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It would be nice if the Valley was more pedestrian friendly - all too often bikers ignore the rules. One example is near the Palo Alto Caltrain station tunnel b

by Bahamut 11y ago

It would be nice if the Valley was more pedestrian friendly - all too often bikers ignore the rules. One example is near the Palo Alto Caltrain station tunnel between Stanford and downtown Palo Alto, and too many times pedestrians come close to getting hit by their recklessness :( . One time I got yelled at by a biker on El Camino when trying to board a bus...the biker tried to pass to the right of the bus. It is frustrating how often bikers don't care about co-existing with the other modes of transportation & following the rules - I feel like this needs to change first before the area becomes bike friendly.

erikpukinskis 11y ago
> I feel like this needs to change first before the area becomes bike friendly. As in people should stop work making the area bike friendly until the issue of dangerous driving of bikes is ended?
npsimons 11y ago
While I agree that cyclists should be better behaved, I feel that it may be an (over)reaction to hostility from drivers. There's a saying motorcyclists have: ride like they (the car drivers) can't see you. I like to extend that for cyclists as "ride like they can see you and they're trying to hit you." The sad truth is that America is bike hostile, and even apart from that, many who shouldn't be driving are still issued drivers licenses (one cyclist was killed by an old lady near where I live, but no one's going to tangle with the AARP, and most people thought she'd have lived had she been in a "safe" car).
fizx 11y ago
It would be nice if the Valley was more pedestrian friendly - all too often cars ignore the rules. One example is near the Palo Alto Caltrain station tunnel between Stanford and downtown Palo Alto, and too many times pedestrians come close to getting hit by their recklessness :( . [Eh, pick any time you've seen a car shoot through a crosswalk and narrowly miss pedestrians... I observe this at least weekly] It is frustrating how often drivers don't care about co-existing with the other modes of transportation & following the rules - I feel like this needs to change first before the area becomes car friendly.
- TulliusCicero 11y ago
  I love this comment because it illustrates perfectly the cognitive dissonance going on. People everywhere talk about how drivers in their area are like, so, so bad, but nobody ever suggests that we halt investing in car infrastructure until they get better. And that's a good thing: you don't stop investing in a vital public good just because it's sometimes abused. That applies to bikes as much as cars.
  - Bahamut 11y ago
    I have far more problems with bikers in the area than cars - the close encounter rate is quite high, largely because a lot of bikers don't have good control over their bikes or because they don't care at all about pedestrians and are willing to run them over to force them out of the way. I'm quite amazed I haven't been hit by a biker yet to be honest, some even talking on their cellphones held in one hand while driving pedestrians running out of the way. I'd be more sympathetic towards bikers if they didn't decrease the quality of getting from one place to another for pedestrians & harass when they decided to not follow laws & rules there for good reason. You act like being pedestrian friendly isn't a vital public good - I'd argue it is more important than being bike friendly, and if being bike friendly has a logical result in making it much more perilous for a pedestrian (and I'd fear for those with babies in baby carriages), one needs to consider that the current system does not work, and this problem needs to be solved either before or alongside the bike friendly problem.
    - TulliusCicero 11y ago
      > I'd be more sympathetic towards bikers if they didn't decrease the quality of getting from one place to another for pedestrians & harass when they decided to not follow laws & rules there for good reason. Fine, but do you know how you get nice, polite cyclists like in Denmark or the Netherlands? You give them good infrastructure so it doesn't feel like they have to break the rules! If there were no pedestrian signals and no sidewalks, do you think pedestrians would be as well-behaved as they are today? > You act like being pedestrian friendly isn't a vital public good - I'd argue it is more important than being bike friendly, and if being bike friendly has a logical result in making it much more perilous for a pedestrian (and I'd fear for those with babies in baby carriages), one needs to consider that the current system does not work, and this problem needs to be solved either before or alongside the bike friendly problem. Again, you have it backwards: Most people on bikes will gladly stay off the sidewalk if there is equivalently safe-feeling infrastructure available. But a painted bike lane does not feel safe, not unless it's a traffic-calmed street. Making better bike lanes means fewer collisions between pedestrians and cyclists, not more.
