Can you make it to the market on a bike?

On Wed, 25 Jul 2007 10:14:44 -0700, Jack May wrote:

So what. If people consider a bike an inferior way to commute, then all
your arguments are worthless.

I consider the average car driver to be a fat, lazy, overstressed,
thoughtless slob, even if he gets there first. So much for /your/
arguments.

"Bill Z." wrote in message
...
"Edward Dolan" writes:

"Bill Z." wrote in message
...
"Joe the Aroma" writes:

Your idiotic platitudes aside, the reason why bike lanes won't happen
is
because of democracy, the vast majority of people do not bike and
therefor
do not demand bike lanes. Democracy in action.

We have plenty of bike lanes around here. Many are along routes
children use to ride their bicycles to school. It may surprise you,
but a "majority of people" have children and will support anything
that they think will reduce the chances of their children being
injured. Bike lanes are also popular with commuters, who feel more
comfortable when there is one. And our traffic engineers like them as
well - on expressways or similar heavily used road, the bike lanes
double as breakdown lanes or as areas where cars can merge into to let
emergency vehicles get by. The cost difference between a bike lane
versus a striped shoulder is basically zero.

Bike lanes are not as safe as many imagine them to be. An idiotic driver
can
easily wipe you out and then claim that he never saw you.

We weren't talking about how "safe" they were. The issue was whether
the government would install them given that most people don't ride
bicycles. I pointed out that most voters have children and those
children ride bicycles.

No, you confounded idiot, it is all about safety. No one in their right mind
gives a damn about anything else.

In case there is any confusion, a bike lane is part of a road
and should not be confused with a bike path, which is a completely
separate facility. The paths are popular too, as they are really
bicycle/pedestrian paths.

Bike paths are the only way to go. They are extremely safe as long as you
keep your speed down.

Not true, unless the paths don't cross streets very often. A
bi-directional path paralleling a street is dangerous at every
intersection. It's been shown that riding the wrong way on a
sidewalk is several times more dangerous than riding in the
same direction as traffic on a roadway (with the accidents
occuring at the intersections).

Idiots like Bill Z are driving me crazy. Cyclists on a bike path must stop,
look and listen at every intersection with a street. Who would be so stupid
as not to do this? Bill Z apparently.

Regtards,

Ed Dolan the Great - Minnesota
aka
Saint Edward the Great - Order of the Perpetual Sorrows - Minnesota

On Thu, 26 Jul 2007 08:46:49 +0930, Michael Warner
wrote:

On Tue, 24 Jul 2007 11:50:23 -0700, Zoot Katz wrote:

garages: time spent watching automobile commercials or attending
consumer education meetings to improve quality of the next buy.

Americans go to meetings to learn how to buy cars? Wow.

They attend automobile trade shows in droves.
--
zk

"Edward Dolan" writes:

"Bill Z." wrote in message
...
"Edward Dolan" writes:

"Bill Z." wrote in message

We have plenty of bike lanes around here. Many are along routes
children use to ride their bicycles to school. It may surprise you,
but a "majority of people" have children and will support anything
that they think will reduce the chances of their children being
injured. Bike lanes are also popular with commuters, who feel more
comfortable when there is one. And our traffic engineers like them as
well - on expressways or similar heavily used road, the bike lanes
double as breakdown lanes or as areas where cars can merge into to let
emergency vehicles get by. The cost difference between a bike lane
versus a striped shoulder is basically zero.

Bike lanes are not as safe as many imagine them to be. An idiotic
driver can easily wipe you out and then claim that he never saw
you.

We weren't talking about how "safe" they were. The issue was
whether the government would install them given that most people
don't ride bicycles. I pointed out that most voters have children
and those children ride bicycles.

No, you confounded idiot, it is all about safety. No one in their
right mind gives a damn about anything else.

You know, for a know-nothing moron, Dolan sure is arrogant.

If you think public support for bike lanes is based on hard data about
how safe they are, you are an idiot - public support is based purely
on perceptions, and most people think bike lanes are safer. The
reality is that bike lanes have little impact on actual safety, but do
have a noticable impact on comfort level - many people simply feel
safer when in a bike lane, and figure their kids will be safer
too. That's as far as they go with it. Meanwhile, the school
districts figure it is easy to teach younger children to stay on the
right side of a bike-lane stripe rather than to try to teach these
chlidren to behave like licensed drivers. So the schools push for
bike lanes too, and the parents go along with it.

