More from the UK: "Bike lanes save lives of drivers as well ascyclists, study finds"

On 5/30/2019 6:00 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote:
On Thu, 30 May 2019 08:48:22 -0700, sms
wrote:

Well actually it's from the U.S., reported in the UK.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/bike-lane-cycling-road-safety-driver-deaths-fatalities-a8934841.html

"With added bike lanes, fatal crash rates dropped in Seattle (by 61 per
cent), San Francisco (by 49 per cent), Denver (by 40 per cent) and
Chicago (by 38 per cent)."

Cue the "Danger Danger" people to dispute the study. Maybe it wasn't the
bike lanes at all, maybe it was more people wearing helmets--wait that
couldn't be. Maybe it was more disc brakes. Maybe it was risk
compensation. Did gardening injuries go up or down?

https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...488?via%3Dihub

The full title of that study seems to be " Why cities with high
bicycling rates are safer for all road users. Wesley E. Marshall,
Nicholas N. Ferenchak. Journal of Transport & Health, 2019.
and an abstract of the study states:

Despite bicycling being considered ten times more dangerous than
driving, the evidence suggests that high-bicycling-mode-share cities
are not only safer for bicyclists but for all road users. We look to
understand what makes these cities safer. Are the safety differences
related to "safety-in-numbers" of bicyclists, or can they be better
explained by built environment differences or the people that inhabit
them?

Results
The results suggest that more bicyclists is not the reason these
cities are safer for all road users. Better safety outcomes are
instead associated with a greater prevalence of bike facilities -
particularly protected and separated bike facilities - at the block
group level and, more strongly so, across the overall city. Higher
intersection density, which typically corresponds to more compact and
lower-speed built environments, was strongly associated with better
road safety outcomes for all road users. The variables representing
gentrification also accounted for much of our explainable variation in
safety outcomes.

Conclusions
This paper provides an evidence-based approach to building safer
cities. While the policy implications of this work point to protected
and separated bike infrastructure as part of the solution, we need to
keep in mind that these approaches are complementary and should not be
considered in isolation. Moreover, our results - particularly the
safety disparities associated with gentrification - suggest equity
issues and the need for future research.

"need for future research"

Boilerplate. Just as teachers' union officials always add
something about higher school taxes for the government
schools, outcomes and efficiency be damned. What researcher
ever called for less research?

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On Friday, May 31, 2019 at 1:37:31 AM UTC+1, AMuzi wrote:

"need for future research"

Boilerplate. Just as teachers' union officials always add
something about higher school taxes for the government
schools, outcomes and efficiency be damned. What researcher
ever called for less research?

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

Hold on a minute there, young man. I have often said that my research projects would go faster if I were funded to do them in St Tropez, especially the one which requires measuring the upper thighs of women to check whether Dr Kinsey got it right when he claimed that in the generation since pasteurisation of milk American women put on 3 inches around the upper thigh, and of course how universally relevant his claim has now become, urgent work that no one else is even suggesting.

Andre Jute
Hands-on research

On Thursday, May 30, 2019 at 7:43:08 PM UTC-4, sms wrote:
On 5/30/2019 4:07 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote:

snip

"While the policy implications of this work point to protected and
separated bike infrastructure as part of the solution, we need to keep
in mind that these approaches are complementary and should not be
considered in isolation. Moreover, our results - particularly the
safety disparities associated with gentrification - suggest equity
issues and the need for future research."

It's also important to understand that a city doesn't need to cover
every single foot (or mile) with protected bike lanes in order to make a
difference. Selecting the areas where problems most often occur is often
sufficient, and choosing one route out of many possible routes for a
protected bike lane is adequate, you don't have to have every parallel
road with identical infrastructure. This is what cities around here do,
we look at where protected bike lanes will have the most effect and
concentrate our financial resources on those areas.

Also, be very careful when looking at the statistics of how ridership
levels change. Sometimes an area will have a steady increase over a long
period of time then all of a sudden have one bad year. An anomaly can be
a weather event, a natural disaster, or a host of other things. Some
people intentionally take numbers completely out of context in an effort
to mislead people. I can tell you that bicycle commuting in Silicon
Valley probably fell significantly for 2019 because we've had an
extremely wet winter and spring. Last year we had an unprecedented
number of bad air days due to large wildfires which led to less cycling.