TulliusCicero 11y ago
Your sentiment is perfectly understandable, but also wrong. Here's a comment from a Dutch guy about biking in the bay area that sums it up: > I think the expectations thing is a big problem, especially combined with bikers being (having to be) more obnoxious in the US. When I just arrived, I was shocked with how much all the bikers broke the rules (skipped lights, biked on the curbs etc.) and just were general assholes in traffic. Two weeks later I was one of them. Cyclists break the rules because the system doesn't care about them. Cyclists aren't second-class citizens (that would be pedestrians), they're more like third-class. At least pedestrian gets a lot of protected, separated infrastructure in the form of sidewalks; cyclists usually have to make do with a strip of paint on the road right next to cars that could kill them in an eye-blink. Or look at intersections: they're clearly designed to prioritize cars first, right? And then pedestrians are second, you can't turn left in one go like cars and there's no protection, but you at least have your own signalling. Intersections often ignore bikes completely, you basically have to wait until a car comes along, or awkwardly waddle over to the walk button. Looking at it another way: motorists go above the speed limit and through red lights constantly. Should we stop investing in freeways until 'they' start obeying the law? Of course not.
- hueving 11y ago
  >Your sentiment is perfectly understandable, but also wrong. What do you mean it's wrong? The poster said bikers were behaving like assholes, and you refute it with a quote saying a biker from Europe acted like an asshole here?
  - TulliusCicero 11y ago
    Sorry, I meant this specific part here, which felt like the conclusion: > I feel like this needs to change first before the area becomes bike friendly. He's got it backwards: you don't wait until cyclists behave well before you invest in good infrastructure. You invest in good infrastructure, which causes cyclists to start behaving well. The difference between the Dutch cyclists and American ones isn't that Americans are just all huge jerks in comparison, it's that only one of those two groups feels like they have to break the law to get around on bikes.
state 11y ago
I have been cycling since I was a kid — both in a silly spandex suit and as a commuter. I've commuted on a bike in cities around the US and in Europe. I hate to say it: but Bay Area commuter cyclists are without a doubt the worst. I'm more worried about another cyclist hitting me or doing something dangerous than I am about traffic most of the time. I recently had someone nearly hit me by passing me on the right without saying something. When I suggested that they should either pass on the left or call out "on your right" he yelled at me. Baffling.
dasil003 11y ago
I think part of the problem is that you have to have brass balls to bike in certain routes anyway, which leads to a higher distribution of assholes than you get in other groups. But after being a cycle commuter in the best (Minneapolis), worst (Albuquerque), and middle of the road (SF/Peninsula/East Bay) cities in America and then also London (which I guess is sort of middle of the road for Europe), I think the real problem is American urban planning and the entitlement of the American driver. Basically, average city streets in the US are like highways in Europe, they are wider, faster, and drivers don't give two shits about pedestrians, cyclists or anyone else (except in Berkeley, Berkeley is like a weird parallel universe of pedestrian etiquette); a disturbingly large proportion of otherwise decent Americans get behind the wheel and turn into Mr Hyde. Contrasting with London where congestion is every bit as bad, not only on the roads, but also the sidewalks, and you find a sort of emergent cooperative effort for everyone to pay attention to everyone else and attempt to make the least nuisance of themselves. This is necessary because often the sidewalks (pavements) are overcroweded and pedestrians spill into the streets, but the cars and the bicycles watch out for this. Similarly, cyclists will reach critical mass and sometimes block traffic, but then filter themselves down to single file to let cars go by. Lanes are much more fluid in general, with oncoming traffic making room for buses to pass each other by utilizing part of their lane. To sum it up, America lacks an attitude of public cooperation when it comes to transportation infrastructure and utilization. I suppose this is the cultural legacy of a century of being able to simply move west and be granted 160 acres of land to oneself.

