Bike Lobby and Dishonesty

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Huh? If there's a bike lane on a block a bicyclist is on then why don't they have to use it?

They might need to turn in a way the bike lane isn't condusive to. They might be in a mood. Their might be a car parked in the bike lane, blocking it.

Then why are we spending money to build them if the very people that demand them don't use them because they might be "in a mood"?

The entire bike lane project is a boondoggle. The city has spend BILLIONS on bike infrastructure -- infrastructure that's maybe used by a 1,000 people. The cost per user is astronomical and indefensible. It would be cheaper to pay every biker in D.C. $100,000 to just take the bus.

Spot on!

Completely wrong and you're totally making up complete over the top hyperbolic nonsense, for example it's not even remotely "billions" spent on bike infrastructure. And, DC bike lanes get used by a hell of a lot more than "maybe 1,000" people.

Right, "maybe 1,000" is an obvious understatement and just as obviously, totally made up. The "bikecommuting" Slack channel at my employer alone has 55 people in it, and there are several other people who commute only by bike who aren't even in that channel. We're nowhere near one of the largest employers in the city. You get over 1,000 pretty quickly if each workplace has a few dozen people riding to work.

Then let's get a trafficl flow survey. Not intentions or potential interest. Actual year round use because a bicyclist in a bike lane is one of the rarest sights in the city. I've seen more deer on the streets than bikes in bike lanes.

I believe you. It can be very hard to see what's around you when you're looking at your phone so much. It's ok, I see you.

Maybe the spandex acts like camouflage. But seriously, nobody has to believe me. Everyone can see for themselves whether the lanes are used or not. If they are in fact being used then a simple traffic survey will answer that question definitively. Seems like a win win.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Huh? If there's a bike lane on a block a bicyclist is on then why don't they have to use it?

They might need to turn in a way the bike lane isn't condusive to. They might be in a mood. Their might be a car parked in the bike lane, blocking it.

Then why are we spending money to build them if the very people that demand them don't use them because they might be "in a mood"?

The entire bike lane project is a boondoggle. The city has spend BILLIONS on bike infrastructure -- infrastructure that's maybe used by a 1,000 people. The cost per user is astronomical and indefensible. It would be cheaper to pay every biker in D.C. $100,000 to just take the bus.

Spot on!

but they didn’t so I’ll keep using the bike lanes.

Good for you. Somebody should. Hope you do so even when you are "in a mood". When the very people the bike lanes were built for don't use them it shows how pointless they are.

In the meantime we should pass a law that all cyclists must use bike lanes and paths if there is one available. That would increase safety, reduce congestion and show whether they are useful or not.

Can we also have a law that cars can’t park in bike lanes? The amount of time drivers yell at me for being in the road when I have to swerve in and out of delivery drivers and people just chilling with their hazards is awful

To be clear, that IS the law, so I'd settle for just enforcing it, but obviously we can't have that, people could complain if they got tickets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RIP to the two cyclists who died recently. The state department woman was a great person. What a loss. I live in Shaw near whether the other cyclist died. As a mom and a driver, I just hope that parents who think it’s safe and cool to ride with their kids in trailers and baby seats on their bike will think twice. I rode bikes downtown with my kids during the pandemic when the streets were mostly empty, but it’s not safe most of the time, especially at rush hour. One mistake by a car and the unthinkable will happen again. Ok if adults take risks, but please don’t put your kids on the line. Also, I hope all the scooter people will take note. So many near accidents every day.

+1

You have to be insane to allow a child on a bike in Washington D.C. It is really, really dangerous.

Yes, and the whole goal of the nefarious bike lobby is to... make it safer! Those evil bastards.

Good luck with that. Maybe when you're done, you can also figure out a way to make boxing safe, to make football safe and to make assault rifles safe too.

