  E_hemingway Member Username: E_hemingway Post Number: 1862 Registered: 11-2004 |
Interesting read. The idea sounds like a good one, just look at Ann Arbor's success, but will we actually take action on this plan? Movement aims to make Detroit an easier city to walk and bike http://freep.com/article/20081 120/BUSINESS06/811200344 | ||
Detroitnerd Member Username: Detroitnerd Post Number: 3709 Registered: 07-2004 |
MDOT Road Crew Slaughtered in Hit-and-Runs DETROIT - An MDOT road crew painting a bike lane on a stretch of Mt. Elliot was run over repeatedly by motorists who apparently thought it was a motor vehicle lane. The crew, which was painting the new bike lane as part of normal road maintenance, was working at a sharp curve near Hamtramck Drive, when several motorists cruising down Mt. Elliot simply ran them down and kept going. One motorist, driving what onlookers identified as a green 1973 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme, stopped briefly to shout back at the mauled bodies, "Get out the ****in' road!" MDOT officials say the confusion may have resulted from inadequate efforts to educate Detroit residents about the new bike lane project. ... ** SATIRE ** SATIRE ** SATIRE ** | ||
Fishtoes2000 Member Username: Fishtoes2000 Post Number: 731 Registered: 06-2005 |
Not taking action on the plan is a big concern. It's part of my job with the Michigan Trails and Greenways Alliance to help push it along. The plans author, Giffels-Webster has also been a big advocate. | ||
Hunchentoot Member Username: Hunchentoot Post Number: 111 Registered: 03-2005 |
This reminds me of reading that the plan for Michigan Avenue involves stamped concrete designed to look like brick. I'm of the opinion that the brick is not only very durable but also is itself a traffic calming measure due to its bumpiness. Narrow Michigan -- keep the bricks. More trees are great but they must be formalized and intelligently planted. The current Michigan Avenue street trees are planted at irregular intervals, are too small, and are not well maintained. The result is that they provide little shade or protection from the street while being kind of an eyesore. I also have mixed feelings about bike lanes. A bicycle infrastructure is a good idea, but it's very easy to drive in bike lanes or open your car door into them after parking. Perhaps another curb to separate bike lanes from the sidewalk and road on the arterials should be considered. | ||
Retroit Member Username: Retroit Post Number: 489 Registered: 04-2008 |
I support the encouragement of bike use, but riding a bike on a busy street is DANGEROUS! | ||
Detroitnerd Member Username: Detroitnerd Post Number: 3716 Registered: 07-2004 |
They do need an education component. People do things differently in Detroit because they learn from experience. For instance, ever notice how people tend to pass on the right in Detroit? Even if it's a parking lane? Similarly, cyclists tend to ride AGAINST traffic, due to the popular misconception that you're in more danger of people running you down from behind than you are riding against traffic. (Or, maybe they have a point; maybe drivers are so bad they'll run you down; or maybe you get noticed better by people turning into the street.) Anyway, this bike lane thing sounds good, but I wonder a) will there be an educational component? and b) will cyclists now be ticketed for riding in the street where there are bike lanes? | ||
Bike4beer Member Username: Bike4beer Post Number: 47 Registered: 09-2008 |
Bicycling on any street is dangerous but i still do it. However there are roads that I do avoid. Generally if the posted speed limit gets up towards 45 I will find another route if the road is busy enough or there is not enough of a shoulder. I have been hit by a car while bicycling on a road with a posted limit of 25 with little traffic on it. It can happen at anytime. | ||
Professorscott Member Username: Professorscott Post Number: 1707 Registered: 12-2006 |
Cyclists are not required to ride in bike lanes. Think of it as an HOV lane kind of thing: if you have a car with four people in it, you don't have to use the HOV lane, but you can. But if you're in a SOV, you can't use the HOV lane. Same with bikes: you don't have to use a bike lane but you can, and cars can't. In fact, if you're riding in a bike lane and you want to make a left turn, you have to merge into traffic to do it. Bike lanes are just a way to encourage more people to bicycle, and they provide a perception of increased safety compared to riding on the street in traffic lanes. (I haven't read studies to know whether they actually improve safety or not; as a guess, I'd say they probably