by Bahamut 11y ago

erikpukinskis 11y ago

> I feel like this needs to change first before the area becomes bike friendly. As in people should stop work making the area bike friendly until the issue of dangerous driving of bikes is ended?

npsimons 11y ago

While I agree that cyclists should be better behaved, I feel that it may be an (over)reaction to hostility from drivers. There's a saying motorcyclists have: ride like they (the car drivers) can't see you. I like to extend that for cyclists as "ride like they can see you and they're trying to hit you." The sad truth is that America is bike hostile, and even apart from that, many who shouldn't be driving are still issued drivers licenses (one cyclist was killed by an old lady near where I live, but no one's going to tangle with the AARP, and most people thought she'd have lived had she been in a "safe" car).

fizx 11y ago

It would be nice if the Valley was more pedestrian friendly - all too often cars ignore the rules. One example is near the Palo Alto Caltrain station tunnel between Stanford and downtown Palo Alto, and too many times pedestrians come close to getting hit by their recklessness :( . [Eh, pick any time you've seen a car shoot through a crosswalk and narrowly miss pedestrians... I observe this at least weekly] It is frustrating how often drivers don't care about co-existing with the other modes of transportation & following the rules - I feel like this needs to change first before the area becomes car friendly.

TulliusCicero 11y ago
I love this comment because it illustrates perfectly the cognitive dissonance going on. People everywhere talk about how drivers in their area are like, so, so bad, but nobody ever suggests that we halt investing in car infrastructure until they get better. And that's a good thing: you don't stop investing in a vital public good just because it's sometimes abused. That applies to bikes as much as cars.
- Bahamut 11y ago
  I have far more problems with bikers in the area than cars - the close encounter rate is quite high, largely because a lot of bikers don't have good control over their bikes or because they don't care at all about pedestrians and are willing to run them over to force them out of the way. I'm quite amazed I haven't been hit by a biker yet to be honest, some even talking on their cellphones held in one hand while driving pedestrians running out of the way. I'd be more sympathetic towards bikers if they didn't decrease the quality of getting from one place to another for pedestrians & harass when they decided to not follow laws & rules there for good reason. You act like being pedestrian friendly isn't a vital public good - I'd argue it is more important than being bike friendly, and if being bike friendly has a logical result in making it much more perilous for a pedestrian (and I'd fear for those with babies in baby carriages), one needs to consider that the current system does not work, and this problem needs to be solved either before or alongside the bike friendly problem.
  - TulliusCicero 11y ago
    > I'd be more sympathetic towards bikers if they didn't decrease the quality of getting from one place to another for pedestrians & harass when they decided to not follow laws & rules there for good reason. Fine, but do you know how you get nice, polite cyclists like in Denmark or the Netherlands? You give them good infrastructure so it doesn't feel like they have to break the rules! If there were no pedestrian signals and no sidewalks, do you think pedestrians would be as well-behaved as they are today? > You act like being pedestrian friendly isn't a vital public good - I'd argue it is more important than being bike friendly, and if being bike friendly has a logical result in making it much more perilous for a pedestrian (and I'd fear for those with babies in baby carriages), one needs to consider that the current system does not work, and this problem needs to be solved either before or alongside the bike friendly problem. Again, you have it backwards: Most people on bikes will gladly stay off the sidewalk if there is equivalently safe-feeling infrastructure available. But a painted bike lane does not feel safe, not unless it's a traffic-calmed street. Making better bike lanes means fewer collisions between pedestrians and cyclists, not more.

TulliusCicero 11y ago

Your sentiment is perfectly understandable, but also wrong. Here's a comment from a Dutch guy about biking in the bay area that sums it up: > I think the expectations thing is a big problem, especially combined with bikers being (having to be) more obnoxious in the US. When I just arrived, I was shocked with how much all the bikers broke the rules (skipped lights, biked on the curbs etc.) and just were general assholes in traffic. Two weeks later I was one of them. Cyclists break the rules because the system doesn't care about them. Cyclists aren't second-class citizens (that would be pedestrians), they're more like third-class. At least pedestrian gets a lot of protected, separated infrastructure in the form of sidewalks; cyclists usually have to make do with a strip of paint on the road right next to cars that could kill them in an eye-blink. Or look at intersections: they're clearly designed to prioritize cars first, right? And then pedestrians are second, you can't turn left in one go like cars and there's no protection, but you at least have your own signalling. Intersections often ignore bikes completely, you basically have to wait until a car comes along, or awkwardly waddle over to the walk button. Looking at it another way: motorists go above the speed limit and through red lights constantly. Should we stop investing in freeways until 'they' start obeying the law? Of course not.

hueving 11y ago
>Your sentiment is perfectly understandable, but also wrong. What do you mean it's wrong? The poster said bikers were behaving like assholes, and you refute it with a quote saying a biker from Europe acted like an asshole here?
- TulliusCicero 11y ago
  Sorry, I meant this specific part here, which felt like the conclusion: > I feel like this needs to change first before the area becomes bike friendly. He's got it backwards: you don't wait until cyclists behave well before you invest in good infrastructure. You invest in good infrastructure, which causes cyclists to start behaving well. The difference between the Dutch cyclists and American ones isn't that Americans are just all huge jerks in comparison, it's that only one of those two groups feels like they have to break the law to get around on bikes.

state 11y ago

I have been cycling since I was a kid — both in a silly spandex suit and as a commuter. I've commuted on a bike in cities around the US and in Europe. I hate to say it: but Bay Area commuter cyclists are without a doubt the worst. I'm more worried about another cyclist hitting me or doing something dangerous than I am about traffic most of the time. I recently had someone nearly hit me by passing me on the right without saying something. When I suggested that they should either pass on the left or call out "on your right" he yelled at me. Baffling.

dasil003 11y ago

I think part of the problem is that you have to have brass balls to bike in certain routes anyway, which leads to a higher distribution of assholes than you get in other groups. But after being a cycle commuter in the best (Minneapolis), worst (Albuquerque), and middle of the road (SF/Peninsula/East Bay) cities in America and then also London (which I guess is sort of middle of the road for Europe), I think the real problem is American urban planning and the entitlement of the American driver. Basically, average city streets in the US are like highways in Europe, they are wider, faster, and drivers don't give two shits about pedestrians, cyclists or anyone else (except in Berkeley, Berkeley is like a weird parallel universe of pedestrian etiquette); a disturbingly large proportion of otherwise decent Americans get behind the wheel and turn into Mr Hyde. Contrasting with London where congestion is every bit as bad, not only on the roads, but also the sidewalks, and you find a sort of emergent cooperative effort for everyone to pay attention to everyone else and attempt to make the least nuisance of themselves. This is necessary because often the sidewalks (pavements) are overcroweded and pedestrians spill into the streets, but the cars and the bicycles watch out for this. Similarly, cyclists will reach critical mass and sometimes block traffic, but then filter themselves down to single file to let cars go by. Lanes are much more fluid in general, with oncoming traffic making room for buses to pass each other by utilizing part of their lane. To sum it up, America lacks an attitude of public cooperation when it comes to transportation infrastructure and utilization. I suppose this is the cultural legacy of a century of being able to simply move west and be granted 160 acres of land to oneself.