safe to cycle when there is no cycle path or even no shoulder at all. Unfortunately my experience in a lot of the US is that most drivers don't know how to deal with cyclists, so they'll ignorantly tailgate, cut you off or abuse you just for following the road rules. I'm not sure if that results in more casualties, but it certainly makes the experience of cycling more fraught, which means less people will want to cycle, so there is a vicious circle of increasing driver ignorance. I think painted lines at least provide some antidote to that.

> I think your calculation of car sizes is a bit wide. I think most cars in the US are around 6 feet wide.

You're not including mirrors in the width of the vehicle. Typical exterior mirrors on passenger vehicles extend out about 6 inches from the body, so that adds a foot to the vehicle's width. My VW Golf Sportwagen is about 7 feet wide mirror to mirror. My Honda Odyssey is about 7.5 feet wide mirror to mirror. I've measured both vehicles by dropping a string from the edge of the mirror housing down to the ground, and marking it on both sides and measuring the distance between the marks. Take a look at the interactive graphic towards the bottom of the page by Cycling Savvy[1]

Commercial vehicles like tractor trailers and buses are 8.5 feet wide at the body. Their mirrors extend out further, meaning that they're close to 10.5 feet wide mirror to mirror.

[1] https://cyclingsavvy.org/lane-width-space/

> I ride in my normal road position, about 75 cm from the kerb.

The rationale behind riding closer to the edge of the roadway is that drivers of motor vehicles have more room to overtake. But would a motor vehicle be able to fit between you and another motor vehicle in an adjacent lane when overtaking while leaving sufficient distance between their vehicle and the cyclist?

I would posit that's not possible, meaning that there is no benefit derived from riding closer to the edge of the road. I would also assert that it's actually more dangerous compared to just riding in the center of the general purpose traffic lane.

"I would posit that's not possible, meaning that there is no benefit derived from riding closer to the edge of the road. "

When you overtake a cyclist driving in the middle of the road, you have a longer time on the other side of the road while overtaking, than if the cyclist drives on the right. So that can mean, a driver will sometimes do a more dangerous overtaking and then in fact, endanger you, when he quickly has to change lanes again to abort the overtaking.

A more dangerous overtaking than someone trying to 'squeeze' through without even going into other lane?

> When you overtake a cyclist driving in the middle of the road, you have a longer time on the other side of the road while overtaking, than if the cyclist drives on the right.

The amount of time needed to move completely to the opposite side of the road as opposed to straddling the center line time 2 is not significant. The amount of time to actually overtake the cyclist easily exceeds that by a factor of 10 or more. In other words, there really isn't any signficant difference in terms of the time required to complete an overtake.

Physically separated bike lanes are even worse. You can't get out of them easily if you come across a lot of debris. And they are harder to street clean, so debris accumulates more.

As a counterpoint to the "harder to clean" argument, I can offer the following.

I've just been to Montreal, and with temperatures well below freezing and lots of recent snowfall, the segregated bike lanes were completely clear of snow. Every day. In the places I've been around town, I am not sure I've ever come across any significant debris, in any season.

This is in stark contrast with many (especially older) bike lanes in the UK, which are basically unrideable in any season as they're covered in drain covers, potholes and debris.

I think the difference here is not so much the difficultly of cleaning as the commitment to doing it.

Why would they be any harder to clean? A city can just have one of their sweepers be a much smaller, cheaper, sweeper. Likewise for snow clearing. A much smaller and cheaper machine can often be used.

In regards to painted lines--they mostly do not pass the 'would you let your kids ride on them?' test. Drivers treat them as additional car lanes or a place to drift off into while texting.

