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I'm sure there are cities in climates where commuting by bicycle is a great idea, but really, very little of the U.S. is accommodating to this on a year-round basis. Snow, sleet, heavy rain, high winds, freezing cold and blistering heat, along with average commuting distance further than the average commuter could manage even on a good day, all make it difficult to impossible for the vast majority of potential commuters to make year-round use of this option. And if it can't be used year-round, you still need the infrastructure in place to accommodate 100% auto use.
I'm sure there are cities in climates where commuting by bicycle is a great idea, but really, very little of the U.S. is accommodating to this on a year-round basis. Snow, sleet, heavy rain, high winds, freezing cold and blistering heat, along with average commuting distance further than the average commuter could manage even on a good day, all make it difficult to impossible for the vast majority of potential commuters to make year-round use of this option. And if it can't be used year-round, you still need the infrastructure in place to accommodate 100% auto use.
I commuted year round when I lived in Edmonton Alberta which is real winter for too many months. I was in Toronto last month and there were many bikes being used on the roads even though it was -20C and snowing . Putting bikes on the side street is an idea by people who do not commute by bike. When they set up one in Edmonton I tried it, every block had a stop sign so you never got any speed up, it took forever to cross some of the streets and generally made for a much longer commute. Why don't the cars use the roads that require stopping for a stop sign every block, it is easier to get a car in motion than a bike? It might be because it is a bad idea.
You might be surprise on how far some are willing to cummute by bike, 20 to 40 km is not unheard of. Where I live you are allowed to ride bikes on the major highways, the equivalence of your interstate. Drivers just need to watch where they are driving and pay attention to what they are doing. In my one trip to Europe the thing I noticed was that all kinds of traffic including bikes, pedestrians, street cars, buses and cars seemed to be able to share the streets and the cars zipped around at a good clip. The difference seemed not the distance or the climate but that the drivers had to drive instead of sitting comfortably inside their steel cages and point their vehicle down the road. My father hated bikes and always pointed out where they were running red lights etc but never seemed to notice that cars were doing the same thing at the same location.
Share the road is a good philosophy. The people on bikes or in buses are not in cars ahead of you and do not need parking spaces on the street.
I'm sure there are cities in climates where commuting by bicycle is a great idea, but really, very little of the U.S. is accommodating to this on a year-round basis. Snow, sleet, heavy rain, high winds, freezing cold and blistering heat, along with average commuting distance further than the average commuter could manage even on a good day, all make it difficult to impossible for the vast majority of potential commuters to make year-round use of this option. And if it can't be used year-round, you still need the infrastructure in place to accommodate 100% auto use.
Quote:
Originally Posted by dkf747
The OP needs to visit Copenhagen and see how well bikes and cars with their own lanes work. I really enjoyed commuting by bike there once upon a time. We need a system like they have there. It is a near perfect system for moving both cars, buses, and bikes, and pedestrians as well, all at the same time.
I think if you ask the people of Copenhagen as to whether it is their perfect, always dry and sunny weather that allows them to bike commute you would get some schnitzels accidently spat at you from the hilarity of the assumption.
Personal automobile ownership is certainly not about to become a thing of the past.
I do think we may see per capita ownership decline some, but that is because it is increasingly impractical to own an automobile in some of the most heavily urbanized areas of the country. The areas are just too congested for personal ownership and use to really be practical.
Which, ironically, is why there is increased attention being paid to creating bike lanes.
What's ironic about it?
Anyways, there's basically two types of "major roadways" and I'm not sure which one the OP is referring to.
You have suburban arterials, usually 2-4 lanes per direction, no on-street parking, often with a median or at least left turn lane, and traffic speeds typically around 40-50mph.
Usually biking on a suburban arterial is quite unsafe due to the high speed and volume of traffic, and there aren't a whole lot of alternate routes on side streets because the surrounding side streets are all loops and culs-de-sacs. On the plus-side, they often have very wide rights-of-ways, so you can have space dedicated to bikes without reducing the number of car lanes. I don't really think bike lanes would be appropriate on these though because bikes would still be close to a lot of high speed car traffic. Separated bike infrastructure would be better IMO, ex: https://www.google.ca/maps/@43.56358...Hx-9SNLEaw!2e0
Then you have "main streets" or urban arterials, which typically have more intersections and slower traffic, like around 15-30mph, as well as on-street parking. They're usually in narrower rights of ways than suburban arterials ex: https://www.google.ca/maps/@43.64947...cSUdvi6tlw!2e0
For urban arterials, I would say that it's a lot safer biking in a regular traffic lane, and you're also more likely to have alternatives as side streets since there's often a street grid. You don't always have side streets as an alternative though, like in the link I gave (Dundas St W in Toronto) although there's a lot of N-S side streets, there's a lot less alternatives for going E-W.