DP but whatever, bike lanes are going to continue to be built and expanded because their positives far outweigh their negatives. Your false equivalences comparing a method of commuting to recreation activities and deadly weapons (a car is much more analogous to an assault rifle in the damage it can do) aren’t winning arguments. You’ve already lost and I’ll keep biking my way to work as more and more lanes get put in for my safe travel

Some things are just inherently really dangerous -- guns, boxing, riding a bike in a major city -- and there's nothing anyone can do about this. Common sense will tell you this. It would be better if cyclists weren't such incredible crybabies and just took responsibility for the risks they choose to run. It's not the government's job to protect you from hurting yourself while doing something stupid.

I dunno I moved here from Tokyo where it’s incredibly safe to bike. I defy you to say that’s not a major city. They don’t even have tons of protected bike lanes. They have smaller cars (and trucks) and smaller roads and drivers who are cognizant of and careful around cyclists.

For the moment, Tokyo is a major city. But as its population decreases and it becomes more in the orbit of Korea or China, it will be another "waiting for the other shoe to drop" place like Hong Kong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RIP to the two cyclists who died recently. The state department woman was a great person. What a loss. I live in Shaw near whether the other cyclist died. As a mom and a driver, I just hope that parents who think it’s safe and cool to ride with their kids in trailers and baby seats on their bike will think twice. I rode bikes downtown with my kids during the pandemic when the streets were mostly empty, but it’s not safe most of the time, especially at rush hour. One mistake by a car and the unthinkable will happen again. Ok if adults take risks, but please don’t put your kids on the line. Also, I hope all the scooter people will take note. So many near accidents every day.

+1

You have to be insane to allow a child on a bike in Washington D.C. It is really, really dangerous.

Yes, and the whole goal of the nefarious bike lobby is to... make it safer! Those evil bastards.

Good luck with that. Maybe when you're done, you can also figure out a way to make boxing safe, to make football safe and to make assault rifles safe too.

DP but whatever, bike lanes are going to continue to be built and expanded because their positives far outweigh their negatives. Your false equivalences comparing a method of commuting to recreation activities and deadly weapons (a car is much more analogous to an assault rifle in the damage it can do) aren’t winning arguments. You’ve already lost and I’ll keep biking my way to work as more and more lanes get put in for my safe travel

Some things are just inherently really dangerous -- guns, boxing, riding a bike in a major city -- and there's nothing anyone can do about this. Common sense will tell you this. It would be better if cyclists weren't such incredible crybabies and just took responsibility for the risks they choose to run. It's not the government's job to protect you from hurting yourself while doing something stupid.

My dude or dudette. You just said assault rifles are the same as biking in a major city. I want whatever you put in your coffee this morning. I think I’m in love with you

You're missing the point (again). All I'm saying is that some things are just really dangerous and it's a waste of time to pretend otherwise. Cyclists just seem delusional about the risks they run.

A biker in our neighborhood was hit by a car when he ran through a red light. His wife set up a Go Fund Me Page to pay for his co-pays while he was hospitalized and then continued to ask for money because they needed a larger car to haul him around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Rules for bikes are the same as for cars. Try and pass a car on the right when he's making a right hand turn and let us know how it works out.

They should be but they're not. The bicyclist can legally undertake the truck. But it's extremely dangerous. Because the truck can make a right turn and run over the bicyclist.


Rules for cars have been ironed out over years of crashes, and are designed so that everyone knows what all the cars are supposed to be doing, for the safety of everyone. Rules for bikes are designed for convenience or efficiency but not for safety.

I would partly disagree here. Rules for bicycles are certainly designed for convenience, but at the expense of clarity. Cyclists demand to be able to make risk-based judgments in certain situations that cars are simply not allowed to make due to the risks. This means that there are no bright lines rules governing cyclist behavior. The most important thing for safety is that all users can have expectations of how other users will act in certain situations. Unfortunately there is a lot of pushback to setting these brightline rules for cycling. It’s worth noting that countries in Europe that have lower accident rates for bicycles do have clear rules governing all users.

And there it is. Bicyclists do whatever the hell they want and then blame drivers for collisions.

