Bike Lanes!

[boywonder.livejournal.com]

So, I've noticed a lot of bike lanes popping up on the streets of Somerville lately. While I wholeheartedly applaud the effort, they seem to me to have been done haphazardly. Kinda like they're almost in the middle of the car lane? On Powderhouse Blvd. and Cameron Ave. for example, there seems to be barely enough room, if clearly not enough room, for a car to safely pass a cyclist in the new bike lanes. Has anyone else seen them? It's like, maybe if they had moved them closer to the sidewalk a foot or so, there would be plenty of room for bikes and cars, but it seems the city made an error in it's effort...

Comments

[jamiesquared.livejournal.com]

I was thinking the same thing when I drove home via Powderhouse today. My only idea was that maybe they are temporary and show the workers what roads are getting real bike lanes? It really didnt make sense to me as they are totally in the middle of the street.

[ron_newman]

If they were closer to the sidewalk, they would put the cyclist in danger from opening doors of parked cars. Drivers should partially cross the double-yellow line to pass bicyclists.

[jamiesquared.livejournal.com]

These bike symbols are not in the same location as any other bike lane I have ever seen.

[boywonder.livejournal.com]

So...we should put motorist in danger by having them cross the double-yellow lines? Not trying to be a jerk here, just don't really understand how that makes everything better. Plus, as far as I know, it's illegal for motorists to cross a double-yellow line.

[pierceheart.livejournal.com]

You're talking to the same person who advocates riding the wrong way down one way streets on a bicycle.

[antimony.livejournal.com]

No, if there isn't room to pass safely, they shouldn't pass. Bikes are legally allowed on non-limited-access roads as vehicles. True, they are often slow vehicles, and it's frustrating to be stuck behind a slow driver for whatever reason, but they're allowed to do that.

I'm not riding in dooring range, even if that's what's striped as a bike lane. I like living. If it's horrifically crowded, I'll make sure I'm letting cars get past -- and that I'm keeping a very even distance from the curb/center so that people know exactly how much room to spare.

[qwrrty.livejournal.com]

+1

When the lane is too narrow to permit a car to pass me safely, I'll take the whole lane so they don't try. I most definitely am not going to put myself in danger so that you can save another 30 seconds on your daily commute.

Sometimes I slow down the cars behind me, and sometimes the traffic slows me down. If I can cope with it, so can they. That's life, folks --better get used to it.

[boywonder.livejournal.com]

So you're for holding up traffic on a major road because it's convenient for you to do so? Bikes aren't cars. If a speed limit is posted at say 30, and you're not keeping up with it and are severely holding up the flow of traffic at say 8 mph, everyone is supposed to just accept that? The polite thing to do would be to move over to the side, but I guess you're saying that's not your style.

I'm gonna start a group and start advocating for car lanes.

[qwrrty.livejournal.com]

So you're for holding up traffic on a major road because it's convenient for you to do so?

I'm for staying safe.

Holding up traffic is not really a lot of fun, but I still prefer it to riding in the door zone and getting dead. I would be delighted if every street had a twelve-foot car lane, a five-foot bike lane, a door zone and room for parked cars. Regrettably, we don't live in that world.

I get that you're frustrated about this, but we have to remember that "Speed Limit 30" is a maximum speed, not a minimum, and it's not a God-given right either. You don't always get to go as fast as your car will take you, and I don't always get to go as fast as my bike will go either. That's life. The polite thing to do is to share the road. I do, and I hope you will too.

[squirrelitude]

I'd love to be able to save time on my commute by blowing through red lights on my bike (which I could probably do safely, since I can see over cars when I stand on my pedals), but it's against the law for a good reason, so I suck it up and deal. That law is only there because *cars* blowing through red lights is dangerous, but the rules of the road still apply to me. (Not all cyclists follow this. That irritates me too.)

Cars were not the first to use roads. They're a fad caused by cheap oil, and the market is slowly correcting itself. However, there is still a culture of entitlement left over, and people get real uppity when they have to share.

[miss-chance.livejournal.com]

Cars were not the first to use roads. They're a fad caused by cheap oil, and the market is slowly correcting itself.

:-)

[muffyjo]

Cars were not the first to use roads.

Well, sure, but horse and carriage have long since gone out of fashion in these parts!

[charlwoo.livejournal.com]

Bicycles ARE traffic. They have as much right to use the lane as a car does. Cyclists' taxes pay for the public road resources too.

[boywonder.livejournal.com]

Thank you for cycling responsibly. I'm willing to respect your right to be on the road if you're willing to respect mine. The point of my original post was that I feel the placement of the shallows is unsafe for both bikers and motorists.

[dcltdw]

Exactly.

It was quite the eye-opener to go cycling in Holland. Country roads are barely wide enough for two cars to carefully pass each other. The road is painted with two stripes: bike lane, car lane, bike lane.

Thus, a car overtaking a cyclist crosses the far bike lane to pass the cyclist. Two cars approaching each other have to navigate behind the cyclists to pass each other, and then can go back to driving down the center of the road.

Rather novel usage for a narrow street. :)

[lyonesse.livejournal.com]

from what i gather, those symbols (of a bicyclist, specifically *without* a lane marker) are called something else ("sharrows"?) and are intended to remind people to share the lane with the bikes safely, rather than isolate cars and bikes into separate areas.

kind of like, say, crosswalks -- you don't expect cars not to be in them, but you don't expect pedestrians not to be in them, and the signage means you're supposed to check.

[modlin.livejournal.com]

Indeed, sharrows (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_lane_marking).

[charlwoo.livejournal.com]

It sounds like the OP meant sharrows instead of bike lanes.

[totient]

one half of Powderhouse Blvd is not wide enough for a car, a cyclist, and a parked car with its door open. The symbols are to encourage bicyclists to ride far enough from the parked cars that they won't get killed.

[pekmez.livejournal.com]

The new ones I've seen are share-rows (or sharrows, or whatever) - they are specifically bike markings without a lane marker. They don't mark off an area cars can never go in, but rather an area that cars should be aware bikes have the right to share too so that both cyclists and drivers know where the safe space for traffic on this road is. (the sharing is of course true on all roads, but the markings make it more explicit and certainly make me, as an occasional cyclist, smile.)

[turil.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the sharrows are reasonably good band-aid solutions, but only when done right. They remind people that cyclists belong in the road with all the other vehicular traffic. But in most places in Somerville and Cambridge they install them way, way too far to the right, in the door zone and/or gutter area, making them more dangerous than helpful, as they encourage people to drive their bikes badly.

And of course, the bike lanes are nearly all insane. When the city needing the bike committee's ok on the plans for a bike lane on Somerville Ave years ago, everyone on the bike committee agreed that the lanes were dangerous, but then everyone but me voted to OK them, for some bizarre reason of "not wanting to upset the DPW". (That's when I pretty much gave up on the bike committee as being a force for positive change...)

[turil.livejournal.com]

Bike lanes, special lanes for the "special" drivers...

It's like putting a band-aid on your head because you have a headache.

And even then, the band aid doesn't stick.

Sorry, the best solution to safe roads is addressing the root problems of why people drive like stressed out elephants, not segregation.

[squirrelitude]

Are these bike symbols with a double chevron on top?