Are we tackling cycle lanes wrong?

ColdAsIce

ColdAsIce

ColdAsIce

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Almost finished my holiday to Poland. I’ve been to 3 major cities so far plus a smaller town where my gf is from.

cycle lanes are part of the pavement network. Bikes are not on the roads. Warsaw and Wrocław the whole city is pretty much a full cycle lane network for bikes/e-scooters etc.

It just works. You don’t have drivers interacting with cyclists and pedestrians are separated also.

I feel the installation of cycle lanes in the UK are disruptive and dangerous to the road network.

Thoughts?
 
Problem is a lot of legacy issues in this country but yeah the cycling infrastructure in this country for the most part is useless if not dangerous. Unfortunately the huge challenges and lack of willingness to tackle them likely mean nothing will be done.
 
I generally feel like cycling lanes painted onto roads are a waste of time and more dangerous than without the markings.

I personally don't mind cycling on the road with other traffic but would certainly use a well segregated lane. However as stated above, it's just not particularly viable in a lot of places.
 
The first thing that should be done is to make drivers automatically at fault if there's an accident involving a vulnerable road user. Most drivers are absolutely fine of course but I can't go for a lazy bike ride at 7am on a sunday morning in the countryside without a good chance someone is going to try to end my life. It's insane.
 
Nutty_Death said:
I personally don't mind cycling on the road with other traffic
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Might change your mind if you were cycling my commute route regularly!

Uhtred said:
The first thing that should be done is to make drivers automatically at fault if there's an accident involving a vulnerable road user. Most drivers are absolutely fine of course but I can't go for a lazy bike ride at 7am in the morning in the countryside without a good chance someone is going to try to end my life. It's insane.
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The latest set of highway code changes have leaned towards that way and it is actually making the situation worse not safer.
 
Square into round hole. Cities are just so crammed in and lack of bypasses or roads around cities or towns i feel this is the issue. Motorists will increase as will cyclists. We already need wider motorways and many A roads needing to become dual double carriageways.

I can only guess long term if driving everywhere and lack of exercise became less ingrained into society we'd get some big investment into public transport. Even taking a bike on the train is a nuisance with no guarantee there's space for another bike.

Going to many other country's capitals is an eye opener for sure.

A quick lazy solution idea could be bikes are allowed on the pavement, but with speed limits. But who would police, and with people on their phones walking down the street it also creates more issues.
 
our infrastructure constantly takes you on and off the road which is obviously more dangerous than just staying on the road, also the sides of our roads are generally full of massive potholes or grates that aren't even flush with the road surface...
 
The_Arbiter said:
A quick lazy solution idea could be bikes are allowed on the pavement, but with speed limits. But who would police, and with people on their phones walking down the street it also creates more issues.
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What it needs is a big scale, radical, approach - but the amount of land owners, etc. that would impact would be a huge problem. IMO we should be investing in a light weight, not just cycle, alternative to roads - a lot of journeys could be done in a more efficient vehicle sitting somewhere between car and bicycle - maybe not quite Sinclair C5 but as an illustration of the point.
 
Rroff said:
What it needs is a big scale, radical, approach - but the amount of land owners, etc. that would impact would be a huge problem. IMO we should be investing in a light weight, not just cycle, alternative to roads - a lot of journeys could be done in a more efficient vehicle sitting somewhere between car and bicycle - maybe not quite Sinclair C5 but as an illustration of the point.
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Electric mopeds that do 50mph are ~£3k. Even less for ones that cap out at 40mph. They're a bargain imo.
 
Nutty_Death said:
I generally feel like cycling lanes painted onto roads are a waste of time and more dangerous than without the markings.
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better than when it's a shared path but the signs are so small peds won't even notice
bWQl5Fy.jpg and there's no separation lines on the pavement either.


thats the level of inteligence that goes into planning our cycling infrastructure, it's almost like they are meeting some qouta so just install a stamp sized sign
 
Rroff said:
What it needs is a big scale, radical, approach - but the amount of land owners, etc. that would impact would be a huge problem. IMO we should be investing in a light weight, not just cycle, alternative to roads - a lot of journeys could be done in a more efficient vehicle sitting somewhere between car and bicycle - maybe not quite Sinclair C5 but as an illustration of the point.
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Agreed 100%. The rules on electric vehicles are still too prohibitive imo. I think a lot more people would use electric bikes if they were twist and go for example, and didn’t require full licensing and insurance etc.

We should be looking to translation as many loca journeys on to small electric vehicles as possible. Leaving main arteries free for drivers who need it. Lorries, tradesmen etc.
 
arknor said:
better than when it's a shared path but the signs are so small peds won't even notice
bWQl5Fy.jpg and there's no separation lines on the pavement either.


thats the level of inteligence that goes into planning our cycling infrastructure, it's almost like they are meeting some qouta so just install a stamp sized sign
Click to expand...

Ultimately these schemes, rules, etc. need to be intuitive and fit well with the natural order of things - a lot of these highway code changes and schemes, etc. of late have increasingly gone against how people tend to think, involve taking on non-trivial through to complex information relevant only to that specific instance, etc. etc. people can argue whatever they like but ultimately it does not work (at least not without some kind of authoritarian approach to enforcing it on people).
 
ColdAsIce said:
Almost finished my holiday to Poland. I’ve been to 3 major cities so far plus a smaller town where my gf is from.

cycle lanes are part of the pavement network. Bikes are not on the roads. Warsaw and Wrocław the whole city is pretty much a full cycle lane network for bikes/e-scooters etc.

It just works. You don’t have drivers interacting with cyclists and pedestrians are separated also.

I feel the installation of cycle lanes in the UK are disruptive and dangerous to the road network.

Thoughts?
Click to expand...
Yeah they're being shoved in where they shouldn't be.


The bridge into chester now has a pavement and cycle lane each side of the road but because it was just a narrow old bridge in the first place this means the lanes are not wide enough for a car.

So the cars have to drive half in the cycle lane....
 
Tefal said:
Yeah they're being shoved in where they shouldn't be.


The bridge into chester now has a pavement and cycle lane each side of the road but because it was just a narrow old bridge in the first place this means the lanes are not wide enough for a car.

So the cars have to drive half in the cycle lane....
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Chester has been squeezing cars out for at least 45 years and now they wonder why the city centre is dying.
 
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