Correct: A bicycle rider crashed into my car as I was waiting for a red light. The rider was on a bike path by a major street that bisects the path. Everyone else was waiting for the intersection to clear so that they could cross the street, but Bicycle Princess tried to maneuver in front of my car so that she could cut through the waiting cars. It was a tight squeeze and she lost her balance and she and her bike "fell" into the front of my car. She created about $2,000 worth of body damage but refused to provide ay identifying information. Fortunately, an Arlington County cop was nearby and saw the effect of the accident she caused. She claimed that she was a poor student and could not pay for the damage. I found her parents and sent photos of what she did to my car. They paid up. Can you imagine racing that kind of brat.

No i can’t and I feel sorry for your parents raising someone who thinks it is ok to block bike paths.

Not as sorry as I feel for your parents who couldn't afford a school where you learned to read. "a bike path by a major street that bisects the path." This is what that means: The bike path crosses a major street. The street has traffic lights on it. I was stopped at a traffic light. The person who hit my car was stopped at the same traffic light. Rather than wait for the traffic light to change to green, she tried to maneuver between my car and the car ahead of me so that she did not have to wait for the red light. So, old son, it is okay to block bike paths.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Rules for bikes are the same as for cars. Try and pass a car on the right when he's making a right hand turn and let us know how it works out.

They should be but they're not. The bicyclist can legally undertake the truck. But it's extremely dangerous. Because the truck can make a right turn and run over the bicyclist.


Rules for cars have been ironed out over years of crashes, and are designed so that everyone knows what all the cars are supposed to be doing, for the safety of everyone. Rules for bikes are designed for convenience or efficiency but not for safety.

I would partly disagree here. Rules for bicycles are certainly designed for convenience, but at the expense of clarity. Cyclists demand to be able to make risk-based judgments in certain situations that cars are simply not allowed to make due to the risks. This means that there are no bright lines rules governing cyclist behavior. The most important thing for safety is that all users can have expectations of how other users will act in certain situations. Unfortunately there is a lot of pushback to setting these brightline rules for cycling. It’s worth noting that countries in Europe that have lower accident rates for bicycles do have clear rules governing all users.

And there it is. Bicyclists do whatever the hell they want and then blame drivers for collisions.

Correct: A bicycle rider crashed into my car as I was waiting for a red light. The rider was on a bike path by a major street that bisects the path. Everyone else was waiting for the intersection to clear so that they could cross the street, but Bicycle Princess tried to maneuver in front of my car so that she could cut through the waiting cars. It was a tight squeeze and she lost her balance and she and her bike "fell" into the front of my car. She created about $2,000 worth of body damage but refused to provide ay identifying information. Fortunately, an Arlington County cop was nearby and saw the effect of the accident she caused. She claimed that she was a poor student and could not pay for the damage. I found her parents and sent photos of what she did to my car. They paid up. Can you imagine racing that kind of brat.

Do you know what percentage of drivers come to a complete, legal stop at the 4 way stop signs in my neighborhood? Over the course of COVID, I had a chance to actually assess this and track it.

About 4%

Please stop with the nonsense.

Did you also assess the number of drivers who stop at red lights? That would be more relevant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RIP to the two cyclists who died recently. The state department woman was a great person. What a loss. I live in Shaw near whether the other cyclist died. As a mom and a driver, I just hope that parents who think it’s safe and cool to ride with their kids in trailers and baby seats on their bike will think twice. I rode bikes downtown with my kids during the pandemic when the streets were mostly empty, but it’s not safe most of the time, especially at rush hour. One mistake by a car and the unthinkable will happen again. Ok if adults take risks, but please don’t put your kids on the line. Also, I hope all the scooter people will take note. So many near accidents every day.

+1

You have to be insane to allow a child on a bike in Washington D.C. It is really, really dangerous.

Yes, and the whole goal of the nefarious bike lobby is to... make it safer! Those evil bastards.

Good luck with that. Maybe when you're done, you can also figure out a way to make boxing safe, to make football safe and to make assault rifles safe too.

