Just Say "No!" to Bike Lanes As more attention is paid to municipal planning, recreation planning and transportation planning, the suggestion is often repeated for bike lanes in Cache Valley. More people would ride their bikes if there were safe bike lanes, we are told. But what is a "safe bike lane," what makes it safe, and what does it provide safety from? For over twenty years, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), highway professionals and transportation advocates have recommended, designed and implemented bike lanes on streets and roads throughout the country. What is the legacy of those efforts? The FHWA now says "they aren't necessarily safer" (FHWA National Bicycling and Walking Case Study #4, 1993, p.38) and "oddly enough ... [they] actually tend to increase conflicts between bicyclists and other users, including motorists" (FHWA, Intermodal Connections, vol 1, No 5, 1995). How can this be? A striped bike lane on a street offers the novice cyclist a sense of protection from that most-feared danger: the car overtaking from behind. But collision statistics clearly show that the car behind does not pose much risk to cyclists. Motorists can easily overtake a bicyclist moving visibly, predictably and legally ahead of them. The vast majority of urban bike/car collisions in daylight involve the car ahead, generally at intersections. Half of those collisions are the bicyclist's fault, and a share of the others could be prevented by some pro-active techniques by the bicyclist. Bike lanes do nothing to alleviate that real danger ahead. In fact, by directing the novice cyclist to a curbside location, the bike lane tends to place the moving bicyclist where turning or intersecting motorists do not expect, or look out for, conflicting traffic. Bike lanes may encourage the straight travelling cyclist to pass to the right of right turning cars, or encourage cyclists to make last second left turns across lanes of through traffic. These are among the conflicts that the FHWA "oddly enough" identified. Bike lanes also require more maintenance than the same wide lane without a stripe. Motor traffic sweeps debris from the travelled portion of the roadway. When bikes are not present, cars keep a wide travel lane clean. As motor traffic avoids an empty bike lane, it sweeps debris into that lane. This effect is already visible locally on roads that have a painted shoulder stripe along parts of their distance. Notice where the debris collects with or without the shoulder stripe along eastbound 14th North and along Highway 165 between Logan and Nibley. The same effect is also apparent on 8th East south of 10th North where a new "shoulder stripe" has been added far to the left of the marked parking spaces. A bike lane or shoulder strewn with gravel, glass and garbage can lead to increased rolling resistance, flat tires and loss of control. It can take the cyclist's attention away from smooth interactions with fellow travellers. A bike lane that is a debris field won't even attract the uninformed, novice riders with their misplaced fears. Some communities sweep their bike lanes weekly to avoid this disadvantage. Another advantage that bike lane advocates have offered in other localities is that bike lanes lay claim to space for cycling, legitimizing cycling and reminding motorists to watch for cyclists. Thanks to the pioneering founders of our community, who laid out wide streets to enable wagons to turn around, we already have plenty of space for both cars and bikes. Our current design standards for collectors and arterials preserve that feature, even though a U-turning horse-drawn wagon is a pretty rare sight anymore. We don't need the paint to get the space. Current state law legitimizes cycling; and bikes on the road are a better reminder to motorists than a stripe of paint. Do we spray the paint, attracting more cyclists whose misplaced fears are soothed, only to make collision-causing mistakes at intersections? Leave off the paint, and spend the paint budget on education and awareness instead, and what would we have? Bicyclists sharing wide lanes with safely overtaking motorists as everyone moves through intersections by the same rules regardless of vehicle type. One measure of what we need for the safety of cyclists is to ask those who already take the "risk" and are cycling to get around in our community. Those of us who are on the bicycle seat may have a better idea of the hazards we face than those who fantasize from the driver's seat or easy chair or office desk while their bikes hang, dusty, in the garage. Here are some things cyclists do need: secure parking facilities at destinations, good repair and maintenance of the pavement surface, bike-friendly drain grates and railroad crossings, bike sensitive stop lights, and recognition by motorists that bicyclists have "all the rights ... of the operator of a vehicle" (as well as recognition by bicyclists that we have "all the duties," too). By riding visibly, predictably, legally and with confidence that passing motorists are my fellow citizens and not some other predatory species, I enjoy my ability to meet some of my local transportation needs on a bike. Is our street infrastructure perfect for my purposes? No. Is the "safety" of bicycle lanes what it lacks? No. -- Bob Bayn has cycled Cache Valley's streets and roads for the past 26 years and was recently certified by the League of American Bicyclists as an "Effective Cycling" Instructor.