Woohoo! Houston sucks at bike infrastructure! (Dallas, Portland: car insurance, neighborhoods, inspection)

[elnina]

Originally Posted by Hopelesscause

Some bicyclist here don’t use common sense either. They will insist on riding squarely in the street in the path of automobiles. Dummies/ that’s what the shoulders and marked bicycle lanes are for.

It takes a while till a new culture is born, but it could be done.
The problem is that we are a car culture and are not kind to anyone who wants to share the roads - the pedestrians, the bikers, and cyclists.
In bicycle countries, kids in preschool age are already learning how to correctly use the roads, know the traffic light and signs meaning. They get educated, pass an exam and get ready to bike to school at age 6. Alone.
The roads are built/designed to be safe for cars and cyclists. Everyone take safety very seriously and car drivers are extremely cautious not to hurt anyone. They don't rule the roads like in the US.

[Snapper_head]

Originally Posted by elnina

It takes a while till a new culture is born, but it could be done.
The problem is that we are a car culture and are not kind to anyone who wants to share the roads - the pedestrians, the bikers, and cyclists.
In bicycle countries, kids in preschool age are already learning how to correctly use the roads, know the traffic light and signs meaning. They get educated, pass an exam and get ready to bike to school at age 6. Alone.
The roads are built/designed to be safe for cars and cyclists. Everyone take safety very seriously and car drivers are extremely cautious not to hurt anyone. They don't rule the roads like in the US.

Thanks for sharing. It’s all very true in The Netherlands, Denmark, parts of China, and many other cities around the world.

It’s easy for a college town like Davis California or Cambridge England to become bicycle-friendly. But to get a large city or even a country to use bicycling as a major form of transportation requires an active government - a government that is willing to take on the auto and oil industries. The Netherlands, Denmark, and China all have socially-progressive societies. Even in progressive cities in America like Portland and Austin, it’s a struggle to break American car culture. We saw this in the news this week where it was uncovered that oil barons the Koch Brothers are quietly funding a campaign to kill a big light rail expansion that was approved in Phoenix.

[Ghost Town]

I find Houston within 610 loop pretty good for biking. But outside of 610 and especially suburbs outside of BW8 are horrible for biking...

[WRM20]

Originally Posted by elnina

You are repeating stereotypes. So, FYI:

Lots of people have cars in Europe, they just don't drive to work. Public transportation is superb, and many people just drive a bicycle because it's a convenient and healthy exercise.
When it comes to car ownership, Italy tops the list: 89% of Italian survey respondents reported owning one. The US trailed closely behind with 88%. In general, developed countries showed a high rate of car ownership. In Europe the median national share of car owners was 79%.
Germany tops the list of bike-owning countries, with 80% owning bikes - way more than the United States, where only 53% own a bike.

Cars have very efficient fuel systems and lots of cars use LPG autogas which is cheaper than gasoline in the US (gallon to gallon compared).
Thanks to the environmental and economic benefits it offers, LPG autogas is the most popular alternative motor fuel in the world. It serves as a replacement to either petrol or diesel.

Car ownership isn't that expensive, and on contrary to the US, no-claim insurance rates go down every year as an appreciation for safe driving. After 4-5 years of safe driving, the rate will reach the low bottom which is usually 1/4 of the starting rate.

I'm just going by what I hear from my colleagues who live in Europe. Overall, less than half have a car. If they live in a large city like Amsterdam, Brussels, Budapest, etc, they have no place to park a car, and don't really need one. The ones that live outside the cities usually take public transport to work, and use the car on nights and weekends. I don't know of anyone who has an LPG powered car. In Malaysia, yes, but not in Europe, where there a more diesels than here.

[ukpickey]

You should move to Alaska partner, bike friendly all the way

Originally Posted by Snapper_head

“Houston ranks 5th by total employment, but 32nd by access to jobs on bike networks.”

Incidentally, Dallas sucks, too. Dallas ranks 4th by employment but 40th by access to jobs via bike networks. I guess we can’t all be like Portland.

https://usa.streetsblog.org/2019/07/...tunity-report/

[oceangaia]

Originally Posted by Snapper_head

Bike infrastructure is much less expensive than the cost of car infrastructure.

• A typical, one-way bike/multi-use path is about 5 feet wide. A typical, one-way automobile road lane is 10 to 12 feet wide.
• A typical bike/multi-use path requires 5 inches depth of hardscape materials (concrete, etc.). A typical automobile road requires 12 inches depth of hardscape materials (asphalt, substrate, etc.).
• A typical bicycle with rider including wheels is about 6 feet long. A typical automobile is about 15 feet long.

So if bike lanes only need to be half as wide, half as deep, and hold twice as many people...that means that they’re 6 times more efficient from a resource/cost perspective.

Just because they could theoretically hold more people (assuming no car-sharing) doesn't mean they do. How about some stats of typical number of people that a road lane carries per day versus bike lane.

[Whyrallnamestaken]

It doesn't bother me that Houston "sucks at bike infrastructure".