DP but whatever, bike lanes are going to continue to be built and expanded because their positives far outweigh their negatives. Your false equivalences comparing a method of commuting to recreation activities and deadly weapons (a car is much more analogous to an assault rifle in the damage it can do) aren’t winning arguments. You’ve already lost and I’ll keep biking my way to work as more and more lanes get put in for my safe travel

Some things are just inherently really dangerous -- guns, boxing, riding a bike in a major city -- and there's nothing anyone can do about this. Common sense will tell you this. It would be better if cyclists weren't such incredible crybabies and just took responsibility for the risks they choose to run. It's not the government's job to protect you from hurting yourself while doing something stupid.

I dunno I moved here from Tokyo where it’s incredibly safe to bike. I defy you to say that’s not a major city. They don’t even have tons of protected bike lanes. They have smaller cars (and trucks) and smaller roads and drivers who are cognizant of and careful around cyclists.

For the moment, Tokyo is a major city. But as its population decreases and it becomes more in the orbit of Korea or China, it will be another "waiting for the other shoe to drop" place like Hong Kong.

Tokyo is a city. Korea and China are countries.

Tokyo's population is almost 14 million people. DC is 800,000.

What were you trying to say?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Rules for bikes are the same as for cars. Try and pass a car on the right when he's making a right hand turn and let us know how it works out.

They should be but they're not. The bicyclist can legally undertake the truck. But it's extremely dangerous. Because the truck can make a right turn and run over the bicyclist.


Rules for cars have been ironed out over years of crashes, and are designed so that everyone knows what all the cars are supposed to be doing, for the safety of everyone. Rules for bikes are designed for convenience or efficiency but not for safety.

I would partly disagree here. Rules for bicycles are certainly designed for convenience, but at the expense of clarity. Cyclists demand to be able to make risk-based judgments in certain situations that cars are simply not allowed to make due to the risks. This means that there are no bright lines rules governing cyclist behavior. The most important thing for safety is that all users can have expectations of how other users will act in certain situations. Unfortunately there is a lot of pushback to setting these brightline rules for cycling. It’s worth noting that countries in Europe that have lower accident rates for bicycles do have clear rules governing all users.

And there it is. Bicyclists do whatever the hell they want and then blame drivers for collisions.

Correct: A bicycle rider crashed into my car as I was waiting for a red light. The rider was on a bike path by a major street that bisects the path. Everyone else was waiting for the intersection to clear so that they could cross the street, but Bicycle Princess tried to maneuver in front of my car so that she could cut through the waiting cars. It was a tight squeeze and she lost her balance and she and her bike "fell" into the front of my car. She created about $2,000 worth of body damage but refused to provide ay identifying information. Fortunately, an Arlington County cop was nearby and saw the effect of the accident she caused. She claimed that she was a poor student and could not pay for the damage. I found her parents and sent photos of what she did to my car. They paid up. Can you imagine racing that kind of brat.

Do you know what percentage of drivers come to a complete, legal stop at the 4 way stop signs in my neighborhood? Over the course of COVID, I had a chance to actually assess this and track it.

About 4%

Please stop with the nonsense.

Did you also assess the number of drivers who stop at red lights? That would be more relevant.

Fewer and fewer. I especially love the move of 2022 where someone goes around the line of cars waiting at the red light, in the oncoming traffic lane, to barrel through the red light. This has happened in upper NW at least 5 times to my firsthand witness.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Rules for bikes are the same as for cars. Try and pass a car on the right when he's making a right hand turn and let us know how it works out.

They should be but they're not. The bicyclist can legally undertake the truck. But it's extremely dangerous. Because the truck can make a right turn and run over the bicyclist.


Rules for cars have been ironed out over years of crashes, and are designed so that everyone knows what all the cars are supposed to be doing, for the safety of everyone. Rules for bikes are designed for convenience or efficiency but not for safety.