I'm a little divided about what to do in these more urban neighbourhoods. Usually bike use is quite a bit higher than in the suburbs, often over 5% commute mode share and I know some examples that get over 10%. Oh and it's not like the other 90-95% are driving either, a lot are also taking transit or walking.
I think if you ask the people of Copenhagen as to whether it is their perfect, always dry and sunny weather that allows them to bike commute you would get some schnitzels accidently spat at you from the hilarity of the assumption.
Sunny and dry, maybe not, but generally pretty mild. Copenhagen basically never hits temperatures where I'd be reluctant to bike but just about every North American city either gets cold enough or hot enough (or both) to make me reluctant.
Honestly even the rainfall in Copenhagen is not that bad. Less rainfall than most North American cities (only southwest is drier) and probably more of it is light drizzle as opposed to drenching downpours.
This just doesn't make any sense to me. Why are they putting all these Bicycle Lanes in the major streets in the city? It slows down traffic flow, causes MORE congestion, promotes ill-will between motorists and bicyclists, and is a major safety concern! It also takes up a perfectly good traffic lane and reduces parking space.
Bicyclists belong on the Side-Streets or on bike paths, NOT along major thoroughfares! Next they'll want to allow bicyclists along the Interstate!
I personally would be afraid to ride my bike down a busy main city street.
I live on a busy street in a well-traveled neighborhood. Bike lanes were added specifically to slow down speeding traffic. It worked, to a degree, but not well enough. The city is now considering other traffic-calming devices, and I will welcome them.
I think if you ask the people of Copenhagen as to whether it is their perfect, always dry and sunny weather that allows them to bike commute you would get some schnitzels accidently spat at you from the hilarity of the assumption.
Laugh if you like, but Copenhagen spends very little time in extreme weather conditions. It is literally never too hot to cycle, rarely has a major snowfall by U.S. standards, averages only slightly more than 2 inches of precipitation per month, and has very reasonable winter temperatures compared to huge sections of the U.S..
I think most of those are in the Plateau? Or at least urban core... Those areas do have quite high bike use. If you look at the commuting stats for urban core electoral districts (about 100,000 pop each) in Canada, and then consider that not every street has these and that the streets that do still have more space dedicated to cars than to bikes. And then also consider it's not just about efficiently using road space, it can make sense to compromise on that somewhat for safety.
Montreal
Laurier-Sainte-Marie
-10.5% bike
-28.3% drive (including carpoolers)
-61.2% other (transit, walking, I think it might include motorized bikes too which would benefit from the bike infrastructure)
Rosemont-La Petite Patrie
-7.4% bike
-41.8% drive
-50.8% other
Outremont (includes part of the Plateau and CDN)
-5.6% bike
-35.0 drive
-59.4% other
I would say that in the Plateau it would make sense to have a significant amount of good quality bike infrastructure. In the other districts, maybe in some parts yes, other parts it depends.
Electoral districts in other Canadian cities with relatively high bike use.
Toronto
University-Rosedale: 9.8%
Davenport: 7.0%
Toronto-Danforth: 6.0%
Parkdale-High Park: 5.8%
Vancouver
Vancouver East: 7.3%
Vancouver Quadra: 6.4% (West side+UBC)
Vancouver Granville: 5.3%
Victoria: 10.2%
Ottawa Centre: 7.3%
So none of these have super high bike use, but it's still significant especially when you remember that car use doesn't make up all the rest, but in these core areas, typically about 25-50% of commute trips. And I'm guessing for more local trips, car use is even lower. Many of them have relatively little bike specific infrastructure (at least for Toronto which is the city I'm most familiar with) so when considering whether bike infrastructure is worth it, that bike use would likely go up if installed.
There's also other advantages to encouraging biking especially in urban cores where things are more likely within biking distance. It's more affordable, takes up a lot less space for parking (on street and off street), takes up less space on the street, no noise, doesn't generate smog or particulates, is less dangerous to pedestrians, infrastructure is inexpensive and bikes also do much less damage to roads than cars and trucks.
Sunny and dry, maybe not, but generally pretty mild. Copenhagen basically never hits temperatures where I'd be reluctant to bike but just about every North American city either gets cold enough or hot enough (or both) to make me reluctant.
Honestly even the rainfall in Copenhagen is not that bad. Less rainfall than most North American cities (only southwest is drier) and probably more of it is light drizzle as opposed to drenching downpours.
Just about all the west coast is as friendly or friendlier than Copenhagen for cycling. Vancouver too has milder winters but gets more rain.
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