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Daily bike commuter here. It's not a technological breakthrough that I'm waiting for. We really need infrastructure to catch up to bicycles. It's still very da

Daily bike commuter here. It's not a technological breakthrough that I'm waiting for. We really need infrastructure to catch up to bicycles. It's still very dangerous to bike in Silicon Valley. Cars are generally bike-hostile and sharing the roads with them is dangerous. Not only that, but bike lanes are often just a symbol painted on the road. We need infrastructure that separates bikers from the cars. Also, people just simply need to stop driving so dangerously.

kmonsen 10y ago
Yeah, I feel the same. Also commutes get a lot longer due to the infrastructure not being there and bikes being second class citizens. I try to commute by bike, but it feels longer and scarier than it should.
r00fus 10y ago
To build on your point, though not as bad in SFBay as elsewhere - there are neighborhoods that are only car-friendly, and don't have accessible walk/bike paths between buildings/houses that would make it efficient to bike. The entire basis of city planning in the US has been based on cars for the last 60+ years. I don't see that changing anytime soon, unfortunately. Cars are also designed (except for hybrids and maybe some electrics) to have jackrabbit-starts which make it intolerable at high speeds. You don't realize this until you drive a hybrid or electric, but it affects your attitude towards not only other cars but bikes and pedestrians as well. SUVs have specific problems with their high center of gravity and visibility. I used to joke to my friends that, while renting an SUV for a week, I got flipped off about 3 times. Never happened with other rentals or my daily.
andy_ppp 10y ago
In London they have built some amazing cycle super highways which are great to cycle on, however you can go incredibly fast and some people do - I've seen three ambulances in a week along there (Embankment) recently scraping up people off the road. It's safer than being with cars and lorries but pedestrians seem to not look and walk into the cycle lane because bikes are pretty silent... anyway I do agree with cycle lanes but maybe we need to think through pedestrians and speed as well...
- tarpherder 10y ago
  Pedestrians need to learn to expect bikes on those lanes. I don't know what they look like but they should stand out as bicycle lanes to anyone on the road. Also, cyclists should be careful just like regular drivers and adjust their speed to their environment. If you were raised in The Netherlands you would know very well to check for both cars and bicycles when crossing anything.
  - andy_ppp 10y ago
    The pedestrians along Embankment in London are usually tourists so it's difficult to train them :-D I think the signage needs to be better - or I would rather the curb on the pedestrians was raised to make them think a bit.
    - ebalit 10y ago
      The best bicycle lanes I've seen are painted in green with bicycle symbols here and there. I would think it's pretty universal. I don't know how costly this solution is though.
  - BerislavLopac 10y ago
    > I don't know what they look like Ideally like http://s3.amazonaws.com/lcc_production_bucket/files/8920/in_content.jpg http://s3.amazonaws.com/lcc_production_bucket/files/8920/in_... but in many places they're more like http://ichef-1.bbci.co.uk/news/304/media/images/48375000/jpg/_48375932_img_1553.jpg http://ichef-1.bbci.co.uk/news/304/media/images/48375000/jpg...
    - andy_ppp 10y ago
      Just for posterity it looks like this: http://lcc.org.uk/articles/campaign-success-cycle-superhighway-begins-to-take-shape-on-the-embankment http://lcc.org.uk/articles/campaign-success-cycle-superhighw...
    - tarpherder 10y ago
      The first is pretty good I'd say. That second shot shows nicely why that particular solution doesn't work; cyclists take to the sidewalk as the road is too crowded and dangerous.
tzs 10y ago
> It's still very dangerous to bike in Silicon Valley. How much does this depend on where you are in SV? When I lived and worked in Cupertino, for instance, my job was in a small office park on De Anza near Bollinger. My apartment was near Homestead and Stelling. The layout of Cupertino was basically mostly residential neighborhoods on roughly a grid, with islands of office parks and strip malls, except for a few main streets like De Anza and Stevens Creek that had mostly businesses. It was pretty easy to bike in such a way as to have most of the trip be on the residential streets, which were generally pretty low traffic, and since things were mostly on a grid that didn't add distance. That was 25 years ago, but looking at aerial/satellite maps of today's Cupertino, it looks like it is still basically the same.