I would partly disagree here. Rules for bicycles are certainly designed for convenience, but at the expense of clarity. Cyclists demand to be able to make risk-based judgments in certain situations that cars are simply not allowed to make due to the risks. This means that there are no bright lines rules governing cyclist behavior. The most important thing for safety is that all users can have expectations of how other users will act in certain situations. Unfortunately there is a lot of pushback to setting these brightline rules for cycling. It’s worth noting that countries in Europe that have lower accident rates for bicycles do have clear rules governing all users.

And there it is. Bicyclists do whatever the hell they want and then blame drivers for collisions.

Correct: A bicycle rider crashed into my car as I was waiting for a red light. The rider was on a bike path by a major street that bisects the path. Everyone else was waiting for the intersection to clear so that they could cross the street, but Bicycle Princess tried to maneuver in front of my car so that she could cut through the waiting cars. It was a tight squeeze and she lost her balance and she and her bike "fell" into the front of my car. She created about $2,000 worth of body damage but refused to provide ay identifying information. Fortunately, an Arlington County cop was nearby and saw the effect of the accident she caused. She claimed that she was a poor student and could not pay for the damage. I found her parents and sent photos of what she did to my car. They paid up. Can you imagine racing that kind of brat.

No i can’t and I feel sorry for your parents raising someone who thinks it is ok to block bike paths.

Not as sorry as I feel for your parents who couldn't afford a school where you learned to read. "a bike path by a major street that bisects the path." This is what that means: The bike path crosses a major street. The street has traffic lights on it. I was stopped at a traffic light. The person who hit my car was stopped at the same traffic light. Rather than wait for the traffic light to change to green, she tried to maneuver between my car and the car ahead of me so that she did not have to wait for the red light. So, old son, it is okay to block bike paths.

The fact that it took you a paragraph to explain what this was means it wasn’t as clearly written as you seem to think it’s was. It is actually still not clear where you or the girl were as you mention a street and a path and her passing. Adding directionality and consistent wording to your story would make it decipherable.

My parents did just fine. I have enough money that I don’t freak out when someone does minor damage to my car, I have good enough communication skills that I am able to settle minor legal matters with the involved parties and not their parents, and I don’t think so myopically to think these parents raised their kid wrong or that she was a brat because of a minor incident.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Rules for bikes are the same as for cars. Try and pass a car on the right when he's making a right hand turn and let us know how it works out.

They should be but they're not. The bicyclist can legally undertake the truck. But it's extremely dangerous. Because the truck can make a right turn and run over the bicyclist.


Rules for cars have been ironed out over years of crashes, and are designed so that everyone knows what all the cars are supposed to be doing, for the safety of everyone. Rules for bikes are designed for convenience or efficiency but not for safety.

I would partly disagree here. Rules for bicycles are certainly designed for convenience, but at the expense of clarity. Cyclists demand to be able to make risk-based judgments in certain situations that cars are simply not allowed to make due to the risks. This means that there are no bright lines rules governing cyclist behavior. The most important thing for safety is that all users can have expectations of how other users will act in certain situations. Unfortunately there is a lot of pushback to setting these brightline rules for cycling. It’s worth noting that countries in Europe that have lower accident rates for bicycles do have clear rules governing all users.

And there it is. Bicyclists do whatever the hell they want and then blame drivers for collisions.

Correct: A bicycle rider crashed into my car as I was waiting for a red light. The rider was on a bike path by a major street that bisects the path. Everyone else was waiting for the intersection to clear so that they could cross the street, but Bicycle Princess tried to maneuver in front of my car so that she could cut through the waiting cars. It was a tight squeeze and she lost her balance and she and her bike "fell" into the front of my car. She created about $2,000 worth of body damage but refused to provide ay identifying information. Fortunately, an Arlington County cop was nearby and saw the effect of the accident she caused. She claimed that she was a poor student and could not pay for the damage. I found her parents and sent photos of what she did to my car. They paid up. Can you imagine racing that kind of brat.

No i can’t and I feel sorry for your parents raising someone who thinks it is ok to block bike paths.

