Wrong takeaway
My comment is another takeaway that isn't discussed enough.
A cyclist died, let’s ban cars is an equally valid view as a cyclist died, let’s ban bicycles. Yet, most people defend cars subconsciously.
Bikes are extremely exposed in comparison. One small tap could be devastating.
Cars are a great technology, but a city cannot scale with everyone owning their own car, and families cannot build wealth paying $20,000+/year for their 2-car transit lifestyle.
No, the drunken driver and traffic engineering is at fault.
Some parents cannot afford a car or two, especially living in a city like San Francisco. You assume that they can.
This is what's not discussed enough.
Neglect laws in the US are incredibly vague.
Driving a vehicle for some unnecessary reason like to take a child to a water park for fun could be construed as abuse/neglect, as it unnecessarily exposes the child to danger.
Our neglect, and child reporting laws, badly need overhauled because common sense it totally removed. People have been arrested for as little as letting the kid walk or be at the park independently. Things need reworded to make it clear it isn't neglectful unless the child is facing certain and imminent serious injury or death, or something along those lines.
It really is a catch22. Biking is often not safe on existing roads. But what is the alternative? Not bike at all and wait until we have bikelane utopia? It's just not going to happen. What about people who don't have an option, aka no money? What about people who do not need a car because they live close enough to their destination? What about the cosmological stupidity of only having one viable option for personal mobility in face of climate change, rising fossil fuel prices, local and global pollution due to cars, ...?
Something needs to happen, shaming people for trying to get around on bike, such a small thing, yet, so odious to so many, it isn't helping.
Read what was written. No shaming is there.
You seem to be reacting to something you ascribe to the OP, but there is simply no logical path from statements in the OP's post that leads one to assume anyone is being shamed or blamed.
Here in the Netherlands we didn't get to good bicycle infrastructure by trying to maximize the number of people in dangerous situations as a stepping stone, so maybe I'm missing something unique about the US.
Edit: asked an American friend and apparently in the US cyclists have to assert their presence since there aren't dedicated lanes, up to things like keeping a stick on your bike to hit cars that impinge on your rights. So that's certainly different. I still wouldn't put young children in that situation but it's certainly something quite different from here.
If there aren't enough riders, then the planners won't have the data to support painting some bike lanes to attract more riders and get people out of cars.
And then the car people will complain that the bike lane is taking up "their" road and planners will be forced to remove the bike lane or let it rot.
It's condescending to assume they can.
Yes, its dangerous, because other people make it dangerous. The unfortunate reality of living in America is that a lot of people do a lot of things that are not terribly hazardous to themselves but are quite hazardous to other people. As a parent, I have chosen to do what I can to mitigate the risks as best as I can, short of just staying home, or driving everywhere.
Honestly, this bicyclist was killed at a location where I would feel comfortable riding with my kids. Its fairly low traffic, has decent bike lanes, and the speed limit is low. The simple fact of the matter is that unless you build serious infrastructure, no bike thoroughfare is safe from sufficiently motivated/reckless/drunk drivers. Based on the accident details (especially the driver having minor injuries), this sounds like somebody driving waaaay too fast for the road. All of this to say, this isn't an argument for stopping biking, or biking without kids, but it is an argument for more aggressively enforcing traffic laws on these roads that are tempting to joy riders, and improving biking infrastructure so its harder for these accidents to occur.
We don't allow cars on BART/Caltrain tracks for example because it is dangerous to drivers.
"Yet we see every day people taking their car ready to murder people without any single sense of responsibility."