That worthless and dangerous cycling infrastructure

[dellzeqq]

http://hembrow.blogs...-post.htmlHmmm. I notice his comparator for Oxford Street has a distinct lack of buses. No doubt removing them is a trivial task...

hahahaha

indeed. One imagines Westminster taking on Baron Haussman as transport planner!

 

[dellzeqq]

I think the outstanding feature of this thread is the simple failure to realise that it's not happening. And when it happens it's an irrelevance*. All those of us who detest separate provision for cycles have to do is to avoid Holland - which is a dump, anyway. So we can relax, and go for a ride.


*And I'd like to thank Aristotle for that.

And, as an aside, I led a ride of 16 CCers out through Surrey and Sussex yesterday, the route including the following roads....the A3, the A307, the A3(again), the A3100, the A286, the A272, the A29 and the A24. We had a great time.

 

[benb]

Fame.
http://aseasyasridingabike.wordpres...rdinary-claims-of-an-anti-infrastructuralist/

 

[Red Light]

All those of us who detest separate provision for cycles have to do is to avoid Holland - which is a dump, anyway. So we can relax, and go for a ride.

Holland, Bloomsbury and a few other places in London.

 

[Red Light]

Fame.
http://aseasyasridin...astructuralist/

Good grief. "Please sir, please sir, those horrible people at CycleChat are saying nasty things about me".

I wonder what Richard makes of the blogger's comment

"I certainly don’t think we should accept *any* infrastructure; I don’t believe that any infrastructure is better than none."​

 

[Shaun]

A good thread - but please let's not spoil it by getting too personal.

Thanks,
Shaun

 

[HJ]

Britain lacks an real cycling culture and yet the Netherlands has it is spades, now why is that? Here is an example of why road cyclists in the Netherlands have no problem with being 'segregated'. A part of the problem in Britain is the narrow mindedness of the so called cycle campaign groups who fail to look at best practice around the world. Please try and be a wee bit more open minded...

 

[Mad at urage]

Britain lacks an real cycling culture and yet the Netherlands has it is spades, now why is that? Here is an example of why road cyclists in the Netherlands have no problem with being 'segregated'. A part of the problem in Britain is the narrow mindedness of the so called cycle campaign groups who fail to look at best practice around the world. Please try and be a wee bit more open minded...

I don't know of any "so called cycle campaign group" which is asking for cyclists to be integrated onto the motorways, do you?

 

[As Easy As Riding A Bike]

I don't know of any "so called cycle campaign group" which is asking for cyclists to be integrated onto the motorways, do you?

Indeed so. We might stop and ask ourselves why, of course.

The only cycle facilities I want are ones that give routes not available on the roads.

How dissimilar, in practical terms, are dual carriageways - routes generally available to cyclists - from motorways?

 

[srw]

Britain lacks an real cycling culture

Come to London and say that. You might be somewhat out-numbered by cyclists who don't really think they need a culture to ride.

and yet the Netherlands has it is spades, now why is that? Here is an example of why road cyclists in the Netherlands have no problem with being 'segregated'.

As dellzeqq would say, "show us the map"
(That was entirely a random selection, by the way).

 

[Dan B]

How dissimilar, in practical terms, are dual carriageways - routes generally available to cyclists - from motorways?

When they're the only route between A and B, those being the two places one wants to ride between? A circumstance which will almost never apply to motorways, as (correct me if I'm wrong) part of the process for building a motorway is ensuring adequate alternative provision for people who don't/won't/can't use them for whatever reason.

I'm sure you can think of dual carriageways which are motorways in all but name, but it is not axiomatic that all dual carriageways fit that description. Many don't

 

[Red Light]

Britain lacks an real cycling culture and yet the Netherlands has it is spades, now why is that?

Because the cycling modal share has never dropped below 20% in the Netherlands over the past century whereas its a percent or two in the UK ?

 

[srw]

To be fair, I think I have used that particular cyclepath (if it's the one I'm thinking of it goes across the Polders alongside a motorway). It's fantastic and typical of the facilities being built alongside some of the newer roads in the netherlands.

I'm a big fan of good-quality facilities where appropriate - but as you suggest they need to be designed in, or (as Sustrans has found) converted from other kinds of transport links.

A couple of weeks ago we were in Scotland. There are two very high quality ex-railway paths going west and north-west from Johnstone, near Glasgow. Near me the Phoenix trail between Princes Risborough and Thame is pretty damned good. All of those seem well used, by everyone from club riders to potterers.

But the panglossian posters who point to a single good example and say "that's what we need everywhere" are deluded.

 

[dellzeqq]

Britain lacks an real cycling culture and yet the Netherlands has it is spades, now why is that? Here is an example of why road cyclists in the Netherlands have no problem with being 'segregated'. A part of the problem in Britain is the narrow mindedness of the so called cycle campaign groups who fail to look at best practice around the world. Please try and be a wee bit more open minded...

that is just horrible. The case against made in spades

 

[Tommi]

The general rule is that it is for those that are proposing a change to demonstrate there's real support for it, not others to prove there isn't. So until you can show that the status quo of no facility should stand.

Excuse me? The world wide status quo is that cycle lanes/tracks improve cycling rates and/or safety - see the supporting research.

If you mean "UK style cycle lanes/tracks" or "UK style cycle lanes/track ignoring proper designs" please do say so.

So show me the evidence that if you are given £1m a mile to spend that a) cycling is dangerous enough compared other daily activities to need an intervention, b) that the cycle facilities will produce a significant increase in safety and c) they will produce a significant increase in numbers cycling.

Second is there is no evidence that cycle lanes attract new people to cycling in any significant numbers.

The research I originally posted supports b) and c) and contradicts your second item - enough to have world wide support. What do you know the rest of the world doesn't? Care to share the research? Would you also mind explaining why the rest of the world is wrong?

They spent a lot of money* putting in 320km of cycle network in Dublin but it resulted in a fall in cycling. On the other hand the investment in the DublinBikes share bike scheme led to a big increase in cycling

(You said elsewhere building the cycle network caused "drop in cycling of 15% in commuters and 40% in school students" but "Dublin Canal Cordon Counts" does not support that claim. For one it does not distinguish between commuters and school students. So let me ask again, source?)

Funny place that Dublin.

Before they started building the cycle network cycling count was already declining. Oddly, after they started building it in 1997 the decline slowed down noticeably (source: 1988-2003 1997-2010 (pdf)):

According to Wikipedia DublinBikes started in 13 September 2009 and yet the Cordon Counts show increase in cycling already from 2004 onwards, year after the cycle network (as originally laid out I presume) completed. Strangely enough the first drop in counts since then was between 2009-10 right after DublinBikes started which directly contradicts your claim. Did you mean to provide some other source? Since the counts are made in November it's unlikely DublinBikes related construction work can be blamed either.

Admittedly year 2004 is bit of a mystery, but I'm sure you can point me to solid evidence how the cycle network had no role here whatsoever and it's all because of Bikeability or somesuch.

Couldn't find the "Dublin Transport Initiative 1995" document since all I get is the one for 2011-17 which shows continued development of the strategic cycle network. Strange that. You really should tell them how they'd get much more people cycling safely if they just stopped building all those cycle lanes and tracks.

Cyclists cycling against the traffic flow on a two way cycle lane have a 12.4x (Sweden), 10x (Finland) increased collision risk compared to on the road and 3.4x (Sweden) and 4x (Denmark) higher risk in the with traffic direction.

The Räsänen papers you cited make no mention of Sweden or Denmark or otherwise make such comparisons. Want to try again?