Not as sorry as I feel for your parents who couldn't afford a school where you learned to read. "a bike path by a major street that bisects the path." This is what that means: The bike path crosses a major street. The street has traffic lights on it. I was stopped at a traffic light. The person who hit my car was stopped at the same traffic light. Rather than wait for the traffic light to change to green, she tried to maneuver between my car and the car ahead of me so that she did not have to wait for the red light. So, old son, it is okay to block bike paths.

The fact that it took you a paragraph to explain what this was means it wasn’t as clearly written as you seem to think it’s was. It is actually still not clear where you or the girl were as you mention a street and a path and her passing. Adding directionality and consistent wording to your story would make it decipherable.

My parents did just fine. I have enough money that I don’t freak out when someone does minor damage to my car, I have good enough communication skills that I am able to settle minor legal matters with the involved parties and not their parents, and I don’t think so myopically to think these parents raised their kid wrong or that she was a brat because of a minor incident. [/quote


Sorry, my native language is not English. I speak four languages fluently, but English is not one of them. The police told me to contact the parents because they said the girl was a student and had no insurance or means to pay for the damage she caused. I am happy that you can pay or other people's mistakes. When I contacted the parents, the mother said that the daughter was a problem and made a nice apology with the money she sent. The police did not think it was a minor incident and the girl also received a ticket for her action. The mother knew about the ticket before I contacted her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RIP to the two cyclists who died recently. The state department woman was a great person. What a loss. I live in Shaw near whether the other cyclist died. As a mom and a driver, I just hope that parents who think it’s safe and cool to ride with their kids in trailers and baby seats on their bike will think twice. I rode bikes downtown with my kids during the pandemic when the streets were mostly empty, but it’s not safe most of the time, especially at rush hour. One mistake by a car and the unthinkable will happen again. Ok if adults take risks, but please don’t put your kids on the line. Also, I hope all the scooter people will take note. So many near accidents every day.

+1

You have to be insane to allow a child on a bike in Washington D.C. It is really, really dangerous.

Yes, and the whole goal of the nefarious bike lobby is to... make it safer! Those evil bastards.

Good luck with that. Maybe when you're done, you can also figure out a way to make boxing safe, to make football safe and to make assault rifles safe too.

DP but whatever, bike lanes are going to continue to be built and expanded because their positives far outweigh their negatives. Your false equivalences comparing a method of commuting to recreation activities and deadly weapons (a car is much more analogous to an assault rifle in the damage it can do) aren’t winning arguments. You’ve already lost and I’ll keep biking my way to work as more and more lanes get put in for my safe travel

Some things are just inherently really dangerous -- guns, boxing, riding a bike in a major city -- and there's nothing anyone can do about this. Common sense will tell you this. It would be better if cyclists weren't such incredible crybabies and just took responsibility for the risks they choose to run. It's not the government's job to protect you from hurting yourself while doing something stupid.

Pretty much this. It may seem unfair but the best way to not become a bike fatality in the city or nearby burbs is to avoid the streets. Stay on the paths and just realize that you may have to slow down for pedestrians-just as you've been telling the cars on the road to do. Make better choices. No driver wants to be involved in any type of fatality. I'm vociferous in my dislike of bikers because stories like this make me angry. That poor woman had a family and a life to live. Now there is a great big hole where she used to be. Awful and all because of one bad choice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RIP to the two cyclists who died recently. The state department woman was a great person. What a loss. I live in Shaw near whether the other cyclist died. As a mom and a driver, I just hope that parents who think it’s safe and cool to ride with their kids in trailers and baby seats on their bike will think twice. I rode bikes downtown with my kids during the pandemic when the streets were mostly empty, but it’s not safe most of the time, especially at rush hour. One mistake by a car and the unthinkable will happen again. Ok if adults take risks, but please don’t put your kids on the line. Also, I hope all the scooter people will take note. So many near accidents every day.

+1

You have to be insane to allow a child on a bike in Washington D.C. It is really, really dangerous.

Yes, and the whole goal of the nefarious bike lobby is to... make it safer! Those evil bastards.

Good luck with that. Maybe when you're done, you can also figure out a way to make boxing safe, to make football safe and to make assault rifles safe too.