Not true, unless the paths don't cross streets very often. A
bi-directional path paralleling a street is dangerous at every
intersection. It's been shown that riding the wrong way on a
sidewalk is several times more dangerous than riding in the
same direction as traffic on a roadway (with the accidents
occuring at the intersections).

Idiots like Bill Z are driving me crazy. Cyclists on a bike path must stop,
look and listen at every intersection with a street. Who would be so stupid
as not to do this? Bill Z apparently.

If Dolan had bothered to read anything before shooting off his fat
mouth, he would know about some of the literature. In particular,
Wachtel and Lewiston (1994) Risk Factors for Bicycle-Motor Vehicle
Collisions at Intersections; ITE Journal, September, 1994. You can
read a copy on-line at
http://www.bicyclinglife.com/Library/riskfactors.htm. In particular
you should read the following:

"Bicyclists on a sidewalk or bicycle path incur greater risk
than those on the roadway (on average 1.8 times as great),
most likely because of blind conflicts at intersections.
Wrong-way sidewalk bicyclists are at even greater risk, and
sidewalk bicycling appears to increase the inciÂ*dence of
wrong-way travel."

That's based on real-world measurements, not mindless speculation
from some usenet kook like Dolan.

--
My real name backwards: nemuaZ lliB

"Bill Z." wrote in message
...
"Edward Dolan" writes:

"Bill Z." wrote in message
...
"Edward Dolan" writes:

"Bill Z." wrote in message

We have plenty of bike lanes around here. Many are along routes
children use to ride their bicycles to school. It may surprise you,
but a "majority of people" have children and will support anything
that they think will reduce the chances of their children being
injured. Bike lanes are also popular with commuters, who feel more
comfortable when there is one. And our traffic engineers like them
as
well - on expressways or similar heavily used road, the bike lanes
double as breakdown lanes or as areas where cars can merge into to
let
emergency vehicles get by. The cost difference between a bike lane
versus a striped shoulder is basically zero.

Bike lanes are not as safe as many imagine them to be. An idiotic
driver can easily wipe you out and then claim that he never saw
you.

We weren't talking about how "safe" they were. The issue was
whether the government would install them given that most people
don't ride bicycles. I pointed out that most voters have children
and those children ride bicycles.

No, you confounded idiot, it is all about safety. No one in their
right mind gives a damn about anything else.

You know, for a know-nothing moron, Dolan sure is arrogant.

Well, I know what I know and I have no tolerance for idiots who essentially
know nothing.

If you think public support for bike lanes is based on hard data about
how safe they are, you are an idiot - public support is based purely
on perceptions, and most people think bike lanes are safer. The
reality is that bike lanes have little impact on actual safety, but do
have a noticable impact on comfort level - many people simply feel
safer when in a bike lane, and figure their kids will be safer
too. That's as far as they go with it. Meanwhile, the school
districts figure it is easy to teach younger children to stay on the
right side of a bike-lane stripe rather than to try to teach these
chlidren to behave like licensed drivers. So the schools push for
bike lanes too, and the parents go along with it.

Not true, unless the paths don't cross streets very often. A
bi-directional path paralleling a street is dangerous at every
intersection. It's been shown that riding the wrong way on a
sidewalk is several times more dangerous than riding in the
same direction as traffic on a roadway (with the accidents
occuring at the intersections).

Idiots like Bill Z are driving me crazy. Cyclists on a bike path must
stop,
look and listen at every intersection with a street. Who would be so
stupid
as not to do this? Bill Z apparently.

If Dolan had bothered to read anything before shooting off his fat
mouth, he would know about some of the literature. In particular,
Wachtel and Lewiston (1994) Risk Factors for Bicycle-Motor Vehicle
Collisions at Intersections; ITE Journal, September, 1994. You can
read a copy on-line at
http://www.bicyclinglife.com/Library/riskfactors.htm. In particular
you should read the following:

I will never read any of that **** because it is irrelevant. All that is
required to know anything about cycling is an ounce of common sense,
something that is very rare in cyclists as Bill Z proves every time he posts
his stupid and misleading messages.

"Bicyclists on a sidewalk or bicycle path incur greater risk
than those on the roadway (on average 1.8 times as great),
most likely because of blind conflicts at intersections.
Wrong-way sidewalk bicyclists are at even greater risk, and
sidewalk bicycling appears to increase the inci*dence of
wrong-way travel."

That's based on real-world measurements, not mindless speculation
from some usenet kook like Dolan.

I am always assuming an intelligent cyclist in my speculations, not an idiot
like Bill Z.