For example lets look at Pittsburgh, PA. From 1990 to 2017 they had a
240.4% increase in those 27 years. From 2006 to 2017 they had a 67.4%
increase over 11 years. From 2011 to 2017 they had a 2% increase over
six years. But there was a drop of 45.2% from 2016 to 2017. You can't
ignore a long-term huge increase and then look only at a single year─
that kind of cherry=picking of statistics is extremely dishonest and is
something that you often see when someone is trying to manipulate
statistics to suit a particular agenda.

So what do those bicyclists in segregated protected bicycle lanes do when that lane ends? See the problem? Unless the segregated bike lane goes to exactly where the bicyclist wants to go the non-bicyclist is NOT likely to take up bicycling and that's because the "segregated bicycle lane" spiel HAS CONVINCED them that it's TOO DANGEROUS to ride anywhere but in a segregated bicycle lane. How do you expect people to get to and from those segregated bike lanes if you keep harping that bicycling is too dangerous if not in a segregated bicycle lane and without all sorts of safety equipment, such as DRL and bright clothing on bicycles? In effect you're probably doing more to discourage people from taking up bicycling as transportation than you are encouraging them.

Cheers

On Friday, May 31, 2019 at 4:40:29 AM UTC+2, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Thursday, May 30, 2019 at 7:43:08 PM UTC-4, sms wrote:
On 5/30/2019 4:07 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote:

snip

"While the policy implications of this work point to protected and
separated bike infrastructure as part of the solution, we need to keep
in mind that these approaches are complementary and should not be
considered in isolation. Moreover, our results - particularly the
safety disparities associated with gentrification - suggest equity
issues and the need for future research."

It's also important to understand that a city doesn't need to cover
every single foot (or mile) with protected bike lanes in order to make a
difference. Selecting the areas where problems most often occur is often
sufficient, and choosing one route out of many possible routes for a
protected bike lane is adequate, you don't have to have every parallel
road with identical infrastructure. This is what cities around here do,
we look at where protected bike lanes will have the most effect and
concentrate our financial resources on those areas.

Also, be very careful when looking at the statistics of how ridership
levels change. Sometimes an area will have a steady increase over a long
period of time then all of a sudden have one bad year. An anomaly can be
a weather event, a natural disaster, or a host of other things. Some
people intentionally take numbers completely out of context in an effort
to mislead people. I can tell you that bicycle commuting in Silicon
Valley probably fell significantly for 2019 because we've had an
extremely wet winter and spring. Last year we had an unprecedented
number of bad air days due to large wildfires which led to less cycling..

For example lets look at Pittsburgh, PA. From 1990 to 2017 they had a
240.4% increase in those 27 years. From 2006 to 2017 they had a 67.4%
increase over 11 years. From 2011 to 2017 they had a 2% increase over
six years. But there was a drop of 45.2% from 2016 to 2017. You can't
ignore a long-term huge increase and then look only at a single year─
that kind of cherry=picking of statistics is extremely dishonest and is
something that you often see when someone is trying to manipulate
statistics to suit a particular agenda.

So what do those bicyclists in segregated protected bicycle lanes do when that lane ends? See the problem? Unless the segregated bike lane goes to exactly where the bicyclist wants to go the non-bicyclist is NOT likely to take up bicycling and that's because the "segregated bicycle lane" spiel HAS CONVINCED them that it's TOO DANGEROUS to ride anywhere but in a segregated bicycle lane. How do you expect people to get to and from those segregated bike lanes if you keep harping that bicycling is too dangerous if not in a segregated bicycle lane and without all sorts of safety equipment, such as DRL and bright clothing on bicycles? In effect you're probably doing more to discourage people from taking up bicycling as transportation than you are encouraging them.

Cheers

Maybe you should come and look here in the Netherlands how we do it. Along roads with a 80 km/hr speed limit all the bicycle lanes are seperated.

Lou

On Friday, May 31, 2019 at 1:14:31 AM UTC-4, wrote:
On Friday, May 31, 2019 at 4:40:29 AM UTC+2, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Thursday, May 30, 2019 at 7:43:08 PM UTC-4, sms wrote:
On 5/30/2019 4:07 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote:

snip

"While the policy implications of this work point to protected and
separated bike infrastructure as part of the solution, we need to keep
in mind that these approaches are complementary and should not be
considered in isolation. Moreover, our results - particularly the
safety disparities associated with gentrification - suggest equity
issues and the need for future research."