DP but whatever, bike lanes are going to continue to be built and expanded because their positives far outweigh their negatives. Your false equivalences comparing a method of commuting to recreation activities and deadly weapons (a car is much more analogous to an assault rifle in the damage it can do) aren’t winning arguments. You’ve already lost and I’ll keep biking my way to work as more and more lanes get put in for my safe travel

Some things are just inherently really dangerous -- guns, boxing, riding a bike in a major city -- and there's nothing anyone can do about this. Common sense will tell you this. It would be better if cyclists weren't such incredible crybabies and just took responsibility for the risks they choose to run. It's not the government's job to protect you from hurting yourself while doing something stupid.

I dunno I moved here from Tokyo where it’s incredibly safe to bike. I defy you to say that’s not a major city. They don’t even have tons of protected bike lanes. They have smaller cars (and trucks) and smaller roads and drivers who are cognizant of and careful around cyclists.

For the moment, Tokyo is a major city. But as its population decreases and it becomes more in the orbit of Korea or China, it will be another "waiting for the other shoe to drop" place like Hong Kong.

Tokyo is a city. Korea and China are countries.

Tokyo's population is almost 14 million people. DC is 800,000.

What were you trying to say?

And anyway last time I was in Shanghai there were even more bikers on the roads there than I used to see in Tokyo so PP’s suggestion that Japanese bike culture would disappear if it were subsumed by China seems fairly strange.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RIP to the two cyclists who died recently. The state department woman was a great person. What a loss. I live in Shaw near whether the other cyclist died. As a mom and a driver, I just hope that parents who think it’s safe and cool to ride with their kids in trailers and baby seats on their bike will think twice. I rode bikes downtown with my kids during the pandemic when the streets were mostly empty, but it’s not safe most of the time, especially at rush hour. One mistake by a car and the unthinkable will happen again. Ok if adults take risks, but please don’t put your kids on the line. Also, I hope all the scooter people will take note. So many near accidents every day.

+1

You have to be insane to allow a child on a bike in Washington D.C. It is really, really dangerous.

Yes, and the whole goal of the nefarious bike lobby is to... make it safer! Those evil bastards.

Good luck with that. Maybe when you're done, you can also figure out a way to make boxing safe, to make football safe and to make assault rifles safe too.

DP but whatever, bike lanes are going to continue to be built and expanded because their positives far outweigh their negatives. Your false equivalences comparing a method of commuting to recreation activities and deadly weapons (a car is much more analogous to an assault rifle in the damage it can do) aren’t winning arguments. You’ve already lost and I’ll keep biking my way to work as more and more lanes get put in for my safe travel

Some things are just inherently really dangerous -- guns, boxing, riding a bike in a major city -- and there's nothing anyone can do about this. Common sense will tell you this. It would be better if cyclists weren't such incredible crybabies and just took responsibility for the risks they choose to run. It's not the government's job to protect you from hurting yourself while doing something stupid.

Pretty much this. It may seem unfair but the best way to not become a bike fatality in the city or nearby burbs is to avoid the streets. Stay on the paths and just realize that you may have to slow down for pedestrians-just as you've been telling the cars on the road to do. Make better choices. No driver wants to be involved in any type of fatality. I'm vociferous in my dislike of bikers because stories like this make me angry. That poor woman had a family and a life to live. Now there is a great big hole where she used to be. Awful and all because of one bad choice.

You dislike bicyclists because sometimes drivers hit them with their cars. Got it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RIP to the two cyclists who died recently. The state department woman was a great person. What a loss. I live in Shaw near whether the other cyclist died. As a mom and a driver, I just hope that parents who think it’s safe and cool to ride with their kids in trailers and baby seats on their bike will think twice. I rode bikes downtown with my kids during the pandemic when the streets were mostly empty, but it’s not safe most of the time, especially at rush hour. One mistake by a car and the unthinkable will happen again. Ok if adults take risks, but please don’t put your kids on the line. Also, I hope all the scooter people will take note. So many near accidents every day.