Painted lines can be both very good and very bad. It really depends on implementation. A painted strip right through the door-zone of parking is the well known example of bad painted lines. But painted lines next to a pair of narrow lanes are bad even without parking: here, without the bike lane a cyclist would effectively take most of the full lane, with overtaking cars easily doing a half-width zip merging on the outside lane. It's an easy flow with cars temporarily "compressed" onto "1.5 lanes". But when you compress the cars onto two permanently narrow lanes, with an explicit bike lane, drivers will reliably stop the zip merge and just plow through, often even much closer to the bike lane than to the other car lane. The worst examples are those where the original road was slightly too narrow to make 2x car and 1x bike and they painted a minimum width bike lane: on those, drivers keep doing double file and those on the right routinely enter the bike lane - and they still don't do the "partial zip" they'd do without the bike lane. Those things are not only worse than fully separated, they are worse than absence of bike infrastructure.

But a not-bad lane implementation (either enough room for well-sized lanes for both cars and bikes or making the remaining car lane clearly too narrow for double file), yeah, I'd take it over fully separated any single time. Much better coordination with right turning traffic (occasionally, when speed happens to match, I even merge through the right turn lane so they don't have to give me right of way, clear win-win), much safer access to left turn lanes if you need it, much easier merging into traffic when the bike infrastructure is blocked (plenty of occasions, both sides of legality) and in general sooo much less interaction with stray dogs, children, cyclists who ride against traffic because in their mind they are a pedestrian with wheels instead of a very light vehicle, pedestrians who walk there because in their mind they are cyclists (yeah, that has happened to me, I admit) and so on. I love painted lanes! Just please avoid those horrible mistakes that you have to avoid while setting them up when you set them up.

In the Netherlands there are also roads with just a painted bike lane. The difference is that the whole bike lane is painted in a solid color (usually reddish). This gives a constant visual feedback to drivers. Because of the paint it is just ever so slightly raised and has a different texture than the regular asphalt, so there can be a noticable difference in sound when car tires go onto the bike lane.

See for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cycling_in_the_Netherlands#/me...

The main difference is that the decision of painting the road or segregating traffic in the Netherlands is based on traffic volume and traffic speed. High speed high traffic zones get segregate bicycle traffic. Low speed low traffic routes can cope with mixed traffic and just a side lane for bicycles.

The decision of just painting over curbs for cost is the main infrastructure mistake and 'false saving' in a lot of European cities outside NL.

> The main difference is that the decision of painting the road or segregating traffic in the Netherlands is based on traffic volume and traffic speed. High speed high traffic zones get segregate bicycle traffic. Low speed low traffic routes can cope with mixed traffic and just a side lane for bicycles.

The current standard technically doesn't allow for bicycle gutters: Traffic should be either fully mixed on low speed, low volume streets or fully separated. Though bicycle gutters do still get made (space being the primary excuse), from what I've seen it's primarily old roads that have yet to be renewed since the standards changed.

https://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2020/08/12/cycle-lanes-in...

Cycle lanes are the subject of active and intense debate in the netherlands, and while they remain grandfathered (not sure they’re allowed for new roads) they are not the part of the recommendations.

Furthermore, the legal management of cycle lanes is a lot harsher in the netherlands: drivers are not allowed to drive, park, or stop in cycle lanes. Cycle lanes with solid lines can not be encroached on at all, while cycle lanes with dashed lines may be crossed or used to pass an obstacles.

> It is really frustrating how highway engineers, as a profession, are unwilling to consistently learn lessons from the Netherlands in designing cycle infrastructure.

These decisions aren't made by highway engineers, they are made by politicians.

The highway engineer puts a proper bikelane, makes the highway wider, and tells the politician that its going to cost 100 million dollars to do a couple of kms.

The politician says that there is no money for that, at most 10 million, and that they "promised it", and suggests whether one can't paint a line or something for cheap instead. Otherwise, the engineer is fired.

So the cousin of the politician ends up being paid 10 million $ for painting a shitty 1000$ line that serves no purpose.

There is a systemic difference between the UK and the Netherlands.

Suggesting that the UK doesn't have good bike lanes cause Netherlands has better highway engineers is as accurate as suggesting that the UK did Brexit cause their highway engineers are bad.

I wish that were true but, having sat in lots of meetings with them (including an hour with the leader of the County Council last month), that's not my experience.

