Dual-Direction Bike Lanes

"Steve McDonald" wrote

Quoted message said:

<snip long rant about badly designed bike lanes>

... I suspect that

Quoted message said:

those riders who express a preference for on-street lanes, rather than separate bikepaths, must
belong to a different species than I.

Steve McDonald

I think most of us are expressing a preference for *well designed* on street bike lanes, not the
death traps you described. There are several wrong way bike lanes in my area, I ignore them and
travel on the roadway. Fortunately the law in my state lets cyclists use the roadway whether or not
a bicycle lane is present.

Steve McDonald said:

A few people have mentioned the dangers of bike lanes that go opposite directions and are on
each side of streets that are one-way for motor traffic. About a dozen years ago, some
geniuses with the city and university in Eugene installed such a setup, that seems like a
shooting gallery, with bikers being the ducks. It's 5 blocks long and the motor lane is very
narrow and heavily traveled. It's a crazy experience to ride the lane that has cars coming
the other way, just a few feet to your left. Unlike same-direction drivers, those coming at
you headon, have a greatly reduced time to see you and react properly. The worst part is that
there's 4 street entries in this stretch, where cars cross in front of bikers. Since the
motor traffic is one-way, many drivers think to look only to the right before they cross and
ignore the possibility that a biker may be coming from their left.

A cyclist would have to be nuts to ride against traffic -- bike lane or no. Do not use this lane.
Bike lanes under the best of circumstances are of marginal use (beyond awareness issues), and most
of them end at intersections, or route car right turn lanes right through the bikes, which is worse
than useless. But this is legislative murder.

There has to be an alternate route going the way you can't use on this path (since the motorway is
one-way). Use that.

--

David L. Johnson

__o | Some people used to claim that, if enough monkeys sat in front _`\(,_ | of enough
typewriters and typed long enough, eventually one of (_)/ (_) | them would reproduce the
collected works of Shakespeare. The internet has proven this not to be the case.

[email hidden] (Steve McDonald) wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

How many such bicycle traps exist in other cities and how do they come into existence?

There's one several miles long on West Lake Sammamish Parkway here in Bellevue, (WA USA). There is a
steep slope alongside the lake. The Parkway was originally a state route, and the state did not want
to pay for the costs of a bike lane on both sides of the street when it was built.

If you go here: google.comgroupsOpen ↗
oe=UTF-8&output=gplain (or tinyurl.comn6hqOpen ↗) you'll see my article I posted about the
political issues involved in changing this situation.

To call these "dual-direction bike lanes" is a misnomer. They are single direction bike lanes,
and they run in the direction with the rest of traffic only. Anyone who uses them to ride
against traffic endangers him/herself, and all others (cyclists, pedestrians, and motorists) who
make up traffic.

Warm Regards,

Claire Petersky ([email hidden]) Home of the meditative cyclist:
home.earthlink.netWelcome.htmOpen ↗ Singing with you at: tiferet.nettiferet.netOpen ↗ Books
just wanna be FREE! See what I mean at: bookcrossing.comCpeterskyOpen ↗

Quoted message said:

How many such bicycle traps exist in other cities and how do they come into existence? How
many bikers would have to die on them, before they would be changed? I no longer use this
reverse-direction lane, even though I have to make a detour up a hill and ride on sidewalks
to safely avoid it. It's also at one end of a

There's a wrong way trap where I live too. Its a path not a lane (separated from the roadway by a
few feet, which makes the cyclists even more invisible) The worst part is they've installed bicycle
signals at the intersections as well. Bike light going on the wrong side of the road (left) is
green at the same time the auto light is green, so someone could easily make a left turn without
checking for someone coming up the wrong way off the bicycle path and the light makes it appear
safe to do so.

I don't know if its the existence of wrong way lanes or what, but I find that there seems to be a
significant number of cyclists that figure if its a bike lane at all they can travel whichever way
they want in it.

Tanya Quinn said:

There's a wrong way trap where I live too. Its a path not a lane (separated from the roadway by a
few feet, which makes the cyclists even more invisible) The worst part is they've installed bicycle
signals at the intersections as well.------

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Most separate bicycle paths are intended for two-way traffic. It's onstreet bike lanes going
against one-way motor traffic flow, that I was describing. However, the situation you mention,
where a separate path goes through light-controled street intersections, can be dangerous. We
have a bikepath that goes down the center median between a 4-lane parkway. When a bike rider
goes through one of many intersections, the wait/walk signal for pedestrians is used and no
motor traffic can make turns when the walk light is lit. This solves the safety problem, if
drivers obey the lights.

When both bicycles and turning cars have a green light together, as on your path, this makes
things very hairy. I'd talk to the agency in your city that manages traffic lights and tell
them of the danger this causes for riders. They might respond by shifting to a green light
phase for the bikepath that is separate from that for the motor traffic lanes (wishful
thinking??).

Steve McDonald