Regards,

Ed Dolan the Great - Minnesota
aka
Saint Edward the Great - Order of the Perpetual Sorrows - Minnesota

On Thu, 26 Jul 2007 08:46:49 +0930, Michael Warner
wrote:

On Tue, 24 Jul 2007 11:50:23 -0700, Zoot Katz wrote:

garages: time spent watching automobile commercials or attending
consumer education meetings to improve quality of the next buy.

Americans go to meetings to learn how to buy cars? Wow.

They attend automobile trade shows in droves.

They get invitations to coffee klatch, wine & cheese parties, buffets
and barbecues from the local automobile dealerships where they're
customers.

And to clarify, Zoot Katz did not_write what has drawn these idiotic
responses form from the unwashed, it was written by IVAN ILLICH.

Zoot Katz posted a quote - in quotation marks with the attribution.
Get it?

Here's a few more of his quotes to twist your knickers.

"The bicycle is the perfect transducer to match man's metabolic
energy to the impedance of locomotion. Equipped with this tool, man
outstrips the efficiency of not only all machines but all other
animals as well. Bicycles let people move with greater speed without
taking up significant amounts of scarce space, energy, or time. They
can spend fewer hours on each mile and still travel more miles in a
year. They can get the benefit of technological breakthroughs without
putting undue claims on the schedules, energy, or space of others.
They become masters of their own movements without blocking those of
their fellows. Their new tool creates only those demands which it can
also satisfy. Every increase in motorized speed creates new demands
on space and time. The use of the bicycle is self-limiting. It allows
people to create a new relationship between their life-space and
their life-time, between their territory and the pulse of their
being, without destroying their inherited balance. The advantages of
modern self-powered traffic are obvious, and ignored. That better
traffic runs faster is asserted, but never proved. Before they ask
people to pay for it, those who propose acceleration should try to
display the evidence for their claim."
---
"The bicycle also uses little space. Eighteen bikes can be parked in
the place of one car, thirty of them can move along in the space
devoured by a single automobile. It takes three lanes of a given size
to move 40,000 people across a bridge in one hour by using automated
trains, four to move them on buses, twelve to move them in their
cars, and only two lanes for them to pedal across on bicycles."
-- Ivan Illich, Energy and Equity, Toward a History of Needs, 1978.
http://ranprieur.com/readings/illichcars.html
---
"The compulsion to do good is an innate American trait. Only North
Americans seem to believe that they always should, may, and actually
can choose somebody with whom to share their blessings. Ultimately
this attitude leads to bombing people into the acceptance of gifts."
--
zk

"Edward Dolan" writes:

"Bill Z." wrote in message
...
"Edward Dolan" writes:

"Bill Z." wrote in message
...
"Edward Dolan" writes:

"Bill Z." wrote in message

We have plenty of bike lanes around here. Many are along routes
children use to ride their bicycles to school. It may surprise you,
but a "majority of people" have children and will support anything
that they think will reduce the chances of their children being
injured. Bike lanes are also popular with commuters, who feel more
comfortable when there is one. And our traffic engineers like them
as
well - on expressways or similar heavily used road, the bike lanes
double as breakdown lanes or as areas where cars can merge into to
let
emergency vehicles get by. The cost difference between a bike lane
versus a striped shoulder is basically zero.

Bike lanes are not as safe as many imagine them to be. An idiotic
driver can easily wipe you out and then claim that he never saw
you.

We weren't talking about how "safe" they were. The issue was
whether the government would install them given that most people
don't ride bicycles. I pointed out that most voters have children
and those children ride bicycles.

No, you confounded idiot, it is all about safety. No one in their
right mind gives a damn about anything else.

You know, for a know-nothing moron, Dolan sure is arrogant.

Well, I know what I know and I have no tolerance for idiots who essentially
know nothing.

Then you should have zero tolerance for yourself!


insults from Dolan snipped

If Dolan had bothered to read anything before shooting off his fat
mouth, he would know about some of the literature. In particular,
Wachtel and Lewiston (1994) Risk Factors for Bicycle-Motor Vehicle
Collisions at Intersections; ITE Journal, September, 1994. You can
read a copy on-line at
http://www.bicyclinglife.com/Library/riskfactors.htm. In particular
you should read the following:

I will never read any of that **** because it is irrelevant. All that is
required to know anything about cycling is an ounce of common sense,
something that is very rare in cyclists as Bill Z proves every time he posts
his stupid and misleading messages.

Dolan is a bald-faced liar - I posted a citation and quote from an
article that appeared in a peer-reviewed journal. If he thinks these
journals are "****", he has simply proven himself to be a crackpot.

