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Comment by ldbooth | Hacker News Reader

Certainly part of the problem is the protocol of the highway system itself, and our expectation as consumers. Passengers can get by on 30kg ebikes we need a lane system for those on all roads, not just a 'take your own risks bike lane'. 1500kg passenger vehicle curb weight should not be the starting point for passenger vehicles. But no one takes this on because it's regulatory and a quagmire.

Trucking is an unavoidable issue, but (at least in the US) there is plenty of space for combined solar/wind/battery sites on trucking corridors.

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Whenever I see comments like this I gotta ask: do you have kids?

Like I can’t fathom the car-rejectionist position coming from someone with multiple offspring.

This random source on the Internet [1] suggests most car miles are single passenger. Just looking out my window (main street in average American town) this number looks about right. So for the vast majority of passenger transport the car is not the best choice.

[1] https://thealternativedaily.com/why-ridesharing-matters/

Most, not all. If you ban cars, that also bans their uses for families with multiple kids or family members.

Yours is the first comment in this thread about a car ban. Nobody is arguing that cars don't have uses, but that also doesn't mean we should ignore their negative effects and skip investing in more efficient options.

If you redo roads to only permit bikes instead of cars, it's an effective car ban. Sure, you can still have your car, but you can't take it anywhere because the roads only fit bikes now.

Of course there's nuance to be had, but most discussions just devolve into "why would anyone need a car?"

Again, I don’t think anyone is arguing for making regions of the US unreachable by car. But when there are 6+ car lanes and no separated bike infrastructure there are clearly regions unreachable by bike.

No one wants that. We want separated bike lanes. I also don't see why this angers drivers, you should want it too because now there's no cyclists on your car road. Everyone wins.

Regarding the obvious tax comment someone will make, infrastructure budgets usually come from city and council taxes, it does not come from car registration or even fuel tax when you wring out the details.

In other words cyclists have been paying their share of infra budget and getting nothing for it for a long time.

If you can't picture what it actually looks like, look up the Not Just Bikes video on Stroads. It does a good job of describing the current situation, and why it's hard for people to imagine how bikes could fit with current road infra without impacting them.

> No one wants that. We want separated bike lanes. I also don't see why this angers drivers, you should want it too because now there's no cyclists on your car road. Everyone wins.

You may want that, and indeed, I would highly prefer that, but most people who discuss this can only think about political punishments to affect behavior and go back to thinking that driving must absolutely suck in order for people to choose other options, rather than making alternatives even better than driving.

You don't need to begin with the mindset of "too many car lanes, destroy them until people are forced to use the nonexistant bus". It should begin with "people prefer driving. How many we make something even better so they don't prefer driving anyone?"

Sure, that will begin a competition between transportation modes, but when it comes from trying to make something even better, not out of wrath of driving/cars, then perhaps people will listen.

I'm in total agreeance, this can be a hard conversation to have online because I think each side assumes the worst version of the other.

Separated bike lanes does not imply removing total car throughput, in many cases separated bike lanes can be routed down low-traffic areas, alongside drainage canals or railways, through parks and such. Areas where maybe a handful of cars are using it, but hundreds of cyclists would use since it's the bike thoroughfare.

Modern city planning is often a story of "Worst of both worlds", in that because we can't even get these small projects done, people are are on foot or cycling have no choice but to be in the way of car traffic (be that cycling in traffic or making it so there has to be pedestrian crossings on major roads and that kind of thing). It's terrible for everyone when it could have been excellent had there just been some better planning and more budget toward non-car infra.

> No one wants that. We want separated bike lanes. I also don't see why this angers drivers, you should want it too because now there's no cyclists on your car road. Everyone wins.

The reason why you don't see why this "angers" drivers, is because it doesn't. No driver is angered by a bicyclist on their own road not interfering with the flow of traffic. Drivers are angered by cyclists that impede the flow of traffic and create safety hazards (yes, mostly for themselves) by having a bicycle share the road with a 2000 pound steel car going twice the speed. Move cyclists to a grade separated lane and no one will be bothered.

The problem is the population of bicyclists is large enough to support such an infrastructure project in only a few places. Whereas the cost of laying down a white strip of paint is sufficiently cheap that it can be done in many more places. So it boils down to money.

Arguing that cyclists pay taxes which are used to fund roads and so should have this major infrastructure project funded just for them (if they can direct their taxes this way, will they promise to never to drive a car? Are other people allowed to dedicate their tax funds to support projects just for them? Can childless people opt out of funding public schools and instead fund special centers just for them?) -- is not going to work. Public spending is about pooled resources and public benefits. Everyone benefits from roads -- e.g. even the bicyclists purchase goods shipped to them via roads. Roads allow the economy to function so that bikes can be produced and purchased, etc. At the same time, one can argue that cars benefit from cyclists who reduce traffic. These things are sorted out via a political process -- as a result of power, not some kind of mathematical algorithm.

