Re: Painted cycle lanes may make roads more dangerous for bike riders
Posted: 14 Apr 2019, 9:54am
the cycle lanes near me are great :- https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.45956 ... 312!8i6656
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Cugel wrote:Well, I go by my own and very personal experiences. Despite being a very experienced cyclist well-able to control the bike and anticipate road dangers of every kind, I know that a so-called cycle lane in the gutter of the road is a more dangerous place for me than an open road of similar kind and use.
There are endless dangers introduced by and hence caused by the white-line demarcated cycling "lane". They've been listed a thousand times.
The answer ro safer cycling is not so-called cycling infrastructure but the reining-in of all those dangers (including the bad driving habits) of modern motoring. It will require the current law to be vigorously applied and some new controls.
We should begin by adopting the widespread (elsewhere) assumption that any cyclist-with-powered-vehicle "accident" presumes the powered vehicle driver at fault.
We should continue with a serious reduction in speeding, close-passing and those other behaviours that are known to exacerbate the bad results of "accidents"; or to cause them.
Cycling infrastructure already exists. It's called "roads" and is a very good cycling facility indeed if the other traffic is prevented from behaving in an irresponsible and dangerous fashion. New so-called cycling infrasturcture is not only more dangerous but incredibly costly. Spend the money on traffic police instead. And on improving the roads, particularly potholes, which are more far dangerous to cyclists than to motorists.
reohn2 wrote:the cycle lanes near me are great :- https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.45956 ... 312!8i6656
RickH wrote:reohn2 wrote:the cycle lanes near me are great :- https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.45956 ... 312!8i6656
And they're nice & freshly repainted (even painted straight over the potholes)! Still no wider though. I don't know about you but i just ignore them & ride to the right of the line in the main lane.
reohn2 wrote:the cycle lanes near me are great :- https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.45956 ... 312!8i6656
Pete Owens wrote:reohn2 wrote:the cycle lanes near me are great :- https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.45956 ... 312!8i6656
That featured as facility of the month back in 2006:
http://www.warringtoncyclecampaign.co.uk/facility-of-the-month/February2006.htm
Read the linked correspondence to see the traffic engineers attempt to deny the existence of the lane!
That featured as facility of the month back in 2006:
http://www.warringtoncyclecampaign.co.uk/facility-of-the-month/February2006.htm
Read the linked correspondence to see the traffic engineers attempt to deny the existence of the lane!
Vorpal wrote:As far as I am concerned cycle lanes have exactly one purpose. To give me space to overtake (undertake) in congestion. They should only be installed on streets that become congested.
mjr wrote:Cycleways are roads too.
Cugel wrote:Vorpal wrote:As far as I am concerned cycle lanes have exactly one purpose. To give me space to overtake (undertake) in congestion. They should only be installed on streets that become congested.
That's a dangerous thing to do, as I've witnessed many times in Lancaster and other locations where busy town streets have the dreaded white lines and red gutters. There are parked vehicles, unloading goods or people. There are passengers opening doors to get out when the traffic becomes stationary. Vehicles turn left without warning down the many side-streets, entrances and so forth. Vehicles emerge from such places on to the red cycle area of the gutter. The red area is too narrow in many places (as discussed in this thread) and often disappears for a short stretch. Pedestrians wander in to it off the kerb when the pavements are crowded, as they often are in towns.
I cyclded through Lancaster for decades, well before the so-called cycling infrastructure appeared. It was (and still is) much safer to cycle with the trafffic; and to overtake on the right when there's room to do so, not down the gutter.
You can make a case for some cycling infrastructure that's separate from traffic and avoids an otherwise lethal interchange or similar. But even dedicate cycle paths tend to be neglected, full of rubbish and detritus for which cars on a parallel road are often the source. These cycle paths too have various dangerous parts, especially where they intersect with roads at junctions, roundabouts and similar.
Bikes are just traffic.
The answer to danger is to learn cycling competancy and for authorities to control the often outrageously dangerous behaviour of motorists. If these two things could be achieved, cycling would both be and appear far less dangerous. Cycling infrastructure either makes cycling more dangerous or routes cyclists off the roads (where they want to go) on to often inadequate paths (where cyclists often become a problem to pedestrians) going via poor routes to nowhere any cyclist wants to go unless it's for a leisure ride.
Vorpal wrote:Many cycle lanes in the UK are poorly designed. That can make over/undertaking unsafe. But the act itself isn't necessarily so. If I am overtaking, I will make a judgment for myself about which side is safer, and when I need to rejoin a general traffic lane. I generally prefer to filter between lanes. However, if there are long queues, a cycle lane may be the better alternative.
Bus lanes, cycle lanes, and (in some places) multi-occupancy lanes are designed to allow the vehicles using them to make progress when general traffic lanes are congested. IMO, there is no other good purpose for them.
If separation is needed for safety, on a dual carraigeway A road, for example, then cyclists should be fully segregated from traffic on the main carriageway, with physical separation of a few metres and/or barriers.
mjr wrote:Bikes are just traffic.
In one way, yes. In another way, no: we're smaller, lighter, more agile vehicles (although not quite as agile as some bad designers seem to think!), travelling at much more similar speeds to each other than motorists do, much less keen on stopping and much more able to negotiate safe passage without lights and road markings. Roads offer better cycling when they're designed for cycle traffic. Let's harness our strengths.
Bmblbzzz wrote:I agree with all that except the bolded bit. On most roads, motor traffic is limited in speed by the speed of the vehicle in front and by whatever the local attitude to speed limits is. This means it all tends to go at around the speed limit, or lower in congestion and a big higher on certain roads such as motorways.