The Observation Deck

Will….

For starters, the stats I have read indicate that about half of all car/bike crashes are caused by the cyclist. Second, I too would like to see adult bicyclists banned from sidewalks unless they are walking their bike. As for training, it seems contradictory that many parents send their child off to an “expert” to learn to swim, but Dad invariably teaches children how to ride a bike and most dads are ignorant about bike safety. I must admit, I’ve lost track of bike safety training options. There used to be Road 1 taught by LAB LCI’s (pretty simple), now there are “savvy cycling” classes, “effective cycling” classes, “traffic skills” classes and all that. I should try to sort it out because IMO it begins and ends with education. Not infrastructure. As for licensing, Lakewood requires bikes to be “licensed” but it is a very ineffective program that should be scrapped. Not one noteworthy goal is achieved by Lakewood’s licensing program, other than (because riding on an unlicensed bike is a primary offense) it permits Lakewood police to impound unlicensed bikes if they feel inclined. Will is your bike licensed?

Betsy….

I do have a little history with Lakewood’s bike ordinances. The OBF was able to convince Ohio legislators to pass modern bike legislation about six years ago that basically required municipalities to modernize their ordinances, which Lakewood did shortly thereafter (at my urging). And yes, bikes are required to ride as far right as “practicable” but there are numerous carveouts, one of which is that a bike can use the full lane if the lane width does not permit safe passing by motorists within the same lane. And there is not one street in Lakewood that fulfills that requirement. Franklin east of the high school might have if they had not put that silly stripe down to create a right “shoulder.” The upshot is that cyclists can ride down the middle of any Lakewood traffic lane, and should in many instances.

Ben….

Since you mention Los Angeles and New York City specifically….

As regards Los Angeles, I don’t know where you get your 2010 data from. Here’s what I found, all from 2011 and all from the Los Angeles DOT bike blog….

Click here: What are “Sharrows”?

“According the CA MUTCD, (sharrows) are meant to (1) Reduce the chance of bicyclists impacting open doors of parked vehicles on a shared roadway with on-street parallel parking, (2) alert road users within a narrow traveled way of the lateral location where bicyclists ride, (3) encourage safe passing of bicyclists by motorists, and (4) reduce the incidence of wrong-way bicycling.” (emphasis mine)

Also….

Click here: Sharrows are good. So let’s do them!

“The CA MUTCD requires that sharrows be placed at a minimum of 11 feet from the curb and must be present in conjunction with on-street parking, on a street with a posted speed limit not to exceed 35 mph. Sharrows must also be placed immediately following an intersection (in conjunction with parking) and should be spaced no more than 250 ft apart. The City of Los Angeles will be placing sharrows no less than 12 feet from the curb, per the recommendation of our sharrow study.” (emphasis mine)

Picture from the article (though the sharrows should be moved a foot or two to the left)….



And….

Click here: 20 miles of sharrows installed

“We are happy to report that this past weekend, LADOT work crews installed approximately 20 miles worth of (sharrows) on L.A. streets. All told, 797 sharrows were laid down, adding 20.61 miles of bicycle infrastructure to L.A. streets.

So what do sharrows do? According to the Bike Plan’s Technical Design Handbook (TDH), sharrows can be an effective tool for reminding bicyclists to ride further from parked cars to prevent incidents of “dooring”. Sharrows can also make motorists more aware as to the possible presence of bicyclists, and can help orient bicyclists in the correct direction of travel.

The fact is, Los Angeles favors sharrows where on-street parking is present. It looks to me like they won’t even consider dedicated lanes next to parked cars, but I have not dug into their information that deeply. My guess is that what they/you call “Class I” and “Class II” Los Angeles bike lanes are going in on the sort of major L.A. streets (like Wilshire Blvd.) that simply don’t exist in Lakewood. Streets like Chagrin Blvd. here in Northeast Ohio.

Lakewood is not Los Angeles. But if Madison were in Los Angeles, they would not put a dedicated bike lane on it. They would use sharrows. I think that’s pretty clear.

Now, as regards New York City….

You have to understand that most NYC segregated bike lanes were installed 10-12 years ago, before clearer heads prevailed. So today, you have the city saying one thing (having created that mess), but you have their cycling advocacy group, Bike New York, saying this….