Gain political power and you will gain the power to have these types of infrastructure funds directed for your group, otherwise it wont happen. That means cyclists need to win over the rest of the public whose representatives vote on these matters -- which up to this point is not something cyclists have been interested or capable of doing -- e.g. having good public relations and outreach to other taxpayers who aren't cyclists. Cyclists have an image problem with the rest of the public, which results in their political power being disproportionately small. That is why, in most places, all they get is the white strip of paint.

Your comment is rooted so far into car centrism it's hard for me to read through such a different lens. We see the world, very, very differently. That makes for an interesting conversation I guess. I have cars, I am a car enthusiast even. I use roads. But I also know there's people in the city who don't drive, and for them life is still dominated by cars. Sometimes that's me, sometimes I'm in my car.

Every sliver of spare space in our cities has been claimed by car infrastructure, and that's not fair to every other possible way to live. I'm not suggesting we remove roads, but we can do better than this for everyone else in cities.

> Arguing that cyclists pay taxes which are used to fund roads and so should have this major infrastructure project funded just for them

I only drive on a handful of roads, but I'm happy to fund all the others because other people do. That's exactly the same position cycle/pedestrians are in, they pay taxes too so why can't the community cater a little bit to them as well? People far and away pay for more car roads they'll never use than they ever will bike lanes they don't use.

My taxes go to many things I don't use and that's fine, because that's how communities work. I'm even glad we're building a car super-highway project because it'll improve commutes for people who do drive. It's fine to drive, I'm not against it.

I get it, we're not going to be paying for bike highways in suburbia where there aren't even footpaths for walking, because it's so far entrenched that no-one is even trying to walk or ride. But there are so many places in our cities that with just a bit of planning we could have catered to both cars and peds/cyclists at the same time.

"Ban cars" is a fringe position very few people actually hold.

This being said. I mean. Cars have only been around for about a century, we've managed without them for millennia. Surely there is a way to reorganize many places so that their use can be slashed by 95%+, including by families.

One key thing is that it depends on the place. I think that in a lot of big cities it would be possible (not politically, but theoretically) to e.g. ban all curbside parking, reserve all central lanes for high frequency buses, limit all (non-bus) car traffic to 10 km/h. Car traffic would vanish on its own and the QOL increase for residents would more than make up for the inconvenience (less noise, less eyesore, more trees, safe biking, jaywalk everywhere, play in the street, etc.)

On the other hand, you can't really get cars out of hellscape car-centric suburbs (which mostly exist in the US, from my understanding) because they have been designed around the assumption that cars exist. You wouldn't get QOL improvements from slashing car traffic like you would in cities.

So I would argue to leave all these places alone, but we should try to suppress cars in dense cities as much as possible. As someone who lives in one, I would particularly like curbside parking to be nuked, because cars are an eyesore, they block visibility, and they are wasting so much usable space.

Of course, the only reason you need a car for your family is because we built car centric cities that require it. We haven't had that for long, less than 100 years.

I wouldn't suggest someone run a family without a car in a modern American city, but there are still places even in America that didn't get rebuilt around cars and of course plenty of places around the world where you can raise a family without a car.

There is a reason why all of those people chose to spend large sums of money on those vehicles.

Depending on where you live, you can cargo bike with your kids. If you check out the cargo bike forums there are always posts on how to attach baby seats to a bakfiets and such. I've got two kids and my ecargo-bike replaces about 20 car drives a week.

It can actually be easier to raise children in places with good bike infrastructure, because you don’t have to be their chauffeur. They can bike themselves around.

And for smaller children, in cities like Amsterdam, it’s common to see a mom riding with multiple kids sitting in a cargo bike.

Netherlands are flat as a pancake, yes e-bikes are somewhat of a solution to where it is a problem, but snow and sleet are something else… I’ve got kids and an e-cargo bike and it isn’t fun (braking downhill on ice with kids in the trunk… let’s just say I revert to the car in this weather.)

It’s fine if you accept that you’re living a wasteful lifestyle that was completely unnecessary for hundreds of thousands of years.

The Midwest is flat as a pancake.

Yep, 100% of it. Please ignore the hill down the street from my house that two wheel drive cars often can't climb when snowy. It only has about 90 feet of elevation gain over about 2000 feet of distance. The steepest section is about 10% grade over 600 feet. No problem for a typical person riding a cargo bike without electric assist.

