The Oregon Senate passed a bill updating laws around electric bicycles on Monday. It's named for a Bend teen killed in a collision while riding an e-bike last summer.
Was there a protected bike lane next to you when they zipped passed you? It doesn’t matter if there’s a bunch of unused bike lanes in the city if they aren’t where you need to go. There are tons of sidewalks and car lanes that sit unused most of the time but we keep them open because people will eventually use them.
If we treated bikes like we treat cars and pedestrians and give them they’re own lane on every street none of this would happen, cause bikes don’t want to ride on sidewalks just as much as pedestrians don’t want them on the sidewalks. Weaving through pedestrians slows you down and is dangerous. You may be just as scared of bikes as the bikes are of cars but the cars aren’t nearly as afraid of bikes as bikes are of pedestrians. If your in a car and you hit a bike your going to be fine physically cause your surrounded by a metal box meant to protect you. If your on a bike and hit a pedestrian , you may come out better than the pedestrian, but you are way more likely to be physically injured or dead then if you were a driver. There’s a shared stake in avoiding collisions between pedestrians and cyclist that cars don’t have.
The solution has to be more bike lanes and not less e-bikes because e-bikes are better for the environment and people’s health than cars. Even looking at it as just a pedestrian your better with an e-bike riding in a lane next to you then a car, there less dangerous, quieter, and don’t emit a bunch of toxic fumes and brake pad dust that you have to breathe in. The cars are the enemy, not the e-bikes.
Sidewalks are for people. Where I live you ride on the bike lanes, if there are none, you ride on the road. If it scares you to drive on the road, don’t cycle in the city. Don’t put other people in danger cause you don’t like the rules.
We both agree that bikes on the sidewalk are a problem that needs a solution. Making it illegal to ride on the sidewalk isn’t working so the way I see it there are three other solutions:
Increase enforcement so that bikers will get consequences for riding on the sidewalk
Restrict e-bike use
Add more bike lanes
The first one will cost more than the third and could lead to chases that further endanger pedestrians. Theres also no guarantee it will work as long as there’s gaps in the polices views. This also will discourage e-bike use which gets us to two. Restricting e-bikes could stop them from being in the sidewalk but encourages more car use which is bad for the environment and you as a pedestrian. That leaves three which solves the problem and encourages alternative transport which we need to do if we want to stop climate change.
When there’s a problem with a viable solution you have to find out what system is preventing that solution and direct your anger there. Getting mad at the individual only disperses your anger away from the underlying forces that are making that individual do something that will remain. If you report that cyclist and the police actually do catch them and give them a ticket that’s not going to stop them. Even if they confiscated there bike some day another person’s just going to zip past you.
If your boss fires you in favor of an undocumented immigrant who they can pay under minimum wage, getting mad at the immigrant and having them deported isn’t going to help your problem, your boss will just hire a different one and laugh as they watch the poor people fight each other. You need to have solidarity with that immigrant and realize the boss and the immigration system are harming both of you and direct your combined anger towards them.
I love your typical cyclist answer. “It’s not my fault, it’s not my problem, I don’t care about pedestrians, it’s the city’s fault, the city should spend more money on meeeees!”
I do care about pedestrians, I walk way more than I cycle, that’s why I’m proposing a solution that will make both safe. The city would maybe spend a bit more money up front to put down some paint , but long term it would save money because cars wear down the road much more than bikes. Cars are the thing that’s draining the city budget by forcing constant road maintenance.
I don’t understand what you want , if you want bikes to stop being on the sidewalks and for the city to save money along with a bunch of other benefits put down a bike lane, unless you have some better solution. You haven’t suggested any solution though which makes me think you want to just be mad at cyclists and stew in your anger without doing anything, which doesn’t sound like a good way to live.
If you do want to get mad at something get mad at cars which are an exponentially larger threat to you as a pedestrian then a bike. Unless your main means of transport is a car and you can’t get mad at them so you take it out on cyclists instead.
No. The city didn’t zip past me and my kids, it was the biker. My city is filled with unused bike lanes as the bikes zip around the sidewalk
Was there a protected bike lane next to you when they zipped passed you? It doesn’t matter if there’s a bunch of unused bike lanes in the city if they aren’t where you need to go. There are tons of sidewalks and car lanes that sit unused most of the time but we keep them open because people will eventually use them.
If we treated bikes like we treat cars and pedestrians and give them they’re own lane on every street none of this would happen, cause bikes don’t want to ride on sidewalks just as much as pedestrians don’t want them on the sidewalks. Weaving through pedestrians slows you down and is dangerous. You may be just as scared of bikes as the bikes are of cars but the cars aren’t nearly as afraid of bikes as bikes are of pedestrians. If your in a car and you hit a bike your going to be fine physically cause your surrounded by a metal box meant to protect you. If your on a bike and hit a pedestrian , you may come out better than the pedestrian, but you are way more likely to be physically injured or dead then if you were a driver. There’s a shared stake in avoiding collisions between pedestrians and cyclist that cars don’t have.
The solution has to be more bike lanes and not less e-bikes because e-bikes are better for the environment and people’s health than cars. Even looking at it as just a pedestrian your better with an e-bike riding in a lane next to you then a car, there less dangerous, quieter, and don’t emit a bunch of toxic fumes and brake pad dust that you have to breathe in. The cars are the enemy, not the e-bikes.
Sidewalks are for people. Where I live you ride on the bike lanes, if there are none, you ride on the road. If it scares you to drive on the road, don’t cycle in the city. Don’t put other people in danger cause you don’t like the rules.
We both agree that bikes on the sidewalk are a problem that needs a solution. Making it illegal to ride on the sidewalk isn’t working so the way I see it there are three other solutions:
The first one will cost more than the third and could lead to chases that further endanger pedestrians. Theres also no guarantee it will work as long as there’s gaps in the polices views. This also will discourage e-bike use which gets us to two. Restricting e-bikes could stop them from being in the sidewalk but encourages more car use which is bad for the environment and you as a pedestrian. That leaves three which solves the problem and encourages alternative transport which we need to do if we want to stop climate change.
When there’s a problem with a viable solution you have to find out what system is preventing that solution and direct your anger there. Getting mad at the individual only disperses your anger away from the underlying forces that are making that individual do something that will remain. If you report that cyclist and the police actually do catch them and give them a ticket that’s not going to stop them. Even if they confiscated there bike some day another person’s just going to zip past you.
If your boss fires you in favor of an undocumented immigrant who they can pay under minimum wage, getting mad at the immigrant and having them deported isn’t going to help your problem, your boss will just hire a different one and laugh as they watch the poor people fight each other. You need to have solidarity with that immigrant and realize the boss and the immigration system are harming both of you and direct your combined anger towards them.
I love your typical cyclist answer. “It’s not my fault, it’s not my problem, I don’t care about pedestrians, it’s the city’s fault, the city should spend more money on meeeees!”
I do care about pedestrians, I walk way more than I cycle, that’s why I’m proposing a solution that will make both safe. The city would maybe spend a bit more money up front to put down some paint , but long term it would save money because cars wear down the road much more than bikes. Cars are the thing that’s draining the city budget by forcing constant road maintenance.
I don’t understand what you want , if you want bikes to stop being on the sidewalks and for the city to save money along with a bunch of other benefits put down a bike lane, unless you have some better solution. You haven’t suggested any solution though which makes me think you want to just be mad at cyclists and stew in your anger without doing anything, which doesn’t sound like a good way to live.
If you do want to get mad at something get mad at cars which are an exponentially larger threat to you as a pedestrian then a bike. Unless your main means of transport is a car and you can’t get mad at them so you take it out on cyclists instead.