"Bicyclists on a sidewalk or bicycle path incur greater risk
than those on the roadway (on average 1.8 times as great),
most likely because of blind conflicts at intersections.
Wrong-way sidewalk bicyclists are at even greater risk, and
sidewalk bicycling appears to increase the incidence of
wrong-way travel."

That's based on real-world measurements, not mindless speculation
from some usenet kook like Dolan.

I am always assuming an intelligent cyclist in my speculations, not an idiot
like Bill Z.

Dolan has proven himself to be a rude, idiotic usenet kook who ignores
the facts. The article I quoted was published in the Institute of
Transportation Engineers Journal, a peer reviewed publication. With
no real argument, Dolan has no response other than childish personal
insults about how I behave on a bicycle, none of which are true (which
makes Dolan a liar in addition to his other personal problems.)

The facts are that there are a very large number of bicyclists in
the U.S. who are simply incompetent. It is no surprise - they never
got any real training - but it is the current state of affairs. Dolan's
speculations are just that - mindless thoughts with no data to back
them up.

--
My real name backwards: nemuaZ lliB

On Jul 25, 3:55 pm, "Edward Dolan" wrote:
"donquijote1954" wrote in message

ups.com...

On Jul 25, 12:16 pm, "Edward Dolan" wrote:

These surveys also tried to compare the accident probalities on the
part
of the road between crossings. The couldn't find a clear trend,
possibly
because there aren't enough accidents that you can mine any statistical
information from it.

You only need to die once in order to be quite dead.

Unless you believe you can enjoy biking in Heaven. I don't.

Don Quijote appears to be a kindred soul. I will have to pay more attention
to him in the future.

By the way, what is with the 1954? That is the year of my graduation from
high school.

It only means that the new Quixote was born in that year.

I got an idea for a new type of car. Well, the mechanics of it have
been around for a while, but now it really comes handy when we are
fighting (and losing) a war over oil and producing Global Warming.
Here it is...

http://www.rhoadescar.com/

We can perfectly ride in the middle of the lane, while all those
engine-bound couch potatoes participate in the rat race. Like the
idea, Sancho?

On Wed, 25 Jul 2007 21:46:46 +0100, Tony Raven
wrote:

donquijote1954 wrote:
On Jul 25, 3:06 am, "Geoff Pearson" wrote:

what do you do with a gallon of milk - sounds much more dangerous than
cycling?-

A gallon of milk is better than a gallon of gas. Hopefully the milk is
still "Made in USA"...

Gas guzzlers are feeding injustice and terrorism.



Do you know how much gas is consumed and methane produced in the
production and delivery of a gallon of milk?

Tony

"It takes thirty-five calories of fossil fuel to make one calorie of
beef, sixty-eight to make one calorie of pork."

"Every single calorie we eat is backed by at least a calorie of oil,
more like ten. In 1940 the average farm in the United States produced
2.3 calories of food energy for every calorie of fossil energy it
used. By 1974 (the last year in which anyone looked closely at this
issue), that ratio was 1:1. And this understates the problem, because
at the same time that there is more oil in our food there is less oil
in our oil. A couple of generations ago we spent a lot less energy
drilling, pumping, and distributing than we do now. In the 1940s we
got about 100 barrels of oil back for every barrel of oil we spent
getting it. Today each barrel invested in the process returns only
ten."

"According to one set of calculations, we spend more calories of
fossil-fuel energy making ethanol from grain than we gain from it.
The Department of Agriculture says the ratio is closer to a gallon
and a quart of ethanol for every gallon of fossil fuel we invest."

Excerpted from http://www.harpers.org/archive/2004/02/0079915
--
zk

On Jul 25, 5:52 pm, "Edward Dolan" wrote:
"donquijote1954" wrote in message

oups.com...

On Jul 25, 12:30 pm, "Edward Dolan" wrote:

Bike paths are the way to go and surely in the future there will be
thousands and thousands of miles of such paths everywhere. The fact is
that
none of us are safe on the roads and highways where we have to share the
lane with motor vehicles.

They won't happen without a revolution. No political will. Our roads
will remain a jungle until the end of times, which is near if we
insist on launching war over precious resources. "Saving" is missing
from the American English Dictionary. There's hope though...

Hey Don Quijote, I am hoping that gas goes to $20. a gallon. That is what it
will take to get America to abandon their cars. And the sooner the better!

The couch potatoes will have to abandon the comfort of their automatic
vehicles. Which, by the way, it's killing them in types of deseases.

The dictatorship of the lazy and stupid over the fit and smart will
end.