The highway engineers were generally trained in the 80s or thereabouts to value vehicle throughput and continuous speed as their principal outputs. So they continue to build junctions with massive corner radiuses, shared-use pedestrian/cycle paths to maximise the space available for cars, priority for turning cars at side-road crossings, and so on.

Here in Oxfordshire you could describe the situation as "officer capture" - the officers continue to design dreck, and the elected politicians aren't (yet) strong enough to reject it.

> These decisions aren't made by highway engineers, they are made by politicians.

They are made by the public. We need to persaude other citizens, not rely on (and blame) some higher power.

> The highway engineer puts a proper bikelane, makes the highway wider, and tells the politician that its going to cost 100 million dollars to do a couple of kms.

Yikes! That's criminal. You can get an excellent bikelane with a few bollards and a paint can. I would say that's a failure of the engineering profession.

If the road is designed for 2 car lanes, without much tolerance, something has to give. Either you make it wider, or you change it to one car lane, or you remove parking spaces, etc.

If you leave the 2 car lanes, and make them smaller to fit to one bike lane per car lane, such that cars barely fit, and such that cars can't leave a proper distance when overtaking bikes, you end up with the crappy unsafe solution that the OP is complaining about.

You annoy car drivers, and you give bike riders the impression that cycling is unsafe, so this is actually counter productive.

Ah, the ol' Oxford cycle "lanes". Where (if they exist) the paths themselves are bumpier than the Netherlands, and every few dozen meters you are greeted by a water drain or a manhole. In addition you have quite busy rush hours in the mornings and evenings.

I moved from Oxford to the Netherlands a couple years ago and let me tell you: cycling here is a bliss.

Is "a bliss" a typo or is that a (UK) English way of speech? I'm American and I've never seen someone say something is a bliss just that something is bliss (no indefinite article).

I’m an American, and i’ve heard both “is a bliss” and “is bliss” my whole life.

Frankly, I have no idea. I'm not a native English speaker myself, just picked that phrase up.

may be regional dialect

NYC has, at least in Brooklyn, a quite extensive bike lanes network.

It's of very inconsistent quality, besides workarounds that are tolerable given circumstance, like that the path cuts off at one point and resumes on the other lane in the street, the abundance of bike lanes that lack any separation at all from the main street makes it so morons use it as a place to stop their cars or trucks, and then you have to make dangerous maneuvers to get around them, or stop and hope some car gives you right of way when the street is busy.

Cars and trucks? That's nothing. Go along Vernon Blvd in Queens and you might be interrupted by large commercial dumpster-trailers being staged in your lane.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FHZG-kPX0AQs4wf?format=jpg&name=...

Neistat's Bike Lanes is a perennial classic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzE-IMaegzQ

I've pretty much given up on cycling in the UK. I drive now. It's just not safe or fun any more.

The problem is car dominance. 20mph speed limits are flagrantly ignored everywhere, even right next to schools etc. Most drivers have zero experience on the road except for in a car. Cars are getting bigger and bigger and more and more powerful. Streets are lined with cars. Pavements are filled with cars. It's cars everywhere. We've a long way to go before even stopping the tide, let alone turning it around.

Even when Netherlands style infrastructure is introduced in the UK it's a laughable failure. It ends up making things worse. See the Dutch style roundabout in Cambridge, for example. It turns out you can't change people's behaviour by painting a few lines on the road.

This is perhaps the most trafficked new bike path in Milan, going to the city center from North https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtBeEBgodCw

It was built in Spring/Summer 2020. You may start from 1:00 if you're in hurry, you'll get the idea. They moved the parking area towards the center to make way for a protected bike path. The road is narrower for cars but it was stop and go anyway (mostly stop).

Further North, on the way out from the city, they didn't move the parking area. They painted a line between the cars and the parking area.

> Meanwhile our idiot city (Oxford, UK) is spending £1.2m on "Quickways", which are painted lines on existing roads..

Jason of the Not Just Bikes YT channel calls these bicycle gutters:

* https://twitter.com/notjustbikes/status/1431260478303518724

I think it's tricky really. The only way it can work well is if a council starts closing certain roads to motor traffic or to through-traffic but this does cause a knock-on effect that is not easily fixed. There are lots of people who can't realistically use public transport (at least not until it is better etc.) and so if they are completely screwed by traffic decisions then that isn't really fair.