Click here: Avoid the Door Zone

“Many NYC bike lanes, especially the older ones, are located in the ‘door zone’–that is, within 4-5 feet of parked cars. Riding that close to parked cars is dangerous, because it leaves you vulnerable to getting get ‘doored’ (hit by an opening car door). … Bike lanes that put cyclists in the door zone are unsafe.” (emphasis mine)

Also, from the NY Times….

Click here: On “Dooring” of Bicyclists…. (Oct. 2010)

“(Dooring has) always been a top complaint and, anecdotally, a major contributing factor to crashes in New York City,” he said. “If you talk to anyone who’s ridden a bike in New York, everyone has a story about, at best, narrowly avoiding a car door that’s been swung open in their path and bike riders quickly learn that one of the safest ways to ride is to (use the traffic lane), so they are not biking in the door zone.”

And finally….

Click here: DOT and TLC Unveil New Anti-Dooring Video and Decal (Sept. 2012)

“DOT noted that seven cyclists have been killed in dooring crashes in the past five years.”

Just imagine how many total doorings took place when seven resulted in death. Five hundred maybe? My guess is that if NYC had it to do over again they would not have installed door zone bike lanes back then. But instead of removing them, which is what they should do, NYC just launched a campaign featuring decals and a video (woo hoo!) to try to educate motorists to the harm than can befall a cyclist if motorists open their car door without first looking,

Honestly, I don’t know how much clearer it could be that bike lanes within parked car door zones are dangerous, and are these days largely discredited. Segregated bike lanes almost anywhere in Lakewood are a REALLY BAD IDEA, especially because of the near-ubiquitous presence of on-street parking (ex-Franklin). And such lanes on Detroit in Cleveland, their city officials will come to regret them, if they actually do get installed. There is way too much evidence and information these days that highlight their dangers. And this includes even novice cyclists who simply don’t understand the limitations of such lanes. That “false sense of security….”

By the way, some of the best cycling advocacy these days is being done by (believe it or not) Orlando (http://www.commuteorlando.com). Click here to see what they have to say about bike lanes in general.. I won’t cut and paste it here; I really encourage you to read it and to peruse their site.

One thing I also want to make clear is that I’m not even all that fond of sharrows, though they seem like a net positive as they help keep bikes out of door zones. All I am really saying is that if Lakewood wants to visibly “invite” bikes to ride on Madison, which is a laudable goal, sharrows are the best option I know of (even better if there are some “bikes may use full lane” signs). Plus of course what I am saying is that dedicated bike lanes on Madison would clearly be a disaster.

Thanks again for your time and attention….

I'm sure Tim and I could post opposing links for a while to come

But there is no real debate in the cycling and advocacy communities that real bicycle infrastructure (bike lanes, not shared used markings) is the best way to grow cycling and make it safer. If you want proof of this, just look at all the cities that have been ramping up bike lane implementation recently or just do some googling. New York, by the way, created 255 miles of new bike lanes in just the last 4 years, I linked to the report in an earlier post.

The anti-bicycle-infrastructure advocacy groups that were dominant in the US from the 70's to late 90's have faded and haven't been incorporated into new cycling advocacy due to the statistical evidence favoring lanes.

The city is behind, and we need to get started with some real infrastructure so that we don't get stuck status quo of sharrows or nothing. So I'll just post one more link.

http://www.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2012/10/dedicated-bike-lanes-can-cut-cycling-injuries-half/3654/

Dedicated Bike Lanes Can Cut Cycling Injuries in Half

A major city street with parked cars and no bike lanes is just about the most dangerous place you could ride a bike. All the big threats are there: open car doors, bad parallel parkers, passing cabs and public transit. This is not a particularly novel scientific revelation, although research has found it to be true. Things get more interesting when we compare this bad-biking baseline to infrastructure actually intended to accommodate cyclists.

continued at link...

Thanks very much,
Ben

My bike, and my wife's, are not licensed; they are retired, and laziness is the only reason I haven't given them away.

I agree Lakewood's licensing program is ineffective. I would favor a program that would parallel that for cars. The operator must demonstrate capability, and financial responsibility, to obtain an operators license. And the bike license would be large enough that people, and police, could read it in the event of misbehavior or an accident. Perhaps we could help the state and county's financial crisis with the fees attendant to such a program.

Thanks, Tim, no one has ever called me that.

To your point about Madison: Indeed, Madison has some characteristics that make it a relatively safe and comfortable urban biking street. So does Detroit. Both have slow-paced, neighborhood-oriented traffic that is not rushing to get downtown (like on Clifton or Lake, for example).

