The Globe today pitches Boston's upcoming bike-sharing program, with bike-rental kiosks every 300 or 400 yards.
Mike Mennonno, who's been biking the streets of Boston for years, writes he'd like to have a bowl of what city officials are smoking, because Boston barely has enough space for today's bicyclists, what with its glacial pace of adding five miles or so a year of bike lanes:
... The idea of plowing ahead with a full-blown bike-sharing program when the infrastructure can't handle cyclists period, much less more cyclists, is counterproductive. (If you think a traffic jam in your car is bad, you have obviously never experienced bicycle rush hour in Boston.) ...
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Comments
Annoying article
By Mark-
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 10:30am
The article annoyed me in highlighting the "terror" for cyclists while downplaying their near-constant illegal behavior. And I say this as a cyclist who has logged thousands of miles on Boston streets in the past 3 years.
I've experienced very few of the scary moments he writes of. Somebody honks out of turn maybe once a month. Yeah, drivers do stupid things, but it's much worse to come upon a bicyclist riding the wrong way in front of you because you have no idea what stupid thing they'll do next.
Pick a bicyclist, any bicyclist, and watch them until they leave your sight. 9 times out of 10, they'll do something illegal: wrong way, sidewalk downtown, run a light, etc. If you ride with the traffic and follow the laws, you won't have all the scary experiences and angry motorists in the Globe story.
Oh, and don't look for the Boston Police bike squads to enforce traffic rules. They break them as much as anyone else.
Where do you ride?
By SwirlyGrrl
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 11:36am
I'm curious ... car drivers misbehaving *only* once in a while? Really?
I'm sorry, but you may not mean to sound like you are aggregating driver talking points and then stuffing some lycra pants with straw for validation, but that's how it sounds to me.
My experience in the last 25 years is that some motorists don't hate cyclists because of their *perceived* behavior - they hate us because we are "in their way" when we operate legally on the roadways and we get further than they do in traffic because we navigate in less space than their cars do.
Some specifics of your routes, please. Where are these roads you ride with wrong-way cyclists outnumbering cel-addled and entitled heavy equipment operators? I'd like to ride there. Getting hit head on by a cyclist coming the wrong way is way better than being run down by some idiot clown vaguely steering a car while on a cel phone.
Stuffing bike shorts for validation?
By neilv
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 11:38am
Straw, not sock?
Actually ...
By SwirlyGrrl
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 11:43am
Straw or newspaper stuffed cycling or motorcycle gear makes a great "headless cyclist" gag for the front porch come halloween.
Just stuff it up to the neckline and put the empty helmet in the strawcyclist's lap.
That's not why I hate cyclists
By Stewart
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 12:49pm
I only hate the cyclists who won't stay off the fucking sidewalk. If you're going to ride a bike in Boston, more power to you, but have the balls to do it in the street where you belong.
You aren't alone, and yet ...
By SwirlyGrrl
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 2:14pm
For every bonehead sidewalk cyclist I block off the sidewalk (even though one guy thought he was a tough little wimphipster by threatening violence against my "boyfriend" - yeah buddy, ride fixed much?), there are that many or more motorists who scream profanities and insults while telling me to get on the sidewalk "where I belong".
See?
huh?
By anon
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 3:39pm
Where are you riding? I've never heard a single motorist swear at a cyclist for not riding on the sidewalk. You really seem to attract more than your fair share of the dregs of society!
Where I ride
By Mark-
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 5:58pm
Where do I ride? All over really, but some of the most frequent routes are: Washington St. through Roslindale, Columbia Rd. through Dorchester, Mass Ave from the South End to Cambridge, Downtown Crossing to the Back Bay usually by Harrison Ave. and some street that parallels the Pike. I don't mean to suggest that it's paradise but I don't get the stares and glares and honks and cutting-off that so many people (including the Globe article reporter) talk about. I don't know why. The only reason I can think of is that I stop for lights and ride with traffic. Sometimes it does seem a little ridiculous, waiting for "nothing," but it does make me predictable to a driver and that helps.
you're wrong
By DrJoe
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 1:34pm
Wow, for such an avid biker you sure sound like most of the pissed off drivers we've heard from on this topic. Anyway, you're wrong:
1. In the Netherlands, where adherence to car traffic laws by bikes is nearly zero, fatalities per person-mile are less. By the way, this doesn't mean that bikes won't stop at stop lights, just that they're allowed some flexibility to proceed at their own risk when it's safe.
http://www.steamthing.com/2009/07/bike-salmon-omen...
2. There is open recognition in at least one state (Idaho) that making bikes adhere to all of the same laws as cars is in fact dangerous.
http://www.bicyclelaw.com/blog/index.cfm/2009/3/7/...
A bike-related post. Oh wait, hang on!...
By jchristian
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 11:02am
I need time to get a snack together so I can kick back and enjoy watching the impassioned, contentious sniping to follow!
;-)
I'm hoping
By Sock_Puppet
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 12:16pm
They will flood the street in front of my house, and slow down automobile traffic.
I don't believe this will be terribly popular; I just don't imagine that the barriers to entry for bicycle ownership are really that high.
