4 ms·

>You build bike infrastructure in the places where you want more of them, not the places where you have more of them. Or as we say in the active transportation

>You build bike infrastructure in the places where you want more of them, not the places where you have more of them. Or as we say in the active transportation advocacy business, they didn’t count swimmers to decide to build the Golden Gate Bridge. These sorts of statements are analogous to the median vs mean slight of hand (aka lying) that people routinely employ to intentionally mislead. At the very best it's "not the whole truth". To just build stuff and have it be used to a useful degree you need latent demand for transportation of all forms. These assumptions are generally questionably optimistic or untrue outside of urban areas (like real ones, not the census definition). A bike lane to a strip mall off the highway that has nothing else immediately around it does nobody any good. Slap up a bus stop. Even if the bus service is crappy it will still benefit somebody.

dang 3y ago
We've banned this account for continuing to break the site guidelines after many requests to stop. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
jeffbee 3y ago
First of all if you are going to say that my remark is "analogous" to a lie, and that I "intentionally" mislead people in the course of bicycle infrastructure advocacy, then my reply is that you are analogous to a guy who needs to intentionally fuck off. Where the hell do you get off saying something like that about me? Secondly, there is a massive latent demand for cycling infrastructure in highly populated places that are suitable for cycling. That there are other places unsuitable for cycling is irrelevant. Another thing we often say on this topic is there are no transportation solutions to land use problems. But in America even when the development pattern is reasonable the infrastructure for cycling still doesn't exist. The dangerous, unpleasant, and inconvenient scattered bike lanes that we have in most American cities are acceptable to < 1% of potential cyclists, which is why the bicycle mode share in most American cities is << 1%.
- dang 3y ago
  You broke the site guidelines badly here. I realized you were provoked, but users need to follow the rules regardless of what other commenters are doing. I'm not going to ban you right now because, after skimming through your recent history, it looks to me like you've been making a good-faith effort to stick to the rules, which I appreciate. But if you keep resorting to aggressive/abusive posting, we're eventually going to have to. We've cut you a ton of slack over the years, but it's not infinite! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34537078 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34537078 (Jan 2023) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33914274 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33914274 (Dec 2022) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33311881 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33311881 (Oct 2022) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30890360 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30890360 (April 2022) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26628758 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26628758 (March 2021) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26307811 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26307811 (March 2021) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25561372 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25561372 (Dec 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24724281 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24724281 (Oct 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24458954 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24458954 (Sept 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24380545 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24380545 (Sept 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23170477 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23170477 (May 2020)
- bluefirebrand 3y ago
  > Secondly, there is a massive latent demand for cycling infrastructure A claim like that needs some evidence. I don't believe you at all that many people are eager to get rid of more convenient transportation (cars) for less convenient (bikes) > The dangerous, unpleasant, and inconvenient scattered bike lanes that we have in most American cities are acceptable to < 1% of potential cyclists, which is why the bicycle mode share in most American cities is << 1% These numbers suggest that if we had perfect cycling infrastructure that netted 100% of potential cyclists, we would still be seeing actual "bicycle mode share" usage of about 1-2% of commuters? Seems like a poor use of infrastructure to me to cater to such a small demographic of cyclists.
  - 3y ago

dang 3y ago

We've banned this account for continuing to break the site guidelines after many requests to stop. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

jeffbee 3y ago

First of all if you are going to say that my remark is "analogous" to a lie, and that I "intentionally" mislead people in the course of bicycle infrastructure advocacy, then my reply is that you are analogous to a guy who needs to intentionally fuck off. Where the hell do you get off saying something like that about me? Secondly, there is a massive latent demand for cycling infrastructure in highly populated places that are suitable for cycling. That there are other places unsuitable for cycling is irrelevant. Another thing we often say on this topic is there are no transportation solutions to land use problems. But in America even when the development pattern is reasonable the infrastructure for cycling still doesn't exist. The dangerous, unpleasant, and inconvenient scattered bike lanes that we have in most American cities are acceptable to < 1% of potential cyclists, which is why the bicycle mode share in most American cities is << 1%.

dang 3y ago
You broke the site guidelines badly here. I realized you were provoked, but users need to follow the rules regardless of what other commenters are doing. I'm not going to ban you right now because, after skimming through your recent history, it looks to me like you've been making a good-faith effort to stick to the rules, which I appreciate. But if you keep resorting to aggressive/abusive posting, we're eventually going to have to. We've cut you a ton of slack over the years, but it's not infinite! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34537078 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34537078 (Jan 2023) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33914274 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33914274 (Dec 2022) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33311881 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33311881 (Oct 2022) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30890360 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30890360 (April 2022) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26628758 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26628758 (March 2021) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26307811 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26307811 (March 2021) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25561372 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25561372 (Dec 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24724281 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24724281 (Oct 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24458954 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24458954 (Sept 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24380545 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24380545 (Sept 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23170477 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23170477 (May 2020)
bluefirebrand 3y ago
> Secondly, there is a massive latent demand for cycling infrastructure A claim like that needs some evidence. I don't believe you at all that many people are eager to get rid of more convenient transportation (cars) for less convenient (bikes) > The dangerous, unpleasant, and inconvenient scattered bike lanes that we have in most American cities are acceptable to < 1% of potential cyclists, which is why the bicycle mode share in most American cities is << 1% These numbers suggest that if we had perfect cycling infrastructure that netted 100% of potential cyclists, we would still be seeing actual "bicycle mode share" usage of about 1-2% of commuters? Seems like a poor use of infrastructure to me to cater to such a small demographic of cyclists.
- 3y ago