Must there be a bike lane anywhere?

[Froze]

You're right. It's really dangerous for us to use the public highway without the bike lane. We paying our taxes also, the government should prioritize the cyclist.

I disagree, cyclists do not pay taxes to support bike lanes, when they drive cars they buy gas and that supports the roads for automotive use and automotive use only, but that's because they are buying gas for their cars and NOT for their bicycles. And right now the bike paths are being supported by gasoline taxes, but that's only because of pressure being placed on governments from left lobbyist who want to keep 1% of the population happy and disregarding the other 99%. I don't think it's even remotely fair that 99% of the car users have to pay taxes for bike paths while their roads deteriorate!

Obviously I'm a cyclist, but I HATE paying taxes for something that very few, less than 1.5% of the population uses nationwide, yes certain states, those in the sun belt, have a higher usage, but the US is mostly in a cold belt and on cooler and cold days those bike paths are rarely used. I live in Indiana, I ride the bike paths (but wouldn't care if they were there or not!) and on any given weekday in the summer I may see a couple of dozen riders on a 24 mile stretch (round trip), and on some stretches of the path it's mostly people wondering about on foot with kids. On the weekend the usage does go up along with people wondering about on foot with kids, but most of those people are concentrated in the park area that's about a mile loop, once outside that loop usage drops way down. But once school is back and the weather drops I can go on that same 24 mile stretch and be lucky to see one or two riders! And on the weekends I may run into 3 or 4 cyclists. I cannot see the reason for a community to spend an average of $130,000 for one mile of path, (and this figure goes WAY up in the sun belt states, upwards of $535,000 per mile!) And then we hear communities crying that they don't have enough money? LOL!! they don't have enough money because they spend it on stupid projects to appease a tiny percentage of the population!

This is why I support some sort of tax or fee on the purchase of new or used bikes out of a local bike shop, (private sales would be to difficult to police). I think an additional tax of 10% added onto the sale would then go strictly for the use of bike paths. Let me tell you, if you look up how many bikes are sold in each state and then find the average price of a bike, and calculate that you would be shocked as to how much money that 10% would give to the state each year, far more then the gas tax does. Yeah I can hear you all screaming that the government would spend that money on other projects, ok, they do that now with gasoline tax! so what's your point? Or screaming that people won't spend as much money on bikes...which I seriously doubt that by looking at people spending $4,000 just for a set of wheels!!! or $9,000 for a bicycle that doesn't even have 1/10th of the technology in it that you can find in new motorcycles at those prices and less; or $350 for saddle which is probably actually worth only $10 in materials and labor! So no, that will not decrease the sales of bikes or the amount of money spent on a bike, plus most people who ride bikes would be all too eager to spend the tax money to support the building of bike paths. So that theory is shot to hell.

Also the longest bike paths in the US are privately (and some federal grants) funded, so that alone tells you that cyclists would gladly pay taxes on their bikes, it also tells you that people would donate more money then just the taxes if they know it's going to build a robust bike path/lane system in their city and county.

 

[reighn]

In the country where I from, as long as you paying your tax whether it's from gasoline or from your job, its really doesn't matter. The most important here is you paying your tax. I'm a motorcycle rider also, if I will consider that, we also have the right now to ask for the motorcycle lane.

The problem in our government right now, they want to solve the traffic but not doing anything for some two wheels vehicles. You're right tax from gasoline has the big impact but it doesn't means that the government should forget the right of those two wheels vehicles, beside even we don't pay tax by using our bike, we also not destroying the environment from burning the gas.

 

[EfficientNinja]

I wish there is a biking lane everywhere. This would make it safer for all the cyclists. In my country where most drivers are reckless, there is a higher risk of getting hit by vehicles. There aren't any bike lane on almost all of the areas that I've traveled to.

 

[reighn]

I wish there is a biking lane everywhere. This would make it safer for all the cyclists. In my country where most drivers are reckless, there is a higher risk of getting hit by vehicles. There aren't any bike lane on almost all of the areas that I've traveled to.

That's the problem in our country too. Some people can't avoid to use the two wheels vehicles like bike because of heavy traffic even it's really dangerous to use bike in the public or national highway because there's no bike lane.

 

[cyclintom]

Cycling is a good way to promote and support a healthy environment. However we must admit that cycling is not that safe specially when we are sharing road with big and heavy vehicles. I think having a bike lane anywhere would be a good idea for us and for the environement. Unfortunately that is not the case in most countries.

As a matter of fact - cycling is the safest form of transportation there is. It is something like four times safer than walking and even including the corrections for additional mileage it is something like 10 times safer than cars.

The greatest cause of accidents on a bicycle is self-caused crashes usually from riding too far above your capabilities.

Also if you're riding properly and you're keeping a doubtful eye on drivers you almost never get caught surprised. I DID get hit a couple of months ago for the first time in over 40 years of riding by some woman who was plainly not paying attention, rolled a stop sign and accelerated directly into me. I had let two other cars take their turn at a four way intersection and the woman was just behind one of the cars I allowed his turn. The accident was perhaps 15 mph and most of the damage was caused to my bike and not my body which soon healed.