Former road cyclist chiming in. I've been a regular bicycle commuter for over 10 years. Earlier this year I was hit by a motorist who demonstrated extreme lack

Former road cyclist chiming in. I've been a regular bicycle commuter for over 10 years. Earlier this year I was hit by a motorist who demonstrated extreme lack of judgement when passing me earlier this year, leading to some injuries that will probably mostly heal in another year or so. I seriously dodged a bullet and recognize how lucky I've been doing what I was doing. In short, my platform now is that meatbag-controlled multi-ton steel boxes hurling along at up to 60mph and meatbags sitting on top of some tubes stuck together don't belong on the same infrastructure. It will never work. I am categorically opposed to bike lanes delimited only by some paint on the ground. If it is physically possible for a motor vehicle to occupy a space designated for a bicycle, it isn't safe. It won't work. The marginal increase in bicyclist safety isn't nearly enough. Any lobbying to try to build that type of bicycle infrastructure out is a distraction from what actually needs to be lobbied for. By consenting to bike lanes, the government has an "out." They can say that they are "doing something" for bicyclists, so it's a fair deal, and their job is done. In reality, it isn't anywhere close to fair, and the job isn't anywhere close to done. Until bicycle tracks completely separated from vehicular traffic are ubiquitous across all major metropolitan areas of the United States, the country won't be able to begin to claw its way out of its self-inflicted transportation apocalypse. Anybody who attempts to commute by car during rush hour in a major United States metropolitan area knows what I'm talking about. Millions are wasting away years of human life and productivity stuck in their cars in stop-and-go traffic every single day. There needs to be a will to spend billions, not millions, on infrastructure only for pedestrians and bicyclists. Something on the scale of the the Federal Aid Highway Acts of 1921 and 1956 needs to happen today, in 2019. Congress needs to authorize federal funds to create something on the magnitude of 50,000 miles of paved separate cycle/pedestrian tracks. There needs to be a National Urban Mobility Trust Fund with a $100 billion infusion, for starters. I for one will demand nothing less, and I won't ever stop demanding it. We need to stop messing around with these in-the-trenches, one-city-council-at-a-time battles that bicyclist clubs are trying to fight to eek out their pathetic and ineffective lines of paint on the road.