The largest barriers to bike
By JJJ
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 3:26pm
The largest barriers to bike ownership in Boston are
1) theft
2) availability
Bike share removes the first barrier by passing the risk onto the vendor
The second is for suburban bikers who commute into town but want to ride in the middle of the day, but their bike is at home.
bike TAXING, not bike "sharing"
By anon
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 1:14pm
Stop calling it bike "sharing". It's bike RENTAL, and it will force us to become dependent upon a business for transportation. Furthermore, this is a back-door tax. By not making any moves to accommodate owners but instead accommodating a state-granted monopoly, this is how Boston is going to tax bikers. Those of us who own our bikes will be squeezed. Lack of bike racks? City answer: rent. Bike thefts galore? City answer: rent. Lack of bike storage in apartment buildings? Landlord answer: rent. Lack of bike storage in apartment? Roommates: rent.
So instead of having the freedom to travel on your OWN bike without paying a dime to anyone except for occasional parts/service...you'll get the pleasure of having to own and carry a credit card (which not everyone can get) and pay money to travel. And a sizable chunk of that money will go towards taxes...state sales tax (hellooooo 6.25%) plus whatever piece of the pie the city feels like taking out.
It will also generate some nice campaign donations from whoever obtains that exclusive deal...
Force?
By Sock_Puppet
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 2:22pm
So you mean they're going to break into my garage and steal all my bikes? Damn! That's sure scary! Golly, I used my freedom to ride my bicycle just yesterday, and now it's all going away!
Waitaminit, is this Obama's fault? I hear he's the Antichrist...
More bikes = safer biking
By JJJ
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 3:23pm
More bikes = safer biking for everyone. More bikes mean more awareness. Compare being a pedestrian in Boston to one in Dallas. Its the same idea, theres safety in numbers.
Want more ifnrastructure? Than we need more bikes.
How many times have you heard about plans for a bike lane being opposed because "there are no cyclists to use it"? Go to a community meeting, you hear that claim every time.
Also, once again, biking on sidewalks is LEGAL except in the CBD or when otherwise noted by a sign.
CBD?
By Stewart
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 5:17pm
You wanna explain what you think a CBD is?
Central Business District,
By anon
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 5:34pm
Central Business District, i.e. any place generally in downtown or shopping areas where sidewalks are usually full of pedestrians, thus making bicycle traffic a liability.
For example I wouldn't ride a bicycle on the sidewalks of Newbury Street, Boylston, or Hanover Street, but parallel streets without heavy pedestrian traffic like Commonwealth Avenue or Commercial Street fine.
Just a guess
By Kaz
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 5:46pm
Cambridge Business District or City Business District or Central Business District...
Most business districts don't allow biking on the sidewalk (for example, the curb cuts around Central Square all have NO BIKE markings on them).
Exactly
By Stewart
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 5:57pm
Could also be Commercial Business District...regardless, the only phrase I've ever seen in Boston's bicycle laws is simply "business district." I'd like to see more about this "CBD" thing.
Regardless, given that the times I've been -- quite literally -- run into by idiot bicyclists on the sidewalk have been (surprise!) in business districts (specifically on Comm Ave, Brighton Ave, Harvard Ave and Beacon Street). So I'm glad we're in agreement that those bicyclists shouldn't have been on the sidewalk to begin with.
I used CBD in the general
By J
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 6:47pm
I used CBD in the general development sense meaning either central business district or commercial business district, but youre right, the Mass laws just says business district.
That means, no riding in the financial district, which has narrow sidewalks and heavy traffic (during the weekdays anyway).
But theres nothing unsafe or illegal about using wider or empty sidewalks like comm ave. Personally, I use the street when Im going somewhere, but sometimes I want a leisurely ride in which Im sightseeing at 4mph, or barely faster than a pedestrian, so I use the sidewalk.
In Cambridge, it generally means Hardard square, but what theyve done is every time theyve painted a bike lane, theyve banned bikes from the sidewalk parallel to the lane. Thats legal and make sense. Id have no problem with Boston doing the same. Obviously the one exception is Vassar street, where the bike lane is on the sidewalk (best design in the area).
Uh-huh
By Stewart
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 7:22pm
"Business district" somehow just means "financial district," and all other parts of town that have businesses (and therefore, lots of foot traffic) are not in fact business districts. Gotcha.
That is the traditional
By J
Wed, 07/29/2009 - 8:27pm
That is the traditional definition, yes. The law wasnt written for you to interpret, it was written to be understood by people familiar with the subject.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_business_dist...
"In the United States, central business districts are often referred to as "downtown" (even if there is no "uptown"). In most cities the downtown area will be home to the financial district, but usually contains entertainment and retail of some kind as well. "
Wowsers, a real live Wikipedia definition!
By Stewart
Thu, 07/30/2009 - 7:18pm
Never mind that what I was asking was where exactly the city's bike laws claim that biking on the sidewalk is only prohibited in the CENTRAL business district and not in business districts in general, but your non-response response has given me the answer I suspected. Thank you for playing.