Originally posted: March 10th, 2008
Hearing mantras like "Share the road" or "Bicycles belong off of the sidewalks" makes me cringe.
Which is worse: a pedestrian getting hit by a bike or a bicyclist getting hit by a car? Let's think about it...
When a pedestrian gets hit by a bike: He gets scraped and bruised. When a bicyclist gets hit by a car: He gets dead. Which is worse: Bruised or dead?
"Oh, but wait! What if that pedestrian has a baby in a stroller?! What do you think happens to that baby?!"
What happens to that baby if it's sitting in a baby seat on a bike when that bike gets hit by a car?
"Silly idiot! There aren't any baby seats for bicycles!"
Sure there are. I used to ride in one when I was little. And yes, I had a helmet.
So bottom line: Don't be an idiot, bike on the sidewalk (At least when you're on a road where the city actually bothered to put a sidewalk in. And the sidewalk isn't hidden under a foot of snow. But that's a whole other rant.)
"Let me get this straight... You think bicycles should stay on sidewalks (when available) just because some bicyclists might have a baby with them?"
No, you idiot. As I've already told you, and you've already forgotten: bikes should stay on the sidewalk (when available) because a car is far more dangerous to a bicyclist than a bike is to a pedestrian. The baby seat stuff was a rebuttal to the baby stroller argument.
"Ha ha, you said 'rebuttal'."
Yes. Yes I did.
2 comments for "Bicycles and Sidewalks"
As a lifetime vehicular bicyclist, I strongly disagree. The road network that became "highways" in the United States, was originally created at the behest of bicycle riders, NOT automobile drivers (and industry). The impetus was over a million letters to Congress in 1893.
Ever wonder about the basis for "right-of-way" laws and Motor Vehicle code in 50 States? This is because, all of the OTHER vehicles had established their "right" to travel on roads, as it was since Roman times. When the faster, potentially (...and, actually) dangerous motor vehicles confronted the existing traffic mix, these weren't allowed egress until safety rules were established as law, ie, "right-of-way".
The promulgation of attitudes such as yours, threatens to legitimize the banning of bicycles from local roads altogether: a "holy grail" of motor, petroleum, and road-building in this nation. Dozens of millions of dollars have been spent by these industries towards exactly this goal.
So please, before you spout off on a subject which has been painfully and at times lethally exploited against others in the United States (and Great Britain, as well), be sure you understand the issues involved, by those who have lived them.
Interesting points.
I guess I should emphasize that, at the very least, for roads that don't have reasonably-maintained sidewalks or bikepaths next to them, I *absolutely* agree with "SHARE THE ROAD!!" And even if I'm driving on a road that does have a good sidewalk/bikepath, and I see a cyclist, it's not as if I'm going to pretend they're not there or muscle them off or anything like that. I can be a real ass, but I'm not that much of an ass :)
On the rest, I can respect that stance, but I can't help wondering how relevant it still is. Not that I'm trying to slap a big "Irrelevant!" label on it, but I mean: For better or worse, motoried vehicles are here, and at least for the most part, that genie's not likely to get back into the bottle anytime soon. So, as I see it, the question becomes "Well, cars are here, so what now?"
My attempt to answer that goes: Clearly, motorized vehicles can be a real danger to cyclists, so IMO, the ideal solution (though I admit real-world issues like funding and space can at times prevent it from being realistic) would be to have separate roads for cars and bicycles. This has already been implemented in certain parts Lake County, OH (US), where I'm from, and probably in other places as well (though, on a larger scale, yea, it's not as widespread as I'd like to see it). Think of it as the bikepaths being the continuation (or maybe "revival" is more accurate) of the old traditional roads, and the modern two-or-more-lane highways as being something for getting the motorized vehicles out of everyone else's way.