Note that the maximum grade for a wheelchair ramp is 8.3%.

I'm pretty sure 10% was what i had in Limberg. Can we agree that both midwset and netherland are generally flat, and while there are hills in both places, this isn't San Francisco?

By the way, i visited Chicago, Michigan and Colombus, Ohio: I might now have seen everywhere, but those are closer in elevation difference to Amsterdam than Paris and Lisbon are

Aside from the hilly areas of San Francisco, it is quite flat too. Whenever I've visited SF my primary mode of transit is walking. Except for the time I stayed in a hotel at the top of Nob Hill, I was generally walking on land that is flatter than that found in my neighborhood and the older parts of the UW Madison campus.

From what I recall of Columbus, it is every bit as flat as you say. I'd have a hard time telling you about a hill in Chicago. Then again, I'd have a hard time telling you about a time that I was on something other than an 6+ lane highway in Chicago. The view you get from a major highway is often different from what you get in areas where you think of your kids having a casual bike ride.

Except for all the hills and valleys. True there are no mountains but at a human scale, a 100 foot tall hill is still hard to climb.

They weren’t saying “everyone must do it thusly”. They were making the point we should have options.

Right now the only option that infrastructure is actually built for is using a car for everything, even for the single person to run an errand 3 miles away. It’s possible they can be an unintended user of the car oriented roads, but it is much riskier.

it would be nice if the people going on solo trips could take bikes without worrying about their dependents becoming orphans. That way when doing something that actually requires a car highways would be less congested too! Win-win.

I have three kids and cycle with a cargo bike to school and kindergarten every day. Prefer it over the car for our situation greatly.

Replying in good faith: yes! Two! And having them has made me all the more committed to not owning a car as I try to minimise how much I destroy their future.

Have you been to The Netherlands? I was a tourist for 3 weeks, and it was quite a common sight to see a family with young kids coming out their apartment stairway, babies loading on to carriers on mom and dad’s bikes and small children riding their own.

Seeing as how children are at extreme risk from cars yet can’t use them themselves, and chauffeuring your kids around because it’s not safe for them to walk or bike themselves is almost the central time sink of parenthood, it is weird to see parents as the primary advocates of car primacy.

Not everybody can live in the Netherlands though. The Netherlands has just the right weather, just the right geography, just the right urban planning, and just the right social climate.

For a parent, it doesn’t matter how much you advocate, your kid will have their drivers license long before you can change any of the above situations.

The social climate and the urban planning are no more and no less than how people in your community conduct themselves behind the wheel and at the microphone in the community hearings. Incremental bike infrastructure improvements can take a few years in very dysfunctional polities, but 16 would be an outlier, and they can also be done very quickly in healthy ones.

My area has people who have been fighting for better infrastructure for decades. I have voted for the issue as well for decades. The social component is important. When commuters lose a lane on popular roads, they responded by voting the people out of office who were responsible for it.

I know you think it’s simple, but I know from experience that it’s not. Deep car-centric cultures demand more of the same. Maybe where you’re from these attitudes seem like outliers, but in middle America, it’s really not. It’s not an awareness issue, an insignificant number of people here resent the idea. There’s no convincing them.

Also, planning is definitely important. If the lanes don’t go between differently zoned areas, they’re useless for primary transport. What little success we’ve had is used against us as evidence that “nobody wants bike lanes”.

Having some people fighting for it is of course not enough, the community has to want it, but once it does it is fairly easy to make happen. This is in contrast to e.g. trains, which take decades from authorization to passenger service in the best case and often fail for technical or project-management reasons despite voter support.

The bike paths in Finland would like to have a word with you.

It’s more about the culture than anything. The rest of your points are not really the biggest factors.

There are about 190 countries in the world, but I'm pretty sure there's only 1 where a car is required for having a child. (The USA.)

Maybe geography isn't the central issue.

Have you been to the United States? The idea of loading 3 kids on some bikes and riding 10 miles to school, then 15 miles the other direction to work in the midwest on a winter day (temps get into negative fahrenheit in many parts of the U.S.) (or the south/southwest on a hot 100F+ summer day) is laughable. God forbid some after school activity is another 10 miles out of your way or you need to pick up something on the way, or carry them to your parents house which is another 25 miles away.

No one is coming to put a bike lane on the kind of seasonally impassable dirt road that is reasonably found 10 miles from the nearest school. If you want to live deep in the middle of nowhere, no one’s stopping you. But when you come into the kinds of communities that actually sustain the institutions you need (school, work, etc) they aren’t obliged to give over all their public space and put their lives at risk for your truck to move as freely as possible.

