"Zebee Johnstone" <zebeej@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:slrng2dmpj.qt1.zebeej@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> In aus.bicycle on Sun, 11 May 2008 03:20:26 -0700 (PDT)
> tenspeed <tenspeed@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>>
>> Is this going to be safer/faster/better than the existing Bourke
>> Street Bike Lanes?
>
> Consider the fun if the parked cars are vans or big 4WDs, there's only
> one bicycle, and it's a BMX or similar small bike, and a car darts
> into a driveway.
>
> I believe that the majority of crashes in places with Copenhagen lanes
> are at intersections, partly because the cars don't realise the bikes
> will be there, and partly due to sightlines.
Jaaysus!!!
Would it be too much to expect that our TERTIARY qualified TRANS****T
PLANNERS might have the gumption to do a bit of a search of overseas
experiences, before istalling patently unsafe traffic devices.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Segregated_cycle_facilities
"For urban roads, with many junctions, accident analysis suggests the
opposite, that segregated cycling facilities are likely to produce a net
increase in the number of collisions. These conclusions are sup****ted by
the
experience of countries that have implemented segregated cycling
facilities.
In the U.S.[34], UK[35], Germany, Sweden[36], Denmark[37], Canada [38] and
Finland[39], it has been found that cycling on roadside urban cycle
tracks/sidepaths results in significant, up to 12 fold, increases in the
rate of car/bicycle collisions. At a 1990 European conference on cycling,
the term Russian roulette was openly used to describe the use of roadside
cycle paths.[40]"
"In Helsinki, research has shown that cyclists are safer cycling on the
roads mixed in with the traffic than they are using that city's 800 km of
cycle paths [41]. The Berlin police and Senate conducted studies which led
to a similar conclusion in the 1980s [42]. In Berlin 10% of the roads have
cycle paths but these produce 75% of fatalities and serious injuries among
cyclists [43]. In the UK town of Milton Keynes it has been shown that
cyclists using the "off-road" Milton Keynes redway system have, on a per
journey basis, a significantly higher rate of fatal car-bicycle collisions
than cyclists who simply cycle on the ordinary unsegregated roads[35].
Cycle
lanes / bike lanes are less dangerous than cycle paths in urban situations
but even well-implemented examples have still been associated with 10%
increases in casualty rates."
Helsinki has many kms of two-way cycle lanes, and for 'wrong way' cyclists
they are 10 times more dangerous than cycling on the road.
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