Be negligent on a bicycle and a vast majority of the life and limb you are risking is your own. Be negligent in a car and you're putting in mortal danger every other driver and cyclist on the road as well as every pedestrian in the vicinity. The difference between 25lb of metal powered by glutes and quads and 1.5 tons of metal with a tank of flammable liquid and a 200 hp engine is important.

Your point being? Driving or biking on the road makes you a vehicle, all vehicles follow the same set of laws. I don't care if your "I'm a bicyclist" superiority complex makes you think you're above the law; you're not.

According to the laws of California, driving or biking makes you a "driver", but does not make the bike a "vehicle", it's a "device". You are still subject to the laws of the road, though.

> Be negligent on a bicycle and a vast majority of the life and limb you are risking is your own.

I don't think that's true. I haven't personally witnessed any accidents, and I admittedly don't have any data to cite, but I have witnessed many bicyclists cause complete chaos in busy traffic.

I think it's true, depending just how vast "vast" is interpreted. But "I'm taking a bigger risk myself" doesn't excuse putting others at risk.

You're right, there are lots of slow cyclists who seldom top 15mph. Nevertheless, the speed limit is a speed limit, and if I can manage 25mph on a 35mph road, I don't see the issue. Mixed-use roads that see cyclists clogging traffic should provide simple painted bike lanes if nothing else.

  So we should enforce traffic laws on cars but not on
  bicycles? That's fairly myopic...

Fewer than 1000 people die in bicycle accidents a year. It is just not comparable to the danger of auto transport.

Most non-freeway roads don't have minimum speed limits, but I think they should. Based on my own experience, one of the most important factors for road safety is the homogeneity of speed. Having cars (or bikes) going faster or slower than the average flow of traffic have caused the vast majority of congestion and safety problems I have witnessed.

considering the amount of people biking vs the amount of people in cars, I'd guess that biking is the far more dangerous mode of transport.

According to this site [1], biking accounts for 1% of trips, but 2% of traffic fatalities.

[1] - http://www.bicyclinginfo.org/facts/crash-facts.cfm

You might find this interesting:

  UK figures show that it takes at least 8000 years of
  average cycling to produce one clinically severe head
  injury and 22,000 years for one death.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicycle_helmet#Health_benefits...

So? From the cited article giving that stat - "a mile of driving is ten times safer than a mile of cycling".

You might argue that cycling is safe. You can't argue that it is safer. It simply isn't.

Cycling on its own is very safe, it's the cars that are dangerous.

True, but that's a silly assertion. Cars by themselves are pretty safe. It's the other cars that cause problems. Since the cars are there, biking is more dangerous than being in another car.

> Cars by themselves are pretty safe. It's the other cars that cause problems.

Tell that to Michael Hastings, I'm sure he'll be thrilled to hear the news.

If it's not comparable, why are you complaining? Why should I have to respect you more than a car if you're not at any real risk of death? Seems like more effort than its worth, after all I don't really value your life at anything over 0.

Fewer than 2000 people die in plane crashes every year, despite the millions who fly. So I suppose we shouldn't make them follow any rules or safety procedures either, I mean it isn't as if those rules have prevented any deaths. Right?

   Why should I have to respect you more than a car

This is a disgusting perspective, and you clearly have never ridden a bicycle significantly for practical transportation or else you might be able to relate to some of the comments from myself and other cyclists in this thread.

You should respect me because I am exposed, riding a machine with few to no safety devices. It's the same reason I drive particularly carefully around motorcyclists. I do respect them more, so to speak, because they are at far greater risk on the road than car drivers. I want to see that they reach their destination safely, and I know the odds are stacked against them by distracted or arrogant drivers.

These numbers are a little off. Most commuters are going to scoot along in the 8-12 mph range. People riding for exercise or training for a sport are going to get up near 20 mph. Amateur bike races will hold sustained speeds of 24-30 mph for a few hours (depending on the terrain). In the TdF this year the fastest team in the time trial averaged 35 mph for 25 min. TdF sprinters can hit 50 mph and 70 mph on mountain descents.

No, laws that are appropriate for cars may not be appropriate for bicycles. Stop signs, for example. There is no justification for requiring bicyclists to come to a complete stop to safely cross an intersection. (There isn't for cars, either, but that's a separate issue.)

No, you don't get to have it both ways. I have routinely seen bikes dash through stop signs and lights when they don't have right of way. On more than one occasion of seen said cyclist get injured; the person driving the car gets blamed despite the bicyclist breaking the law. This is entirely unacceptable and dangerous, I don't care if you don't think the laws make sense every vehicle has to follow them.

It's myopic not to see the differences between the two vehicles, not to insist that they be taken into consideration if relevant.

Average speed for the front runners in the Tour de France on an average stage is usually around 25mph, and that's with some gruesome hill climbs. On the faster stages, average speeds can reach 35mph. Sprints often hit 40mph, and on downhill stretches are known to exceed 60mph. I commute 7.5 miles into central London daily where the roads really were originally built around the horse and cart and usually manage ~22mph average if the traffic isn't so bad and I catch the lights right.

In todays (stage 10) the ITV4 coverage (Chris Bordman ) said they where hitting 65-70kph at today's finish which is over 40Mph