Re:Roads with protected bike lanes make both cycling and dri...
by ben7799 on Monday June 03, 2019 @04:43PM
(#20088470)
There isn't much correlation between what is posted on signs and what is safe and what is legal.
We see all kinds of insanity in what gets painted on the road.
The option to take the lane is always there and it always works.
If you always follow what is posted some of the time you will be doing something incredibly dangerous.
There's an intersection I go through very regularly on both car & bike (10-20x per week) on my way to work. If you are following the bike lane it actually makes you ride up to teh right onto a highway overpass ramp and then cross the highway overpass ramp and come back down it (wrong way) to get back to the path. If you're riding in the lane you just go straight through the intersection like a car. Which one of these do you think surprises the cars more and sets up more conflict?
And sure you might be in front of cars trying to turn right, but the right on red turn being blocked happens all the time via cars just going straight or left. Usually right on red is prohibited for streets that cross the bike lane road as well.
I don't think it would be surprising given you angle your bike to the direction of your travel (and going left takes you where you came from, going right takes you where you were heading to begin with, so where else are you logically going to go?), and light cycles are short enough where this isn't going to add a significant time compared with merging multiple lanes in traffic or waiting for a yield left (way more dangerous imo with people constantly running yellow lights).