The closest religious school I'm considering for my son is over 20 miles away currently, and obviously I can't move over night to reduce that. I also don't live on a narrow dirt road - I live in a city in a community with probably hundreds of houses

There's also no reliable transit option to either location.

Am I suppose to just suck it up, throw out my vehicle, and bike 90 minutes there just to drop him off?

Car primacy is not the same thing as the ability to drive at all. Cars are obviously useful, and lots of trips wouldn't be feasible without them. But streets in populated areas shouldn't be designed around this kind of trip as the only or primary use case. People choosing the local schools, for example, should have streets on which they can can feel confident walking or cycling, and not need their own vehicles just because you're using one.

I would ask you to, in your words, "suck it up" with respect to some inconvenience in your car trip for that goal. Even then, you might be surprised - adding a bike lane might remove some car throughput, but would also remove some cars. On balance it could work out in your favor.

They say the car erased distance. I don't think we should go back to a primitive era of distance being literally insurmountable, but I do think it would be healthy to rediscover a bit of respect for it.

> People choosing the local schools, for example, should have streets on which they can can feel confident walking or cycling, and not need their own vehicles just because you're using one.

I entirely agree, but we all have to live with the world that we're currently in. It can take years or decades to re-envision a car-dependent area into something more car independent. For example, painting a white line over a highway's current gutter is not pedestrian/bike/transit infrastructure. It's dangerous for everyone. Yet, that's the type of "bike-friendly infrastructure" we get, and when drivers complain, it's viewed as drivers being anti-transit or anti-bicycle. No, it's just dangerous. The bike route shouldn't be inches from a high speed motorway.

> I would ask you to, in your words, "suck it up" with respect to some inconvenience in your car trip for that goal...adding a bike lane might remove some car throughput, but would also remove some cars.

No, it does not. Maybe in your area, it would, but here, it does not, because it's simply too far and unsafe to bicycle on the highway. It's dangerous and bad engineering. It's 5 miles (or 27 minutes according to Google) on major highways to the local elementary school. No one should ever be on a bicycle on these highways, regardless the fact that a small part of that distance might have a painted white lane denoting a bike lane full of road debris.

Instead, there should be a bicycle/pedestrian path that goes a more direct route - the distance is only 2 miles straight (or ~10 minutes), without crossing any major highways or difficult terrain. The school is also only 1.5 miles from a very nice park, but the highway would cross the path, so that conflict would need to be figured out.

Sorry if this comes of as combative, but what I'm pointing out that "painting a lane" simply does not work in the US, but that's all that is suggested and done. Streets and Roads need to be separate, and bikes should remain on streets or non-Road routes, and high speed vehicle travel should remain on roads. Not Just Bikes says this in his channel "Stroads are Ugly, Expensive, and Dangerous", but does so more to clarify/elevate the "Street". However, the discussion tends to miss that the "Road" is still important and needs to be respected. Putting a bike lane on a "Road" is another form of creating a "stroad".

If you're plugged into Not Just Bikes then I'm guessing you've heard the phrase "paint isn't infrastructure." Painted bicycle gutters are not anyone's idea of a solution here, more of a lazy DOT's way of shrugging at the problem without rocking any boats.

What I think we need to reimagine is having the only connection between where people live and where they go to school be a highway. That's unfortunately a fundamental construct in suburban design - subdivisions hanging off of bike- and pedestrian-hostile highways - and it shows up everywhere. Creating new rights of way might be doable in some circumstances. But in others, these things are going to have to stop being highways (or at least lose some lanes) in order to get genuinely safe, separated walking and cycling infrastructure along existing rights of way.

US suburban sprawl, enormous parking lots, and generally inefficient land use is what puts everything 10 to 15 to 25 miles away from home. It didn't have to be like this.

Check out Not Just Bikes on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0intLFzLaudFG-xAvUEO-A/vid...

Part of why you feel that way I assume is because of how where you live is set up, it probably is unfathomable to operate a family without a car, and you shouldn't be worried about that changing any time soon. But proponents for bike infrastructure are not suggesting you put your kids in a bike trailer and ride 40 miles to school, and they aren't suggesting we remove the highways taking you from suburbia into the city. They are usually suggesting that we need more bike or walk friendly neighborhoods. But we also can't all live in the city, so bike friendly infrastructure is also necessary between suburbia and the necessities like work and shopping.

The only reason you need an SUV to keep your kids safe is all the other SUVs on the road. It's become a weapons race of ever bigger tanks. This really has to stop sooner or later.

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