6 ms·

I think for last mile, the bike is a great solution, if the infrastructure would be there. Bike lanes separate from car roads etc.

• judge2020 6y ago
  It also seems like e-scooters would solve this given the proper infrastructure and planning, but those have other problems and that infrastructure wasn't there when the idea was done 2018/2019.
  • wdb 6y ago
    Yeah, it has to be safe to cycle (or scoot) and the infrastructure to exist but that's in my opinion not the case in American big cities.
    • judge2020 6y ago
      Maybe rented Segways would work better :)
  • opportune 6y ago
    This is actually what I do for most last-mile needs, but I use ride share when I need to travel 5+ miles one way quickly. Also, scooters and bikes just aren't safe at night or in rainy/windy weather.
• pvarangot 6y ago
  It's impossible to sustain most big cities with just bikes for the last mile problem. It's just not practical to do your last mile on the cold or the rain every single day if you have a coastal or a very cold winter. Whatever that thing is that's there for those days is probably very similar to ride sharing, or it's just very good public transportation so that it's the last block and not the last mile.
  • wdb 6y ago
    Plenty of people cycle to work or school no matter what the weather... A good raincoat helps
    • throwawayboise 6y ago
      Plenty of people live with dirt floors too. Doesn't mean they like it.
      • djhn 6y ago
        I'm tempted to say this is an attitude issue? Perhaps it's even an idea the car lobby wants to promote. There's nothing inherently bad about rainy, slushy or snowy weather. It's just water. Getting wet is not going to melt you.
        • throwawayboise 6y ago
          No it isn't going to hurt me, but given the option, I would prefer to arrive at work dry and/or not needing to shower and change clothes.
        • _carbyau_ 6y ago
          Water does complicate things and takes extra effort to deal with. A car sidesteps it with a big set of convenience. While convenience is king for the end consumer that's what will happen for most people.
          • bluGill 6y ago
            Not really: you still need to get from where you park the car to the front door of where you are going. That is a shorter distance, but you still need something to deal with weather.
        • asdff 6y ago
          If your feet get wet in most shoes, they are wet the entire day. It sucks. Investing in the correct rain gear you need takes money and time to research options, both are things that not everyone has to spare.
• AmericanChopper 6y ago
  Cities have spend billions on developing bike infrastructure, typically by removing roads, and the best they tend to manage is a low single digit improvements in % of commuters biking (if they get any improvement at all). It’s such an demonstrable failure of an idea that I struggle to believe that people can still suggest it with a straight face.
  • adrianN 6y ago
    Which city spent billions on developing bike infrastructure? In Berlin the share of trips done by bike increased by 40% between 2013 and 2018 and we certainly didn't spend billions on it. We did spend about a billion on building 3km of new Autobahn through the city, but that's a different story.
    • AmericanChopper 6y ago
      San Francisco alone has budgeted over a billion dollars for cycle lanes, and since 2013 has managed to decrease it’s % of cycling commuters from 3.8% to 3.1%. There are some cities in the world that have a high demand for cycling infrastructure, in those cities it makes sense to spend money on it. There are 0 cities in the world that have managed to build a cycling culture out of infrastructure spending. This “built it and they will come” idea has been so thoroughly debunked, you have to be drinking some rather strong coolaid to still have any faith in it. If you look at the numbers, it turns out that it’s better to spend infrastructure budget on things people actually want to use.
      • adrianN 6y ago
        A billion dollars over how many years? How much of that is already spent? When I was in SF two years ago I didn't see any cycling infra that could've cost a billion dollars. I think I only saw two cycle lanes. I certainly wouldn't feel safe to cycle there.