> In an ideal world bicycles are given equal respect and stature on the roads.

Since you mentioned "an ideal world," I'm going to completely disagree. I think that bicycles and automobiles sharing roads is, at best, a manageable but extremely dangerous situation. Like it or not, bicycles and automobiles behave very differently, and require their surrounding vehicles to behave very differently. In an ideal world, there would be separate thoroughfares for automobiles and bicycles, and neither would be allowed on the other (like we already mostly have for pedestrians)

Excepting of course, the millions of intersections and driveways. You know, besides those.

Well, pedestrians already have separate thoroughfares and are not allowed on roads, right? What's the difference?

(like we already mostly have for pedestrians)

If you're talking about sidewalks, it's barely separate, as in a city there are conflicting paths between the road and the sidewalk every dozen feet (every driveway or intersection).

Crossing a street is a lot different than traveling with the flow of traffic in a lane.

Well, in an ideal world it would be both perfectly manageable and not dangerous, but I think we're both saying the same thing. Cars and bicycles are very different and bad things tend to happen when they share the same roadway.