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Separated Cycle Paths: Who Asks the Cyclists?

Jan Heine's latest blog post:

Separated Cycle Paths: Who Asks the Cyclists?

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Permalink Reply by Tom Dworzanski on August 14, 2013 at 4:31am
I'll admit, this is my second year riding and my first seriously on the streets daily, so I don't have the experience some people do; but I don't see why cyclists should have to ride with traffic (95%+ of the route) to be visible at intersections (5%- of the route). Obviously you're less visible if you're way off to the side, just like riding on the sidewalk, but that doesn't mean the whole idea is flawed just because of intersections.

Perhaps the best idea would be a compromise of having protected routes that bring cyclists back into traffic when approaching intersections.

Further I haven't read any studies, but I think the basic correlation between cities with protected lanes and number of cyclists is pretty irrefutable. I can't speak for others but I know cyclist-friendly infrastructure makes me want to ride a street.
Permalink Reply by william on August 14, 2013 at 5:42am

ok. ask this cyclist.

"yes, I like the protected bike lanes. please install more."

thanks. 

heine seems to have an axe to grind by writing about this topic over and over and over. his arguments are still weak. perhaps the implementations in seattle arent that great. whatever. 

Permalink Reply by Thunder Snow on August 14, 2013 at 7:11am

Heine goes on and on about the dangers of intersections, but doesn't examine what can be done to make intersections less dangerous for cyclists.  We could prohibit motorists from turning right on red.  That would make things much safer for both cyclists and pedestrians.  We could put in separate traffic signals for motorists and cyclists, as on the Dearborn bike lanes, so that there is little or no conflict between the two groups. We could even redesign intersections as the Danes have done, to minimize the mixing of modes.

But no, Heine, and the other vehicular cyclists descended from John Forester--they go by "updated" names of "savvy cyclists" and "cycle drivers" these days--use the perceived dangers of cycle tracks as a red herring, in order to try to hang on to the way things have been for the past hundred years: cyclists thrown in among the cars, fending for themselves, often bullied out of the way by drivers who don't wish to share.

Permalink Reply by David Barish on August 14, 2013 at 8:46am

I see the divide less as a car v. bike issue with the blogger being seen as an Uncle  Tom but more as a divide within the two wheeled world.  Frankly, I have a foot on either side of the fence and sometimes, having a short inseam, it can get uncomfortable.

To the extend I want to see a world of cyclists on streets, I am strongly in favor of more and more bikeways and more  and more lanes and protected lanes.  I feel good when I ride Dearborn even if  I am stopping almost every block and not riding very fast.  I feel like I am doing the right thing.  I am riding more upright and  feeling that way as well.

To the extent I like to ride at a pace, to get somewhere, to actually feel the wind on my face, I just want to ride in the street. Leave me alone, let me ride, and let me fend with the traffic. I am experienced and  know how to handle myself.  I am leaning over  on my bar and am in a more aerodynamic position but I have my eyes open and  my wits on alert.

The two feelings expressed above are often at odds with each other.  In general, I will ride bike lanes as I get closer to the heart of the city.  The farther out I am the more I simply want to be on a road. There is a bike lane along Green Bay Rd. in Highwood by Fort Sheridan. Its on a concrete sidewalk. I almost never ride it. I prefer to be on the road to the chagrin of some drivers.  Let the pedestrians and 10mph riders fill that sidewalk while I race by on the road.

There are issues as regards intersections but I feel that if you are on the road,  whatever you are riding/driving, you have to use your common sense. Its only a problem if somebody on the road decides they own it.  Riders need to know that drivers will still be making turns. The lane is not a grant of immunity.  Be aware.

Permalink Reply by Duppie on August 14, 2013 at 9:05am

thanks for making me laugh!

David Barish said:

Frankly, I have a foot on either side of the fence and sometimes, having a short inseam, it can get uncomfortable.

Permalink Reply by Duppie on August 14, 2013 at 9:12am

The implementation that Heine mentions over and over is indeed fraught with danger. It is a 2-way cycle track on a 2-way road. I understand that CDOT has no plans of implementing these in Chicago because of said dangers.


william said:

ok. ask this cyclist.

"yes, I like the protected bike lanes. please install more."

thanks. 

heine seems to have an axe to grind by writing about this topic over and over and over. his arguments are still weak. perhaps the implementations in seattle arent that great. whatever. 

Permalink Reply by Eli on August 14, 2013 at 9:22am

ok. ask this cyclist.

"yes, I like the protected bike lanes. please install more."

Or ask me. "Bike lanes that are 'protected' by rows of parked cars terrify me. Please stop making them." I am not a 'vehicular cyclist.' I am new to biking in the city and these 'protected' bike lanes are supposed to make me feel more comfortable than riding in traffic; they don't.

Heine focuses on intersection risk, but there are other major problems with parking-'protected' bike lanes. They are much more likely to have pedestrians in the lane--people getting out of their cars, people waiting for their friends to get out of the car, people fumbling for their keys, people who are just drunk and confused. You are much more vulnerable to assault from people on the sidewalks--plenty of drunken bar-goers think it's funny to try to grab at you as you go by. In a regular bike lane or a street without a bike lane you can swerve away. In a 'protected' cycle lane you are trapped and there is nowhere to go. Protected lanes that are protected by concrete bollards instead of parked cars don't have these problems, but we don't seem to build that kind here, and the kind we do build feel like traps to me. The two-way Dearborn-style 'protected' lanes present additional hazards from oncoming bike traffic--the last time I rode it I encountered oncoming cyclists riding two abreast, taking up both lanes, as well as a wide pedicab doing the same thing. In other circumstances this kind of thing is an annoyance; on Dearborn you are completely trapped by the parked cars and have nowhere to go and so it becomes genuinely scary.