do.) Bicycling on the street is, in most places, the only reasonable option for a bicyclist. Sidewalk biking is much more dangerous than riding legally on the road. (Michigan communities are allowed to prohibit sidewalk bicycling, but few have done so.) Bicyclists on the road are supposed to obey the same traffic laws that apply to other road users, and ignore them at their peril. "Bike paths" are great, but few and far between, and sometimes badly botched like the proliferation of "sidewalk-bikepaths" in Rochester Hills. Calling an asphalt sidewalk a "bike path" doesn't make it a good bicycling facility. The biggest problem is nobody in Michigan seems to know the right way to implement bicycle facilities, though it's well documented. | ||
Retroit Member Username: Retroit Post Number: 492 Registered: 04-2008 |
quote: "Sidewalk biking is much more dangerous than riding legally on the road." Please explain. | ||
Professorscott Member Username: Professorscott Post Number: 1708 Registered: 12-2006 |
No explanation; it's statistics. There have been numerous studies on this, and there is absolutely no disagreement on this among nonmotorized transportation experts. Here's a sample: "Bicyclists who habitually ride on the sidewalk and across crosswalks are more at risk than those who ride on adjacent roadways. A 1994 study in California compared the accident rate per mile of sidewalk riding compared to the accident rate for road riding (on the same roads) and found that the rate for sidewalk accidents was 1.8 times greater (Wachtel and Lewiston 1994)." I could go on and on with such snippets, but that one is typical and they all reach precisely the same result. | ||
Detroitnerd Member Username: Detroitnerd Post Number: 3720 Registered: 07-2004 |
I think the main thing about sidewalk bicycling is using crosswalks! Drivers never look to see what's coming on the crosswalk. That's where you really get creamed. :P | ||
Choquant Member Username: Choquant Post Number: 14 Registered: 09-2007 |
It's more dangerous because people that are turning into driveways or onto other streets are probably not even looking for pedestrians, let alone fast moving bicycles. When I lived in Ann Arbor, I was very cautious when driving because I knew and could see bikers on the road. However, as careful as I was, I nearly hit someone riding on the sidewalk while turning left one time, because they were going probably 15 mph and I was only looking for people AT THE CORNER ready to cross. He came zooming up and rolled through the intersection and nearly got creamed by me. I felt bad, of course, but he was really stupid. It is undeniably more dangerous to cycle on the sidewalk so if you're going to do it, at least slow down when you come to intersections or busy driveways. I myself ride in the road whenever possible, 'cause fuck the honking horns, I have a right to be there and at least they see me. | ||
Fishtoes2000 Member Username: Fishtoes2000 Post Number: 732 Registered: 06-2005 |
Major studies have found biking on the sidewalk to be significantly more dangerous compared with biking on the road. I went through Royal Oak's bike crash police reports for 2007. Nearly all of the 30 crashes occurred on sidewalks and crosswalks. (It's actually against the law to ride a bike on Royal Oak sidewalks.) I saw the same results for Troy's 20 bicycle crashes in 2007. | ||
Retroit Member Username: Retroit Post Number: 496 Registered: 04-2008 |
The studies may prove me wrong, but common sense tells me that the further away from cars I am, the less chance I have of being hit. I'll stick to the sidewalks. | ||
Detroitnerd Member Username: Detroitnerd Post Number: 3722 Registered: 07-2004 |
You may end up literally "stuck" to the sidewalks. :P | ||
Bearinabox Member Username: Bearinabox Post Number: 1042 Registered: 04-2006 |
quote:Wait, Troy has sidewalks? | ||
Englishkills Member Username: Englishkills Post Number: 21 Registered: 10-2008 |
All of this is great news for Detroit. Slowly but surely moving into the 21st century as far as alternative modes of transportation. An interesting article from the Times published yesterday on the bike culture: http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes. com/2008/11/19/study-finds-cyc lists-disobey-traffic-laws/?sc p=1&sq=bikes%20hunter&st=cse The article's photo shows a delivery guy on a bike riding the wrong way down a one-way. Coincidentally, I'd say 75 percent of the cyclists I see in New York who disobey traffic laws are delivery guys like the one in the photo. A few unsafe cyclists give the rest of us a bad name. Education is important as far as cycling etiquette is concerned. | ||