+1

You have to be insane to allow a child on a bike in Washington D.C. It is really, really dangerous.

Yes, and the whole goal of the nefarious bike lobby is to... make it safer! Those evil bastards.

Good luck with that. Maybe when you're done, you can also figure out a way to make boxing safe, to make football safe and to make assault rifles safe too.

DP but whatever, bike lanes are going to continue to be built and expanded because their positives far outweigh their negatives. Your false equivalences comparing a method of commuting to recreation activities and deadly weapons (a car is much more analogous to an assault rifle in the damage it can do) aren’t winning arguments. You’ve already lost and I’ll keep biking my way to work as more and more lanes get put in for my safe travel

Some things are just inherently really dangerous -- guns, boxing, riding a bike in a major city -- and there's nothing anyone can do about this. Common sense will tell you this. It would be better if cyclists weren't such incredible crybabies and just took responsibility for the risks they choose to run. It's not the government's job to protect you from hurting yourself while doing something stupid.

Pretty much this. It may seem unfair but the best way to not become a bike fatality in the city or nearby burbs is to avoid the streets. Stay on the paths and just realize that you may have to slow down for pedestrians-just as you've been telling the cars on the road to do. Make better choices. No driver wants to be involved in any type of fatality. I'm vociferous in my dislike of bikers because stories like this make me angry. That poor woman had a family and a life to live. Now there is a great big hole where she used to be. Awful and all because of one bad choice.

You don't have to hit submit just because you typed, you know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RIP to the two cyclists who died recently. The state department woman was a great person. What a loss. I live in Shaw near whether the other cyclist died. As a mom and a driver, I just hope that parents who think it’s safe and cool to ride with their kids in trailers and baby seats on their bike will think twice. I rode bikes downtown with my kids during the pandemic when the streets were mostly empty, but it’s not safe most of the time, especially at rush hour. One mistake by a car and the unthinkable will happen again. Ok if adults take risks, but please don’t put your kids on the line. Also, I hope all the scooter people will take note. So many near accidents every day.

+1

You have to be insane to allow a child on a bike in Washington D.C. It is really, really dangerous.

Yes, and the whole goal of the nefarious bike lobby is to... make it safer! Those evil bastards.

Good luck with that. Maybe when you're done, you can also figure out a way to make boxing safe, to make football safe and to make assault rifles safe too.

DP but whatever, bike lanes are going to continue to be built and expanded because their positives far outweigh their negatives. Your false equivalences comparing a method of commuting to recreation activities and deadly weapons (a car is much more analogous to an assault rifle in the damage it can do) aren’t winning arguments. You’ve already lost and I’ll keep biking my way to work as more and more lanes get put in for my safe travel

Some things are just inherently really dangerous -- guns, boxing, riding a bike in a major city -- and there's nothing anyone can do about this. Common sense will tell you this. It would be better if cyclists weren't such incredible crybabies and just took responsibility for the risks they choose to run. It's not the government's job to protect you from hurting yourself while doing something stupid.

I dunno I moved here from Tokyo where it’s incredibly safe to bike. I defy you to say that’s not a major city. They don’t even have tons of protected bike lanes. They have smaller cars (and trucks) and smaller roads and drivers who are cognizant of and careful around cyclists.

For the moment, Tokyo is a major city. But as its population decreases and it becomes more in the orbit of Korea or China, it will be another "waiting for the other shoe to drop" place like Hong Kong.

Tokyo is a city. Korea and China are countries.

Tokyo's population is almost 14 million people. DC is 800,000.

What were you trying to say?

This is what I am trying to say.

For the moment, Tokyo is a major city. As you pointed out its current population is 14 million but that population is expected to decline significantly by the middle of the Century when Japan's current population of 125 million people is expected to fall to 100 million people.
China, to a great extent, and South Korea, to a lesser extent, will try to exploit that falling population by moving on it.

Then Tokyo will be like the former British colony, Hong Kong, waiting for the other shoe to drop -- i.e, a Chinese takeover.