We could prohibit motorists from turning right on red.

Considering that the flagship 'protected' bike lane in Chicago, Dearborn, is on the left side of the street (in the direction of car traffic) and suddenly turns into the de facto left turn lane at every intersection, right-on-red laws seem pretty irrelevant here.

Permalink Reply by Davo on August 14, 2013 at 9:23am

Is there a difference between cycle tracks, cycle paths, PBLs, and bike lanes? It seems that a lot of people are using these words as the same thing even though they seem quite different to me. Cycle tracks (totally separated from the road) would be like the LFT, correct? This doesn't seem like a cost effective addition to our infrastructure unless they would follow old rail lines, rivers, expressways. I like the addition of PBL's and buffered lanes in Chicago and would like to see that increase. Clark seems a lot less stressful than Lincoln since the repainting of the buffered lane vs the shared lane.

I guess my main question is where would we put cycle tracks and cycle paths (if they are basically the same thing)?

Maybe someone could clarify this for me.

Permalink Reply by Tricolor on August 14, 2013 at 9:45am

You never want to be to the right of anyone needing to make a right turn, no matter what kind of transportation you're using.  A protected lane that forces bikes to do this is not safe, even with a convoluted system of lights.  It's barely enough to keep bikes from tangling with traffic turning left from Dearborn since there are still a lot of riders that try to go through against the signal and a some cars that still aren't used to the no left turn arrows.

I absolutely love the idea of a separate path, but not on the street itself.

Permalink Reply by Adam Herstein on August 14, 2013 at 10:13am

The Dutch figured cycle tracks out thirty years ago. Why can't we just copy them?

Permalink Reply by Skip Montanaro 0mi on August 14, 2013 at 10:19am

My intention in posting Jan Heine's blogs is not to rile people up.  As an experienced cyclist, I think he raises a good point about so-called protected bike lanes.  (I suppose if I disagreed with him I would either not get updates about his blog or discard them.)

I have three routes between Evanston and the Loop: Clark Street, the LFT, and just recently, Elston/Milwaukee to the North Shore Channel Trail.  Over the past three years or so that I've been commuting regularly, I have spent much more time on Clark, much less on the LFT, and so far, only a few times on the NSCT.  The only time i have ever seen incidents involving cyclists and motor vehicles has been on the LFT, north of Fullerton, at the intersections.  By "incident", I mean cyclist down with other people providing aid, be it an ambulance, police car, bus, or other passing motorists or cyclists.

The LFT is about the most "protected" bike lane you could ever imagine.  The only opportunity for interaction with cars in that stretch between Fullerton and Ardmore are near Belmont Harbor (at both ends), at Addison Dr (entry to the golf course), at Montrose Dr, and at Wilson, Lawrence, and Foster Avenues.  Of those crossing points, I've never seen problems at any but the four northernmost crossings.  I have personally never seen accidents involving bikes and motor vehicles on Clark, though bikes and cars travel in much closer proximity, and I have ridden that route many more times than the LFT. That is not to say there haven't been incidents on Clark, just that over the total time I've ridden it, I've never seen any.  I would estimate that I've ridden Clark at least ten times more than the LFT over the past three years.

This initially makes little sense.  The LFT would seem to be more protected from cars in general, and have many fewer interactions.  If you think about it though, it begins to make some sense.  Clark is often congested, forcing motorists to slow down.  Cyclists along that route are quite visible, and except for a few intersections (Diversey, Ashland and Ashland/Devon) the intersections are pretty straightforward to navigate.  The LFT, however, especially in the zone north of Fullerton, has few impediments for bikes, allowing them to be ridden faster, and the intersections are atypical, having not only east/west traffic on the avenue, but northbound traffic exiting LSD. Add to that the stop signs for the cars and nothing more than yield signs for the bikes, and the opportunity for collisions becomes apparent.

This is not to say that all cycle paths/protected bike lanes are bad.  Jan is not saying that either.  He's saying they have to be properly designed and constructed.  He references a study in Copenhagen, perhaps the most bicycle-saturated city in Europe.  From the abstract, I quote:

This paper presents a before-after crash, injury and traffic study of constructing bicycle tracks and marking bicycle lanes in Copenhagen, Denmark.... The safety effects of bicycle tracks in urban areas are an increase of about 10 percent in both crashes and injuries.... Design of bicycle facilities and parking conditions for motor vehicles clearly seems to have safety implications, especially at intersections.

I understand many peoples' hesitation about riding in traffic, and the common sense idea that separating bikes and cars is a good thing, especially since it makes people feel safer, and thus gets them on their bikes.  Perception is not always reality though.

Permalink Reply by Tom Dworzanski on August 14, 2013 at 10:44am

From the article:

"[M]any experienced cyclists don’t want to ride on segregated cycle paths" (emphasis added).

I have a suspicion this might be at least some of the motivation behind Heine's thinking. It's kind of like riding the Lakefront Trail on a nice Sunday afternoon with all types of traffic bringing your ride to a pedestrian's pace. These old-time cyclists have gotten used to being the only ones on the road and don't like that they're being pushed to the side along with the slow traffic. I don't know any of this for sure (and I could be totally wrong), but the authors tone rubs me as being a little less than genuine.

Anyway, I took the time to email the address he listed (geopardi.bost@dot.gov) disagreeing with his efforts and hopefully offsetting them.

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