Johnlodge Member Username: Johnlodge Post Number: 9210 Registered: 10-2003 |
quote: They're probably those sidewalks where the city insisted some developer put one in, but every adjacent property was built before that code, so there are patches of sidewalks here and there that just end into grass.  | ||
Otter Member Username: Otter Post Number: 393 Registered: 12-2007 |
"I support the encouragement of bike use, but riding a bike on a busy street is DANGEROUS!" Along the same lines, driving a car on a busy street is DANGEROUS! (to borrow the OP's style). You cannot control others (of course) but you can control how _you_ ride. A bicycle is sort of like a slow motorcycle. Pay attention like you were riding a motorcycle, not a car. I ride about 3500 miles/year, virtually all of it on busy city streets. "The studies may prove me wrong, but common sense tells me that the further away from cars I am, the less chance I have of being hit. " This limits you to riding in circles around the block, doesn't it? The places of greatest danger are those where your path _must_ cross or share cars'....like the crosswalks previously mentioned. The biggest factor, historically, in increasing the safety of cyclists on roads is increasing the number of cyclists on the roads. | ||
Fishtoes2000 Member Username: Fishtoes2000 Post Number: 733 Registered: 06-2005 |
quote: That's more of a European design though it is starting to be used in places like New York and Portland. Here's a recent story about Portland's. Is that what you're referring to? http://bikeportland.org/2008/1 1/20/portlands-first-cycle-tra ck-proposed-cully/ Two drawbacks are they cost much more to build and they cost more to maintain. As for maintenance, physically separated lanes are tougher to sweep and snowplow. If you had many more cyclists using them (as in Europe) I think they would be easier to justify the added costs. | ||
Melocoton Member Username: Melocoton Post Number: 56 Registered: 01-2008 |
Another reason riding on a sidewalk is dangerous is because sidewalks are narrow and often full of people, WALKING. If you ride on the sidewalk, you're likely to hit pedestrians. | ||
Mwilbert Member Username: Mwilbert Post Number: 446 Registered: 11-2007 |
There is lots of cruft on sidewalks, but the main problem as people have mentioned is the problem that drivers aren't expecting something moving that fast in that location. And it isn't good for pedestrians. Safety on a bicycle comes from being where drivers will see you and doing what they expect you to do. Bike lanes are fine as long as they don't require you to do things (particularly at intersections) that are unexpected. | ||
Lmichigan Member Username: Lmichigan Post Number: 6434 Registered: 10-2003 |
Sidewalks vs streets present different dangers. My question is which of the two paths present more fatalities? You may get hit more riding across driveways and such, but what are the difference in injury? It reminds me of the argument about how diving is so much more dangerous than flying, which is true, except that if you're in a plane accident your chances of dying are raised exponentially. I'm really not trying to encourage anyone to ride their bikes of busy sidewalks, but I think it's also a bit disingenous to oversimplify the types of dangers. | ||
Novine Member Username: Novine Post Number: 866 Registered: 07-2007 |
There's even bike lanes in Novi. If you can find them in Novi, no one has an excuse for not building them. | ||
Otter Member Username: Otter Post Number: 396 Registered: 12-2007 |
Cyclists on sidewalks are a danger to pedestrians. Sidewalks are for pedestrians. | ||
Detroitnerd Member Username: Detroitnerd Post Number: 3736 Registered: 07-2004 |
It's weird, but when you go up against PERCEPTIONS of safety, you can keep firing off statistics, but it's a very hard sell. Most people don't realize they're statistically in more danger of harm driving to the grocery store than driving through the worst ghetto ("Lock the doors, honey!"). Similarly, you tell people it's more dangerous to bike on the sidewalk and they're resistant. Why? Because they're conditioned from Day One that, like Mom always said, "Stay on the sidewalk. You can't bike in the street until you're older." Trust the numbers. Biking on a sidewalk, you're MUCH more likely to be injured. And, as others have said, leave the sidewalks for the pedestrians. | ||
Detroitplanner Member Username: Detroitplanner Post Number: 2021 Registered: 04-2006 |
For those of you who think riding a bike on a busy street is dangerous SEMCOG has produced maps that provide a plethora of information for the bicyclist. http://www.semcog.org/Walkable BikeableCommunities_Additional Materials.aspx |