However, what they are currently trying to do by keeping the level of motor traffic and simply slotting in lanes for cycles where there is space clearly doesn't work.

I think a few places like Bristol have been a bit more forceful but they are large enough to have alternate routes for motor traffic.

> if they are completely screwed by traffic decisions than that isn’t really fair.

What does “completely screwed” mean? And is anyone really proposing something that will “completely screw” drivers, or is that more fear speaking than reality?

The existing system of prioritizing cars was never built on fairness for all, and hasn’t been fair to cyclists and pedestrians, nor even really to people who can’t realistically use private transport. It has to be okay for the most privileged among us to experience some changes in their road usage, if we’re to improve the situation for all.

But in the long term people need to take responsibility for their own choices. If you live in the middle of a medieval city and expect to travel 50 miles to a random market town at rush hour you are going to have a bad time. That was never a reasonable choice and puts an unfair burden on everyone else. Oxford can be made suitable for bike and pedestrians. It can never be made suitable for significant vehicle traffic.

> There are lots of people who can't realistically use public transport

What kind of people can't use public transport but can drive a private car?

You want to move yourself oop north, Greater Manchester's "Bee Network" delivers fully segregated cycle lanes - they've just done a large tranche of work to the roads south of Stockport to resize the road to make the walkways wider.

That said, haven't seen them actually used yet. Pass a lot more cyclists that choose the road, still.

https://activetravel.tfgm.com/bee-network-vision/

If the bee network gets fully built then it could be great, but even then it relies upon a lot of paint on the road rather than segregated cycleways. There are some, such as Stockport and Oxford Road but there needs to be far more.

Agreed.

I have seen too many cyclists hit and bloodied up by automobiles that I would never think twice about cycling on the road in my area, either.

It's just not safe.

Forget the paint, just remove the cars from the roads. Suddenly they become really safe, for everyone.

So what would you propose as a solution specifically for Oxford? Many streets such as Abingdon Rd are already narrow enough and I can't see how one could segregate a dedicated lane for cyclists there.

NL does not segregate in historical inner cities either.

Abingdon Road is the difficult one because it genuinely isn't wide enough for segregated tracks. But it's also the easy one because there's a parallel, direct backstreet route (Marlborough Road/Wytham Street), and Abingdon Road itself has few enough businesses that it's not really a destination in itself.

The Quickways proposals are focused on East Oxford where there is enough space. Broadly speaking, all of the East Oxford arterials have enough space for a segregated track on at least one side, usually both. It's only the immediate vicinity of the Plain where they're very narrow. But you could get two protected tracks along the Cowley Road as far as Marsh Road, assuming you reworked the road furniture and parking spaces; one protected track along the Iffley Road from the Plain to somewhere round Magdalen Road, and two from there on; two along most of Headington/London Road, Marston Road, and so on.

And that's why the national cycling network actively avoids Abingdon Rd: https://explore.osmaps.com/en/route/3647727/Sustrans-Hanson-...

Remove all paint and signage to make car drivers slow down from fear. Require cyclists to have extremely bright flashing rear lights. If all else fails increase the number of tiny roundabouts and speed bumps.

> Many cities seem to delight in half-assing their own solutions.

You can expand this out to so many other areas, like building code too. It's enormously frustrating that everyone thinks they're a unique snowflake, they cannot learn from other jurisdictions and they must re-invent the wheel.

There are so many issues that so many cities are facing that are solved problems in other places.

I would be surprised if part of Milan's plan wasn't just to paint some bits of roads a different colour and call it a cycle path. These large initiatives tend to be a mix of solutions, from paint to dedicated cycle paths. This has happened pretty much anywhere a city has announced upgraded cycling infrastructure. Some cities ratio it better than others.

As they did last year... There was quite some adapting for the drivers then and still confusing for drivers not familiar with these streets. Newly painted lanes with width that would vary every 50-100 meters (or less), random taxi/bus stops and parking being interchanged with the bike lane... Not easy for the riders nor the drivers...

