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.

[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.

[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]

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?