Bike lanes and ridership

I went for a walk during the morning commuting hour yesterday, which I don't usually do.  I was surprised by the number of people I saw riding bicycles through the neighborhood streets.  This shouldn't be too surprising as I used to see a large number when I commuted by bike, but what I really noted was the high proportion of females and the number of riders who weren't clad in Lycra.  In fact, I didn't see any Lycra.  I take this to mean that there are more people using bikes to get around than you generally notice, which is a good thing for several reasons.  First, bikes are superior to cars when it comes to pollution, fitness, and possibly mental health as well.  They are quiet, consume less space, are less likely to severely injure or kill a pedestrian or bicyclist if they collide, and they don't use any fuel or produce greenhouse gasses.  If we're not noticing them, that also means that they are less obtrusive than cars.  Sadly, many people have given up riding and discourage others because they do not feel there are safe locations to ride.

Okay, so it should be obvious that I like cycling by now.  You have probably also figured out that I think there should be a network of bike routes that rivals the network available for cars.

It's time for me to give credit where it is due: compared to many cities, Melbourne has a reasonably large network of bike paths and there are a number of bike lanes around.

Now that I've said that I can pick it apart: most of the bike paths around Melbourne are designed for weekend rides with the family, which is great if you only ride on the weekends with the family, but not very good if you want to use your bike for transportation, whether that means riding to work or to run errands.  Furthermore, the bike paths tend to be poorly maintained with very rough paving and vegetation encroaching on the paths.  Routes follow creeks, which make them scenic, but also circuitous.  And there just aren't enough of them.

I hear that there are very good cycling facilities in various parts
of Europe, but I've never been to those places, so I won't talk about
them.  I used to live in Boulder, Colorado, which is fantastic for biking.  The city has really committed to providing good, safe routes for cyclists and the network of paths is so extensive that it was often faster and more direct for me to ride my bike than to drive my car.  Furthermore, because many of the paths are along irrigation ditches and creeks, they are  quite scenic and generally isolated from automobile exhaust.  They are of excellent standard, with underpasses even for quiet neighborhood streets, and have good flat surfaces.  The city plowed the more popular ones when it snowed (granted - after the roads) and swept them occasionally.  The city also had bike lanes on some of the roads, which I used as well.

So I was pleased when my local council announced it would be spending more money to improve bike facilities.  The first evidence I saw of this was the painting of bike lanes along one of my nearby roads.  As is often the case with bike lanes, this one starts at the intersection with a busy road with no bike lane, ends at the intersection with another busy road with no bike lane, and does not intersect any roads with bike lanes (though it intersects many neighborhood streets on which bicycling would be appropriate).  The city must have painted other bike lanes because I've recently read several letters to the editor in our local paper (sorry, it's not on line or I'd provide a link) complaining about the city wasting money on bike paths.

My first reaction was intense irritation at the car drivers who think bicyclists are not entitled to use the roads.  As someone who has commuted by bike for almost 10 years, I've encountered plenty of drivers who act as though I wasn't supposed to be using the road.  And I thought - hey, great blog topic.  So I decided to do a little research on bike lanes, but was surprised by my findings.

It turns out that there is a vocal contingent of bicyclists who think bike lanes are a bad idea.  As I read their arguments I couldn't help but agree with some of them.  Essentially, they are saying that rather than improving safety for cyclists, bike lanes force cyclists out of the smooth flow of traffic and into places where it is dangerous for them to be (for instance, curbside of a car turning towards the curb - right in the US and left in Australia).  They argue that the mere presence of a bike lane reinforces car driver attitudes that roads are for the exclusive use of automobiles and that bikes do not belong there.  They believe the solution is to remove bike lanes and focus on rider education of how to manage traffic situations (what about driver education about who's entitled to use the roads?).

I must admit that when the bike lanes were painted on my local road, I was a bit concerned.  When I was commuting (I'm at home with my child these days) I regularly rode one block on that road and then turned right (across the lane of oncoming traffic - for all you non-Australians).  Because I would be turning right shortly after entering this road, I always turned onto this road into the right side of the lane so I was in position to turn right, and there was plenty of space for cars to pass me on the left.  Now there is a bike lane to the left, which reduces the amount of space the cars have to pass and could cause drivers to feel that I actually belong on the other side of the road from where I am.

In other parts of the city, the bike lanes include the bluestone guttering, which is a dangerous place to ride.  Many of Melbourne's bike lanes are shared use with car parking, and in my opinion, a good number of them are situated so close to the car parking that cyclists are jeopardized by car doors.  The essential problem with bike lanes is that they seem to be constructed as an afterthought and with very little regard to how bicycles work and where cyclists may need to go.

Whereas I agree that many accidents are caused by the cyclists themselves, either through inexperience, lack of attention, or arrogance, I feel the bicycle education solution ignores what I consider to be the superior option: bike paths or shared use paths, like the ones I used in Boulder.

Unfortunately, what is really needed is for drivers of automobiles to acknowledge that the roads are constructed for many modes of transport and to respect the rights of all road users.  It is possible to force respect of other road users by enacting and enforcing strict legislation, but in our car dominated culture, I can't see that happening anytime soon.

Incidentally, good bike routes are not the only facilities the council could provide to reduce the disincentives to ride, but that topic will have to wait for another post.