It's also important to understand that a city doesn't need to cover
every single foot (or mile) with protected bike lanes in order to make a
difference. Selecting the areas where problems most often occur is often
sufficient, and choosing one route out of many possible routes for a
protected bike lane is adequate, you don't have to have every parallel
road with identical infrastructure. This is what cities around here do,
we look at where protected bike lanes will have the most effect and
concentrate our financial resources on those areas.

Also, be very careful when looking at the statistics of how ridership
levels change. Sometimes an area will have a steady increase over a long
period of time then all of a sudden have one bad year. An anomaly can be
a weather event, a natural disaster, or a host of other things. Some
people intentionally take numbers completely out of context in an effort
to mislead people. I can tell you that bicycle commuting in Silicon
Valley probably fell significantly for 2019 because we've had an
extremely wet winter and spring. Last year we had an unprecedented
number of bad air days due to large wildfires which led to less cycling.

For example lets look at Pittsburgh, PA. From 1990 to 2017 they had a
240.4% increase in those 27 years. From 2006 to 2017 they had a 67.4%
increase over 11 years. From 2011 to 2017 they had a 2% increase over
six years. But there was a drop of 45.2% from 2016 to 2017. You can't
ignore a long-term huge increase and then look only at a single year─
that kind of cherry=picking of statistics is extremely dishonest and is
something that you often see when someone is trying to manipulate
statistics to suit a particular agenda.

So what do those bicyclists in segregated protected bicycle lanes do when that lane ends? See the problem? Unless the segregated bike lane goes to exactly where the bicyclist wants to go the non-bicyclist is NOT likely to take up bicycling and that's because the "segregated bicycle lane" spiel HAS CONVINCED them that it's TOO DANGEROUS to ride anywhere but in a segregated bicycle lane. How do you expect people to get to and from those segregated bike lanes if you keep harping that bicycling is too dangerous if not in a segregated bicycle lane and without all sorts of safety equipment, such as DRL and bright clothing on bicycles? In effect you're probably doing more to discourage people from taking up bicycling as transportation than you are encouraging them.

Cheers

Maybe you should come and look here in the Netherlands how we do it. Along roads with a 80 km/hr speed limit all the bicycle lanes are seperated.

Lou

Ah but the Netherlands is a LOT SMALLER than many States or Canadian provinces. Besides which the Netherlands was instituting bicycle paths as the Netherlands developed whereas in North America they have to squeeze bicycling paths lanes into or beside existing roadways. The MAIN problem I see with many bicycle lanes let alone segregated bicycle paths is that they don't go anywhere where a bicyclist would want to go. You ride along a bicycle lane/path and it just suddenly ends making you either ride in the road with motor traffic or walk the bicycle.

Then there is the problem of keeping segregated bicycle paths free of debris and in winter snow. Hereabouts on road bike lanes are often treated as ideal dumping grounds for snow removed from roads.

Geeze if I was afraid to ride my bicycle on a road here with an 80 kph speed limit I'd not get very much bicycling done at all. The VAST majority of my bicycling is done on 80 kph roads.

Cheers

On 5/30/2019 10:14 PM, wrote:

snip

Maybe you should come and look here in the Netherlands how we do it. Along roads with a 80 km/hr speed limit all the bicycle lanes are seperated.

I think that you must have better drivers than in my area. The big issue
here is vehicles on slower roads not staying out of the non-separated
bike lanes. No bike lane at all is better than a bike lane with a
vehicle parked illegally in it because it causes cyclists to suddenly
veer into a vehicle lane to get around it.

On Friday, May 31, 2019 at 6:43:29 AM UTC-4, sms wrote:
On 5/30/2019 10:14 PM, wrote:

snip

Maybe you should come and look here in the Netherlands how we do it. Along roads with a 80 km/hr speed limit all the bicycle lanes are seperated.

I think that you must have better drivers than in my area. The big issue
here is vehicles on slower roads not staying out of the non-separated
bike lanes. No bike lane at all is better than a bike lane with a
vehicle parked illegally in it because it causes cyclists to suddenly
veer into a vehicle lane to get around it.

If there's a stopped vehicle in the bicycle lane the bicyclist should STOP, wait for an opening in the next lane, signal that they're moving left and then move left and ride in the lane until they've passed the stopped vehicle and then they should merge back into the bike lane. There should be NO SWERVING into the traffic lane by the bicyclist if the bicyclist is paying any attention at all to what's in front of them.