The relative safety of many of our streets is not a reason to fail to do something that will encourage more people to take advantage of the city's built-in bikability.

I believe the Planning Commission proudly promotes the goal of being “the most bike-friendly city in Ohio” by some date not too far in the future. Sharrows on Madison will certainly not accomplish that, and neither will they encourage much more ridership than the city / street already has.

I like sharrows just fine. But the city has an ambitious, worthy goal, and lanes do much more to advance that goal. I do not want to see Lakewood held back by a failure to be all it can be.

Despite what you and I acknowledge as relative safety and comfort of riding on Madison or Detroit (and a multitude of other streets) it is a minescule portion of society that routinely takes advantage of bicycles as transportation. If more people chose to do that, it would be good for them as individuals and good for the city (because of the assets we so commonly describe).

Sharrows don't have much impact on how many people ride their bikes.

Lanes do.

To your point about considering bike facilities in the broader context: The City has already considered bicycles in a citywide context. Indeed, the Planning Department did an excellent job gathering information about people's routes and destinations, and what they saw as trouble spots. This discussion about lanes is because some people believe that the resurfacing of Madison provides an affordable opportunity to do more than the modest proposal. There was no opportunity for advocacy during the planning sessions. Thanks to Ben's initiative, the issue has been raised again.

As for the “show and tell” helping me “understand things more clearly,” I appreciate the good will of your effort, but you should know that it is based on the faulty assumption that I do not understand the factors that play while riding in traffic, or somehow don't see this clearly.

To say that bike lanes cause accidents—whether in door zones or not—is every bit as fallacious as it would be to say that striping white lines on highways, or dividing off the right lane from the left for motor vehicles, causes accidents.

That assumes that because there is a white strip on the road, a person cannot divert from that path to avoid danger, but is somehow compelled to crash.

It assumes that the person--motorist or cyclist--dons an invisibility cloak when he or she gets in a lane.

It assumes that the person stops watching for road hazards, just because there's a dedicated lane.

Most people know from their driving experience that none of those assumptions are true. We drive in lanes, and we continue to be able to steer, continue to be aware of the cars around us, continue—for the most part—to behave responsibly. And even though cars drive in lanes, people can see them.

Bike lanes don't cause accidents. Motorists and bicyclists cause accidents.

Further, a bike lane left of parked cars does not significantly change the position of a cyclist with relation to the parked cars. Without the bike lane, a cyclist left of the parking lane –riding in the recommended path of the passenger-side wheel of a motor vehicle—is still in the door zone.

Likewise, a car driving in the vehicular lane left of a parking lane is driving in the parking lane's door zone.

If you fail to attend the prospect of an open door, it matters not whether the road has sharrows, or lanes, or no marks at all.

It's worth noting here that if you open the door of your parked car, and traffic in the lane next to you crashes into your open door, it is not the fault of the traffic. It's the fault of the person who threw open the door. That is true whether the accident involves a bike or a car, and a bike lane or a sharrow or no marking. Neither the passing motorist, nor the passing cyclist, nor the painted lane markings caused that accident. It is the fault of the person who failed to check before opening the door.

Having said that, cars can change lanes to avoid obstacles. They do it all the time, because cars are always driving in their dedicated lanes. Bikes –when they have dedicated lanes—can also change lanes to avoid hazards.

Lanes do not cause accidents. Whether for cars or bicycles, lanes painted on the road help organize traffic. For bicycles, they have the added benefit of encouraging more people to ride their bikes--which is the stated goal of the City.

I've already contributed my opinion here that bike lanes are not a good idea in the State of Ohio, where bikes on a non-freeway roadway have legal access to all of the road already.

Sharrows are simply a tangible way to help motorists to realize that fact.

But let's run with the dedicated bike lane idea for a moment...

If bike lanes were to be considered, a clearly marked off no-travel buffer zone for opening doors would be a must, in my opinion, but why stop there?

Golly gee whillikers, why not also have a dedicated lane for those senior citizen battery chairs and tricycles?

Then too, couldn't we add another lane for the urban roller-skaters? They pay taxes too.

You'd want to add another special lane for trucks, so that deliveries could proceed unimpeded.

Adding a dedicated bus lane would certainly help riders, and could be yet another oh-so-green contribution to urban life.

Gee, we could use Euclid Avenue as our jumping-off-point model.

But ours would be so much better.

Cars? Well, they're no problem. Just think of the Detroit-Superior bridge. Just put 'em on an overpass or an underpass, that's all.

