Re:Sharrows, the bicycle infrastructure that doesn’t work an...
by leetcrew on Sunday December 13, 2020 @10:05PM
(#25413082)
I rode a bike as my sole form of transportation for a few years. it's not "impossible" to do correctly, but it may be impossible to do without exceeding the amount of effort you're willing to exert.
> Sometimes you have to turn left across many lanes of fast cars, what are you supposed to do?
one of the great things about biking is that you get to pick and choose between car rules and pedestrian rules depending on which set fits the situation best. whenever I am uncomfortable making a left turn, I pull off to the right and cross the intersection like a pedestrian.
Re:Sharrows, the bicycle infrastructure that doesn’t work an...
by enriquto on Monday December 14, 2020 @02:50AM
(#25414539)
> one of the great things about biking is that you get to pick and choose between car rules and pedestrian rules
Oh, I hate that! Bikes are transit, and are not supposed to leave the transit in the middle of their way, especially not for negotiating an intersection. Bailing out of the bike and going on foot with the pedestrians does not count as "doing the correct thing", just that using the bike is impossible. Besides, it is annoying for the pedestrians.
Curiously; in France many red-lights are excepted for bicycles. There's often a special, permanent "orange" signal that applies to bikes, thus they are explicitly encouraged to run the red light. If I understand well, this was in agreement with drivers, who were annoyed to wait for all the bikes to start slowly after the light turns green.
I think that if you ever try to use a bicycle in transit (I mean, seriously over a few days, not for 5 minutes), you will see that it is essentially impossible to do correctly. Sometimes you have to turn left across many lanes of fast cars, what are you supposed to do? Inevitably you take the least dangerous path.