A lot of bike paths here in Copenhagen are simply painted and it works fine, even for small kids.

Is there actual enforcement of people stopping their car or parking in those lanes? Doesn't happen for the most part in the US.

You’re definitely not allowed to drive or park in a bike lane, nobody would do that.

On some on way side streets they have this weird system where the bike lane and takes up half the road and shares it with parked cars

A painted bike line in Copenhagen is huge compared to the lanes they paint in Britain.

The British version is about half as wide, and often allows parking for large parts of the day (i.e. is only a lane for a couple of hours).

I've never been to Oxford, but someone mentioned Abingdon Road [1]. Just some bike symbols painted on the road.

Or a little further up [2] -- that thing on the left is a British cycle lane. If you go forward 3 clicks, you can see it ends almost immediately.

You obviously wouldn't take small kids through crap like this: [3]. Unbelievably, this is "National Cycle Route 57" (the StreetView car is pointed the wrong way to see it, but if you search you can find the tiny blue "57" sign at the roundabout.)

Other than the bridges, the only part of Central Copenhagen with painted lanes I can think of is Bernstorffsgade [4].

I'm not really sure where you're thinking of for "lots" of bike paths. A little further out [5] is this, where at least the lanes go behind the parked cars, and are wider. https://osm.org/go/0NWvDIpQ-?layers=C shows solid lines for painted lanes, and there aren't many.

[1] https://www.google.com/maps/@51.7378951,-1.2521828,3a,70.1y,...

[2] https://www.google.com/maps/@51.7471822,-1.2563676,3a,75y,18...

[3] https://www.google.com/maps/@51.7504861,-1.2448391,3a,75y,12...

[4] https://www.google.com/maps/@55.6698747,12.5700607,3a,75y,31...

[5] https://www.google.com/maps/@55.6598222,12.6187002,3a,75y,16...

I haven't done a statistical analysis, but looking at my way to work now it's more than half of it that's painted bike lanes. That from Østerport to the Parliament, meaning the outskirts of the center to downtown.

It's equally frustrating how a certain class of people, i.e. rabid anti-car cyclists, only read publications within their bubble that are equally anti-car, while constantly throwing shade at any country that is not the paradise Netherlands. I encourage you to take that next step: only commenting on these type of stories within your bubble.

I'm a cyclist but I try to get as many perspectives as possible.

Can you recommend some alternative material for cyclists who want to see the other side?

When I commuted to work I cycled 16+ miles a day rain, snow or shine. I also own 2 cars, I love working on them. I've built a few bicycles and regularly maintain them for my friends and family. I think I have a pretty decent perspective on both sides.

Cycling in the UK is 1% of road traffic, and are drowned out of the conversation on how roads are built up until very recently. They are the most vulnerable things on wheels. They are treated as second class citizens on the road, and are subject to abuse car drivers do not get. I'm not 'anti-car', I'm 'anti-getting-killed-while-cycling'.

If a cyclist crashes into a car, the cyclist comes off worse. If a car crashes into a cyclist, the cyclist comes off worse. It's not even close. The relentless amount of hate cyclists receive in the UK is genuinely shocking to me, and any time any sort of positive action is attempted to be brought up (e.g. building new cycling infrastructure) the haters come out of the wood-work to act as if they're being oppressed.

Do you cycle? My money is on 'no'.

It's NOT about car drivers vs. cyclists. You've immediately classified me into somebody who couldn't possibly cycle, as clearly I am evil. I disagreed with an anti-car pro-bicycle article after all!

This is why I think this sort of rabid us-vs-them crap should be kept to its own bubble: it has no place in a civilized discussion among even-tempered people.

I've classified you as someone who doesn't cycle because of how you wrote your initial comment, 'i.e. rabid anti-car cyclists'. This language is the same language people who hold prejudiced views on cycling use. I don't think these people are 'evil', you are making wild assumptions.