kmonsen 10y ago

Yeah, I feel the same. Also commutes get a lot longer due to the infrastructure not being there and bikes being second class citizens. I try to commute by bike, but it feels longer and scarier than it should.

r00fus 10y ago

To build on your point, though not as bad in SFBay as elsewhere - there are neighborhoods that are only car-friendly, and don't have accessible walk/bike paths between buildings/houses that would make it efficient to bike. The entire basis of city planning in the US has been based on cars for the last 60+ years. I don't see that changing anytime soon, unfortunately. Cars are also designed (except for hybrids and maybe some electrics) to have jackrabbit-starts which make it intolerable at high speeds. You don't realize this until you drive a hybrid or electric, but it affects your attitude towards not only other cars but bikes and pedestrians as well. SUVs have specific problems with their high center of gravity and visibility. I used to joke to my friends that, while renting an SUV for a week, I got flipped off about 3 times. Never happened with other rentals or my daily.

andy_ppp 10y ago

In London they have built some amazing cycle super highways which are great to cycle on, however you can go incredibly fast and some people do - I've seen three ambulances in a week along there (Embankment) recently scraping up people off the road. It's safer than being with cars and lorries but pedestrians seem to not look and walk into the cycle lane because bikes are pretty silent... anyway I do agree with cycle lanes but maybe we need to think through pedestrians and speed as well...

tarpherder 10y ago
Pedestrians need to learn to expect bikes on those lanes. I don't know what they look like but they should stand out as bicycle lanes to anyone on the road. Also, cyclists should be careful just like regular drivers and adjust their speed to their environment. If you were raised in The Netherlands you would know very well to check for both cars and bicycles when crossing anything.
- andy_ppp 10y ago
  The pedestrians along Embankment in London are usually tourists so it's difficult to train them :-D I think the signage needs to be better - or I would rather the curb on the pedestrians was raised to make them think a bit.
  - ebalit 10y ago
    The best bicycle lanes I've seen are painted in green with bicycle symbols here and there. I would think it's pretty universal. I don't know how costly this solution is though.
- BerislavLopac 10y ago
  > I don't know what they look like Ideally like http://s3.amazonaws.com/lcc_production_bucket/files/8920/in_content.jpg http://s3.amazonaws.com/lcc_production_bucket/files/8920/in_... but in many places they're more like http://ichef-1.bbci.co.uk/news/304/media/images/48375000/jpg/_48375932_img_1553.jpg http://ichef-1.bbci.co.uk/news/304/media/images/48375000/jpg...
  - andy_ppp 10y ago
    Just for posterity it looks like this: http://lcc.org.uk/articles/campaign-success-cycle-superhighway-begins-to-take-shape-on-the-embankment http://lcc.org.uk/articles/campaign-success-cycle-superhighw...
  - tarpherder 10y ago
    The first is pretty good I'd say. That second shot shows nicely why that particular solution doesn't work; cyclists take to the sidewalk as the road is too crowded and dangerous.

tzs 10y ago

> It's still very dangerous to bike in Silicon Valley. How much does this depend on where you are in SV? When I lived and worked in Cupertino, for instance, my job was in a small office park on De Anza near Bollinger. My apartment was near Homestead and Stelling. The layout of Cupertino was basically mostly residential neighborhoods on roughly a grid, with islands of office parks and strip malls, except for a few main streets like De Anza and Stevens Creek that had mostly businesses. It was pretty easy to bike in such a way as to have most of the trip be on the residential streets, which were generally pretty low traffic, and since things were mostly on a grid that didn't add distance. That was 25 years ago, but looking at aerial/satellite maps of today's Cupertino, it looks like it is still basically the same.