How's the bike infrastructure where you ride?

[Art Deco]

From the archives: Boomers and bikes were made for each other

There are alternatives to driving that can work just about anywhere.

lloydalter.substack.com

As we rebuild infrastructure in the states can we learn anything from Europe?

 

[Mr. Coffee]

As we rebuild infrastructure in the states can we learn anything from Europe?

If we can ever get past the Not Invented Here crap there is a whole lot we could learn from other countries, not merely in bicycle infra. And there is nothing wrong with learning something new from someone else.

 

[Art Deco]

If we can ever get past the Not Invented Here crap there is a whole lot we could learn from other countries, not merely in bicycle infra. And there is nothing wrong with learning something new from someone else.

Cheaper to learn from other's experience than our mistakes...

 

[Art Deco]

A dangerous detour from safe streets

You might say the vehicular cycling movement is car culture on two wheels.

speakeasy.substack.com

 

[steve mercier]

A dangerous detour from safe streets

You might say the vehicular cycling movement is car culture on two wheels.

speakeasy.substack.com

I read that excellent book "Effective Cycling 30" years ago ! It taught me how to navigate in traffic. Everyone should read it.

 

[Art Deco]

I read that excellent book "Effective Cycling 30" years ago ! It taught me how to navigate in traffic. Everyone should read it.

I wasn't familiar with the original book, but the main point of the article is that "sharing the lane" just doesn't work, even for very skilled cyclists. Really not even for motorcycles.
A person on a bike (200-300 lbs at 20 mph) and a 3000-4000 lb SUV going 50 mph need very different infrastructure .

 

[Jeremy McCreary]

Walnut Creek, CA 2/10
Concord, CA 1/10

Visiting here on family business with no bike. Can't say I've seen all of the downtown area or the west side suburb where we're staying. But what little bike infrastructure I've seen is token at best and riddled with huge and dangerous gaps. Rating doesn't include nearby open spaces like Shell Ridge, where I used to ride my MTB.

Thought about renting an ebike for a few days, but no way I'd ride a bike in the area I'm rating here.

Came to Walnut Creek often when we lived in nearby Orinda 20+ years ago. We referred to it as "Wallet Creek" for the conspicuous affluence on parade then, and that's only grown since. There was no Maserati dealer then. Ditto for the McLaren dealer a few blocks down.

In a community with that kind of residential and commercial tax base, you'd think they could do better. But to be fair, not sure where they'd put more bike infrastructure even if they wanted to. Lots of traffic in this commercial and shopping hub, and the downtown and surrounding streets are already seriously oversubscribed.

The bike infrastructure's even worse in much less affluent Concord, CA, the next East Bay city of size to the north.

The infrastructure contrast between these important urban/suburban centers and my current suburban setting in coastal north San Diego County is night and day.

 

[fooferdoggie]

This is a cool signal indicator let you know how much time is left though though the indicator runs counter clockwise. It can be triggered by a bike too

 

[mschwett]

Walnut Creek, CA 2/10
Concord, CA 1/10

Visiting here on family business with no bike. Can't say I've seen all of the downtown area or the west side suburb where we're staying. But what little bike infrastructure I've seen is token at best and riddled with huge and dangerous gaps. Rating doesn't include nearby open spaces like Shell Ridge, where I used to ride my MTB.

Thought about renting an ebike for a few days, but no way I'd ride a bike in the area I'm rating here.

Came to Walnut Creek often when we lived in nearby Orinda 20+ years ago. We referred to it as "Wallet Creek" for the conspicuous affluence on parade then, and that's only grown since. There was no Maserati dealer then. Ditto for the McLaren dealer a few blocks down.

In a community with that kind of residential and commercial tax base, you'd think they could do better. But to be fair, not sure where they'd put more bike infrastructure even if they wanted to. Lots of traffic in this commercial and shopping hub, and the downtown and surrounding streets are already seriously oversubscribed.

The bike infrastructure's even worse in much less affluent Concord, CA, the next East Bay city of size to the north.

The infrastructure contrast between these important urban/suburban centers and my current suburban setting in coastal north San Diego County is night and day.

I have to wonder if there is another factor at work here, which is familiarity, or lack thereof. I dislike cycling in suburbs - period - but Walnut Creek does have the iron horse trail running the full north-south length (and much further beyond) which intersects the contra costa canal trail which runs roughly in a half loop from concord down towards Walnut Creek and back up, intersecting several other bikeways. in fact, one could ride from more or less the middle of concord to Walnut Creek Bart almost entirely on a fully separated bikeway, put your bike on a train and be in any of a dozen cities full of even more bike lanes and great bikeways. Besides the iron horse and canal bikeways, there are lots of bike lanes in Walnut Creek, and while the burbs are not my cup of tea, the PfB bike raring for Walnut Creek is probably pretty accurate at 37/100, crappy but significantly higher than most cities in California, like Los Angeles, San Diego, or Carlsbad, but much, much lower than the handful of California cities which have truly committed to bike infrastructure like Berkeley, San Francisco, or Davis.

 

[Jeremy McCreary]

I have to wonder if there is another factor at work here, which is familiarity, or lack thereof. I dislike cycling in suburbs - period - but Walnut Creek does have the iron horse trail running the full north-south length (and much further beyond) which intersects the contra costa canal trail which runs roughly in a half loop from concord down towards Walnut Creek and back up, intersecting several other bikeways. in fact, one could ride from more or less the middle of concord to Walnut Creek Bart almost entirely on a fully separated bikeway, put your bike on a train and be in any of a dozen cities full of even more bike lanes and great bikeways. Besides the iron horse and canal bikeways, there are lots of bike lanes in Walnut Creek, and while the burbs are not my cup of tea, the PfB bike raring for Walnut Creek is probably pretty accurate at 37/100, crappy but significantly higher than most cities in California, like Los Angeles, San Diego, or Carlsbad, but much, much lower than the handful of California cities which have truly committed to bike infrastructure like Berkeley, San Francisco, or Davis.