Back to the banjo...

Ben VanLear wrote:But there is no real debate in the cycling and advocacy communities that real bicycle infrastructure (bike lanes, not shared used markings) is the best way to grow cycling and make it safer.

I agree, Ben.

In the day, I used to be an avid cyclist.

I have cycled throughout the United States.

Lakewood simply is not a bike friendly community. Sorry. It just is not.

Bike lanes - as isolated as possible - are the safest options, in my opinion.

Matt

While I have not taken the time to read all the posts in this thread I would like to add something I see at Spin.

Novice and Potential commuter cyclists that feel that riding on the sidewalk is the safest way to ride in the city. They do NOT and WILL NOT feel comfortable riding in the street unless they have what they perceive as a DEDICATED space. Sharrows will not satisfy their concerns to either begin or further their cycling experience.

The irony of this being the vast majority of the bicycle and automobile accident repair estimates we do, which is far too many, are due to the cyclist riding through the crosswalks from one sidewalk to the next. I have time and time again explained this yet without bike lanes these folks just will not trust riding in the street.

Brian Rybak wrote:While I have not taken the time to read all the posts in this thread I would like to add something I see at Spin.

Novice and Potential commuter cyclists that feel that riding on the sidewalk is the safest way to ride in the city. They do NOT and WILL NOT feel comfortable riding in the street unless they have what they perceive as a DEDICATED space. Sharrows will not satisfy their concerns to either begin or further their cycling experience.

The irony of this being the vast majority of the bicycle and automobile accident repair estimates we do, which is far too many, are due to the cyclist riding through the crosswalks from one sidewalk to the next. I have time and time again explained this yet without bike lanes these folks just will not trust riding in the street.

Brian, Ben, Tim, Michael (talk about biking heavyweights, whew!)

I want to thank you for the discussion, and I understand all of the points of views, and
can agree with many, even Gary's. They all have to be discussed, and vetted.

At the same time, if Sharrows build awareness and move the city towards SAFER biking,
why would we want to wait. $20,000 to do the city with Sharrows seems like a very small
price to take a large step towards a bike-ability city that is safe.

I have felt Ben's anxiety before. We must strike now while the fire is hot, we have a study
going, the city is... At the same time, I say take what you can when you can and keep the
pressure on the city for more.

I have watched this city through many administrations give lip service to skateboarders,
B-Ballers etc. Are we better off waiting ten years, the time between skateboard study and
ground breaking, and it only happening because of Vince Frantz, Ryan Demro and Mayor
Tom George, got tired of the BS. Or do you take your courts one at a time, ala LOBC?

If safer is the goal, paint the sharrows, continue work on the bike lanes.

But what do I know?

.

Jim O'Bryan wrote: $20,000 to do the city with Sharrows seems like a very small
price to take a large step towards a bike-ability city that is safe.

$20K is the cost of sharrows on Detroit from City Hall to The Y only.

I'm guessing the cost would approach $100K to "do the city" ... or at least the four major east-to-west thoroughfares: Edgewater, Lake, Detroit, Madison.

There seems to be a general consensus that the plan to repave Madison should result in something more than a new coat of asphalt.

Crocker Park, West Park, Gordon Square, Old Rocky River Road and other nearby areas managed to get millions in development dollars. For some reason Lakewood is left to fend for itself. Unless, of course, you count the the Counties homeless resettlement program or the efforts to relocate the Beck Center to Westlake but I don't think that counts.

Anyway, as I've said before, if the people of Lakewood don't have a vision for their City that doesn't mean there is no vision for the City; it's just that it might not be a vision that Lakewood residents will like.

I think before lanes are installed....there should be a class on how to ride a bike in the street and maybe teaching some of these people the laws. One more biker cut me off to turn in front of me and almost cause me to wreck is going to have a huge VW sign on his forehead when I hit him Just saying......

I'm not a cyclist (anymore), but I can only tell you what I've heard. My brother and his wife - who most of you know own Lakewood Hardware and Cuttin' Loose Salon, and the 2 buildings they're in - have had multiple issues with customers nearly run over, or cyclists nearly hit by cars exiting their parking lot. That's a big concern. It's also primarily kids on bikes.

On the other hand, my concern might be that as cyclists have a greater comfort level in the bike lane, will they thereby increase their speed? Could that increase the risk of accidents or incidents?

Just some random thoughts after my morning caffeine kicked in.