How many women want to bike to work? I would say that number is lower than men.

Women would have to put on makeup at work or else the heat would melt it off. What about her hair? Unless her hair is very short, she would have to blow it dry. I don't wash my hair every day. If it stinks from riding a bike to work, I would have to.

What about your clothing? Can you pack it so it isn't wrinkled? I think about all the items I would have to lug to work. Maybe men don't worry so much about how they look.

It just sounds like a lot of trouble and time. How long would it take to ride 15 miles? When I leave work, I just want to get home.

Some of you probably don't know that Harwin Drive has a bike lane. I have never seen anybody riding a bike on Harwin during rush hour traffic. It would be suicide. What they did was to make the lanes narrow and the bike lane is in the gutter. Vehicles in the left lane always drive too close to the middle line causing the vehicles in the right hand land to drive in the bike lane or very close to it.

Are they going to spend a lot of money for bikes lanes that a small percentage of Houstonians will use?

Maybe it makes sense in some areas?

[bu2]

Originally Posted by Snapper_head

Not really, I just didn’t realize that a quantitative analysis would reveal that Houston’s bike infrastructure kinda sucks. I figured lots of other cities would suck as bad as we do.

Given the bayou trails, Houston is probably one of the better cities for safe cycling.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by Snapper_head

It isn’t enough just to build nice bike lanes. That’s a start, of course. But then what planners have found is that the other key ingredient is making it less practical for people to drive cars. This is exactly what they do in the Scandinavian bicycling cities. These cities reduce roads/lanes for cars, lower speed limits for cars, lengthen the traffic light durations for cars, reduce parking for cars, etc. So people can still drive in these cities if they’re really want. But the cities don’t feel any obligation to make automobile transport easy or preferred. And they shouldn’t. Bicyclists should come first, for the reasons detailed above.

What would it take to make driving slow and annoying enough to get Houstonians out of their cars and onto bikes? That’s a good question. But in theory, it could be done.

At UT Austin, for example, there is no parking allowed on campus, unless you’re a university employee. So what do the 50,000 students do to get to and around campus? They do lots of walking, lots of bicycling, and lots of bus riding. In theory, similar things could be achieved in parts of Houston.

So make it difficult for the 98% who drive cars, carpool, vanpool or take a bus to benefit the .1% who bike. That's a sound strategy.

[Snapper_head]

Originally Posted by oceangaia

Just because they could theoretically hold more people (assuming no car-sharing) doesn't mean they do. How about some stats of typical number of people that a road lane carries per day versus bike lane.

Automobiles have had 100 years to become the dominant form of personal transportation in America. Bike lanes in American cities just started to get popular in the last 10 years.

Originally Posted by Whyrallnamestaken

Women would have to put on makeup at work or else the heat would melt it off. What about her hair? Unless her hair is very short, she would have to blow it dry. I don't wash my hair every day. If it stinks from riding a bike to work, I would have to...What about your clothing? Can you pack it so it isn't wrinkled? I think about all the items I would have to lug to work...It just sounds like a lot of trouble and time. How long would it take to ride 15 miles?

Bike commuting is generally intended for shorter distances and milder climates. So bike commuting has its limitations in Houston. You’d be looking at 2 hours of bicycling per day to go 30 miles to and from your work. In the summer, you’d be covered in sweat. On the commute home on summer evenings, you’d continually be at risk of getting heat sickness. You’d need an electric assist on your bicycle. You’d need shower facilities at your work. You’d have to bring a change of clothes in a pack. You’d wish you lived closer to work. On the positive side, you’d never need to spend a moment in a fitness center or spend a penny on fitness center membership. You’d also save many thousands of dollars a year in car payments and car repairs. If you owned a car at all, it would rarely be used and would last you decades.

Originally Posted by Whyrallnamestaken

Some of you probably don't know that Harwin Drive has a bike lane. I have never seen anybody riding a bike on Harwin during rush hour traffic. It would be suicide. What they did was to make the lanes narrow and the bike lane is in the gutter. Vehicles in the left lane always drive too close to the middle line causing the vehicles in the right hand land to drive in the bike lane or very close to it.

That’s a perfect example of a city slapping some paint on the road, calling it a “bike lane”, but not really benefiting anybody. Bike lanes need to separated/protected by curbs, posts, medians, parked cars, or other barriers. They have to be safe for people to bike on.

Originally Posted by Whyrallnamestaken

Are they going to spend a lot of money for bikes lanes that a small percentage of Houstonians will use?

Originally Posted by bu2

So make it difficult for the 98% who drive cars, carpool, vanpool or take a bus to benefit the .1% who bike. That's a sound strategy.

Luckily paint doesn’t cost much. The more a city spends on bike infrastructure, the more it will be used. People use whatever is easiest and most enjoyable. Automobiles have had 100 years and trillions of dollars of investment in the Houston area to get where they are today. If bikes are to become a significant part of the lives of more Houstonians, it will take time and investment. In cities like Portland where they have succeeded in doing this, the benefits have been tremendous.