I have to disagree. Walnut Creek may have the trails you mentioned, but a few trails don't make up for the generally poor infrastructure I've seen in much of downtown. Not a place I'd want to commute through.

In contrast, there are wide, continuous bike lanes of various kinds nearly everywhere in Carlsbad, both downtown (Carlsbad Village) and in surrounding areas, and I can get anywhere in relative safety.

 

[Marcela]

The best thing for me about where I live, Lawrence, KS, is the bike infrastructure, and the close proximity of most anything for shopping. The 8' wide bike lanes are many, and it is just about completed to surround the entire city.

For a quick map of bike lanes, I go to realtor.com and look up a city and there is a tab to bring up the bike paths under transit, lets me know pretty quick what the bike structure looks like. I've been looking for a place to move and that is one of the criteria I look at.

Can you imagine living without fear or judgement?

 

[Kayakguy]

This is a cool signal indicator let you know how much time is left though though the indicator runs counter clockwise. It can be triggered by a bike too
View attachment 169488

Bellingham has been replacing old style walk signals with countdown signals--though not everywhere yet. Very handy to see the walk signal counting down, so you know whether you have time to make the light. Handy for pedestrians, too.

 

[BEC111]

I always feel lucky because my region of Northern Virginia has a very good system of dedicated bike paths. I live about seven miles west of Mount Vernon, and if I go not more than a quarter mile from my home riding through a suburban neighborhood, I will find myself on beautifully paved bike path which connects to the Mount Vernon Trail which is another well-paved bike path along the Potomac River. That goes for fifteen miles before connecting to another paved trail which leads to the C&O towpath, which after one-hundred and eighty-five miles connects to the GAP trail in Cumberland, Maryland, which goes to Pittsburg. Although I have never yet done it, I could go from my home to Pittsburg, almost four-hundred miles away, without traveling more than a half a mile on anything but an off-road, mostly well-surfaced, bike path.

Northern Virginia is really good for biking. I’m in Ashburn and am less than a mile from the W&OD which riding 25 miles or so southeast indirectly connects to the Mt Vernon trail. a very cycling friendly region. And the local govs are working to improve it.

 

[6zfshdb]

Northern Virginia is really good for biking. I’m in Ashburn and am less than a mile from the W&OD which riding 25 miles or so southeast indirectly connects to the Mt Vernon trail. a very cycling friendly region. And the local govs are working to improve it.

Are e-bikes allowed on the Mt Vernon trail now? I tried to ride there 2 years ago and was asked to leave by the park police.

 

[BEC111]

Are e-bikes allowed on the Mt Vernon trail now? I tried to ride there 2 years ago and was asked to leave by the park police.

 

[BEC111]

I not aware of any regulatory issues but I’ve ridden the trail both alone and with the E-Bike Lovers of Washington DC group several times in the past few years without incident

 

[Art Deco]

This article seems like it fits in with your infrastructure thread. This is serous stuff, both the good and the bad builds are permanently installed and rarely changed afterwards.

Toronto has too many Ghost Bikes

The construction industry kills another cyclist and I attend another ride and installation.

open.substack.com

 

[Kayakguy]

Bellingham recently closed one (of three) lanes on Holly St. (main drag) to put in a dedicated bike lane, which is separated from traffic by auto parking. Only hazard I can see is a passenger opening up their (right side) door at an awkward time. So we still have to stay alert. Also, street revisions are happening in my neighborhood that are supposed to improve biking safety. Remains to be seen. Not all "improvements" actually improve anything.

A few intersections have the green "bike box" that allows you to jump ahead of autos, but sometimes I feel awkward about shoving ahead of a car to occupy that space. Last time I encountered one of those, a car had already stopped well into a portion of the bike box, and I debated challenging them about it, but thought better of it.

 

[S.Sage]

I live in central Alabama. Jacksonville is a University town, so there are some bicycle friendly areas locally. But, we don't have a local bike shop anymore, go figure.

I live near the Chief Ladiga rail trail and it connects with the Silver Comet trail in Georgia. Lots of rural roads to ride here. I can ride over to the rail trail north of Jacksonville, AL and take it over to the Cedar Town, GA area for a 60 mile round trip. Its mostly scenic woods, a few mild but long grades. The rail trail has shade and there are some campgrounds and motels that are bicycle forward. A number of trail systems in the area along rivers and we have the Tallagega National Forest near and a few State Parks with bike trails. So, plenty of places to ride, but most require a vehicle ride to a trail head.

I like the Little River Canyon area for low traffic pavement riding and all the forestry roads are nice if you like gravel roads. I use the rail trails to avoid the usual hostile truck traffic, too many reckless drivers for my liking. I stay to the bike trails most of the time. I wish the local roads were safer so I could just ride a bicycle from home, but I don't do that often. Lots of people drive down the middle of the roads here, even around blind curves. So I would say my area of Alabama is a 5 at best. But we do have good single track mountain bike trails here, just not much support you can ride up to. Bring lots of water though, its really hot and humid here!

 

[Jeremy McCreary]

I don't ride in Paris, but the infrastructure there seems to be improving at a rapid rate. Some main arteries were also given over to bikes for the Olympics.

Not sure how effective these new bike lanes will be in practice. On my last visit to Paris in 2019, cars and trucks typically went down the big boulevards in swarms, totally ignoring lane markings. Driving on sidewalks was apparently fair game. And a lot of the driving was done with one hand on the horn and the other shaking a fist out the driver's window.

And these drivers are going to honor bike lanes??