My reply told you that I own cars, I enjoy driving, I enjoy working on them. I find mechanics interesting, cars and bicycles both. I tried to explain that I do not sit in the 'us-vs-them' camp, I pay VED, yet I cycle a lot too. I think I can see both sides of the issue.

I think my response was even-tempered.

You complain about things being 'us-vs-them', yet you think adding cycling lanes is 'anti-car pro-bicyle'. I think you should look at whether or not you sit in a certain camp, to me, the language you use is telling.

I agree with you. Having a car maximizes your opportunity, so by making it difficult and expensive to own a car and drive hurts the people who need the help the most.

It really depends on the context. Driving is often the only feasible way to get around in sparsely populated areas, or areas with extreme weather.

In densely populated temperate areas, cars are often no faster than other modes of transport (although they may be more comfortable), and they impose a very high cost on others, including: fatalities and injuries associated with traffic accidents, premature deaths and reduced quality of life due to air pollution and noise pollution. Parking and road lanes typically consume a great deal more space per passenger mile than buses, trains, trams, bike or walking.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by hurting 'people who need help the most', but in most urban situations owning a car for personal transport is not an option for those with the lowest income, and no realistic policy will make it affordable.

Again, I'm happy to have my views challenged on this.

I live in Boston, in the 90's it was way easier to have a car. The bike lanes have cut our two lane main roads down to one which has created a lot of traffic, a lot more than in the past. And there's much less parking due to the bikes, but also the new developments. The Mayor of Boston in the 90's wouldn't let anyone build housing unless they provided a parking space for every bedroom. The new mayor just green lit a big development that will provide no parking spaces. Having a car is your independence, not having one make you dependent on the public transportation system. It's great if you can choose not to have a car, but I don't think it's fair to prevent other people from making that choice, or making it expensive or difficult.

Also, it's much more difficult to manage a family without a car. A woman I worked with had to pick her kids every now and then. She wasn't making a lot of money and she had to pay for her own parking. It was a good job for her, so she tried to make the commute work, but it's difficult. It was difficult before, but the quality of life has gone down because people want their bicycle utopia.

I've ridden a bike in Boston since the early nineties and I don't think it's any easier or any safer. I can't tell if the bike lanes are really for bicycles or for people who want to create a hassle for people who depend on their car for their family or job.

Did this help at all?

Thanks for your reply.

Ultimately it just depends on your vision of what you'd like your city to be like.

I would like everyone to have the option of cycling or walking around their city without fear of death or hospitalisation. It doesn't seem like an extremist position - the roads are for everyone, there is no intrinsic reason to prioritise cars.

It's so frustrating that it becomes part of some car vs bike culture war.

I would also like the option of using whatever transportation you like to get around. But my observation has been that the roads are unfortunately not for all in Boston and we need to make a choice. Boston is a great pedestrian city, so I would focus on public transit and prioritize cars over bicycles, it worked better that way in the recent past.

The public transit buses have been highly impacted by the bike lanes. By reducing the main roads to one lane because of the bike lanes has created more traffic so it's harder for the busses. The solution to that was to create lanes that only busses can travel, in certain parts of the road, which in turn has created even more traffic and not really improved things. I applaud them for trying, but it really doesn't look like it working from a quality of life stand point.

I think your right how it's become a part of the culture war.

Just to put some perspective on this, I looked up Boston's bike lanes. There are 8 miles of separated bike lanes in Boston, out of 800 miles of down town roads.

Drivers in Boston are being asked to _share_ 1% of the road infrastructure with bikes.

The 60 miles of regular bike lanes caused the loss of parking and loss of two lanes in most of the city's main roads. The main roads are just wide enough to have two lanes of cars, one lane for parking and a nice sidewalk.

I don't even think cyclists make up 1% of the users of the road. Maybe at rush hour you'll see more, but it's not much. And there are only a few diehards that bike in the winter and in the rain. So we're cutting the main roads in half for 1% of the road users that don't use the roads all the time? I'm not sure that makes sense. They don't run the subway or busses after 12 when I'm sure people would use it to get home from the bars. Although the subway and busses cost money to operate whereas the bike lanes don't.

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