Cheers

On 5/30/2019 9:13 PM, Andre Jute wrote:
On Friday, May 31, 2019 at 1:37:31 AM UTC+1, AMuzi wrote:

"need for future research"

Boilerplate. Just as teachers' union officials always add
something about higher school taxes for the government
schools, outcomes and efficiency be damned. What researcher
ever called for less research?

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

Hold on a minute there, young man. I have often said that my research projects would go faster if I were funded to do them in St Tropez, especially the one which requires measuring the upper thighs of women to check whether Dr Kinsey got it right when he claimed that in the generation since pasteurisation of milk American women put on 3 inches around the upper thigh, and of course how universally relevant his claim has now become, urgent work that no one else is even suggesting.

Andre Jute
Hands-on research


You need an assistant to do field work while you compose a
nice report. I'm available.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On 5/31/2019 12:14 AM, wrote:
On Friday, May 31, 2019 at 4:40:29 AM UTC+2, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Thursday, May 30, 2019 at 7:43:08 PM UTC-4, sms wrote:
On 5/30/2019 4:07 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote:

snip

"While the policy implications of this work point to protected and
separated bike infrastructure as part of the solution, we need to keep
in mind that these approaches are complementary and should not be
considered in isolation. Moreover, our results - particularly the
safety disparities associated with gentrification - suggest equity
issues and the need for future research."

It's also important to understand that a city doesn't need to cover
every single foot (or mile) with protected bike lanes in order to make a
difference. Selecting the areas where problems most often occur is often
sufficient, and choosing one route out of many possible routes for a
protected bike lane is adequate, you don't have to have every parallel
road with identical infrastructure. This is what cities around here do,
we look at where protected bike lanes will have the most effect and
concentrate our financial resources on those areas.

Also, be very careful when looking at the statistics of how ridership
levels change. Sometimes an area will have a steady increase over a long
period of time then all of a sudden have one bad year. An anomaly can be
a weather event, a natural disaster, or a host of other things. Some
people intentionally take numbers completely out of context in an effort
to mislead people. I can tell you that bicycle commuting in Silicon
Valley probably fell significantly for 2019 because we've had an
extremely wet winter and spring. Last year we had an unprecedented
number of bad air days due to large wildfires which led to less cycling.

For example lets look at Pittsburgh, PA. From 1990 to 2017 they had a
240.4% increase in those 27 years. From 2006 to 2017 they had a 67.4%
increase over 11 years. From 2011 to 2017 they had a 2% increase over
six years. But there was a drop of 45.2% from 2016 to 2017. You can't
ignore a long-term huge increase and then look only at a single year─
that kind of cherry=picking of statistics is extremely dishonest and is
something that you often see when someone is trying to manipulate
statistics to suit a particular agenda.

So what do those bicyclists in segregated protected bicycle lanes do when that lane ends? See the problem? Unless the segregated bike lane goes to exactly where the bicyclist wants to go the non-bicyclist is NOT likely to take up bicycling and that's because the "segregated bicycle lane" spiel HAS CONVINCED them that it's TOO DANGEROUS to ride anywhere but in a segregated bicycle lane. How do you expect people to get to and from those segregated bike lanes if you keep harping that bicycling is too dangerous if not in a segregated bicycle lane and without all sorts of safety equipment, such as DRL and bright clothing on bicycles? In effect you're probably doing more to discourage people from taking up bicycling as transportation than you are encouraging them.

Cheers

Maybe you should come and look here in the Netherlands how we do it. Along roads with a 80 km/hr speed limit all the bicycle lanes are seperated.

Lou


Maybe it's just a Dutch thing. My Nederlander girlfriend
says she has never run over a bicyclist with her car, not
even a little bit. sample size = 1, incidents = 0.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On Friday, May 31, 2019 at 12:43:29 PM UTC+2, sms wrote:
On 5/30/2019 10:14 PM, wrote:

snip

Maybe you should come and look here in the Netherlands how we do it. Along roads with a 80 km/hr speed limit all the bicycle lanes are seperated.

I think that you must have better drivers than in my area. The big issue
here is vehicles on slower roads not staying out of the non-separated
bike lanes. No bike lane at all is better than a bike lane with a
vehicle parked illegally in it because it causes cyclists to suddenly
veer into a vehicle lane to get around it.


I think the big difference is that drivers are used to bicyclists because they ride a bicycle themselves or have in the past. Getting a drivers license is much harder here I think. Getting along with cyclist is a big part of driving lessons. 'look in your mirrors', look over your shoulder', 'use your indicators in the correct' are phrases you here a lot during driving lessons.

Lou