The Disappointing Distraction of “Vehicular Cycling”

Is this the most counterproductive idea in the world of cycling?
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Thanks to John Simmerman of Active Towns for footage from the Netherlands: • Exploring Utrecht Nov ...
John Forester resources:
www.bicycling.com/culture/a32...
• 2007.05.17_EXT_TT_John...
• 2007 S2b 04 Forrester avi
References:
"Enjoy the Ride - Essential Bicycling Skills": • Enjoy the Ride - Essen...
Vancouver study on preferred bike routes: cyclingincities-spph.sites.ol...
Public bike counter data (including top bike counter in Paris): data.eco-counter.com/ParcPubl...
Montreal bike counter data: data.eco-counter.com/ParcPubl...
Commuting data came from 2021 census in Australia and Canada
Study on cycling in Melbourne: www.sciencedirect.com/science...
Research review of cycling safety: bikehub.ca/sites/default/file...
Bike lane safety study in Montreal: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...
Astonishingly high cyclist death and injury rates in USA: www.researchgate.net/figure/C...
Cyclist death on Saint-Denis in Montreal: www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montre...

[@johanlugthart7782]

Let’s introduce vehicle walking. A side walk is discrimination against the mode of transport.

[@theSleepyLamp]

Actually, are you aware that in the us, there are many places where the sidewalk just ends? Seems like vehicular walking is already a thing

[@agntdrake]

I know this is tongue-and-cheek, but it's kinda true. There are many places where cars do go slow enough that you won't feel like you're about to be killed if you walk/jog on the street. My neighbourhood doesn't have sidewalks, but *everyone* walks because cars do drive slowly. This is echoed in Europe where there are many places which are primarily pedestrian, but local traffic can drive there if it needs to. You just have to drive slowly.

[@xaboff]

@@theSleepyLamp no, it's not really a thing, as people just won't walk at all in those places

[@hq3473]

This but un ironically. Can we slow traffic to such levels that people can simply walk there?

[@somethingsomething404]

I wish downtown Vancouver had a 25/km/hr speed limit. It’s a 3km peninsula you don’t need to drive 60km/hr

[@dernwine]

Johns entire point is ruined by me: I am a confident cyclist. I will ride in traffic and hold my own, take the primary, stay out of the door zone, act like a vehicle in general (and when not treated as one I've made my point very emphatically known at times, both my daily commute and my weekly supercommute take me through heavy urban traffic. AND YET. You give me a safe and well designed bike lane, and I'll instantly choose that over traffic. It's safer, it's faster, and it's an over all more pleasant experience. It's not a question of knowledge, or of skill, or education. It's simple physics.

[@billyea]

Even if the bike lane were slower, i.e. the bike lane is being used by a lot of people at the time and I just feel like going faster, I'm still not going back on the road unless I have no choice. I want to live, speed is secondary. Bike lane wins 100% of the time and it's not even close.

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

Wherever there are frequent intersections, there is no such thing as a safe, well designed bike lane. Bike lanes are fine where there are very few intersections, and bike trails along rivers or on old railroad beds are fine as well.

[@brianmiller5444]

@@SavingCommunitiesDS Your argument is irrelevant. If the only option is riding bikes on a 35 mph or 45 mph stroad with multiple commercial driveways, distracted drivers,viewsheds blocked by signs, and cross traffic....there will simply be fewer cyclists. Only the desperate or "lost" will ride on such streets. So of course, the statistics will show fewer deaths or injuries.

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

@@brianmiller5444, some roads are better than others, but the road you are talking about would be more dangerous with people turning into "multiple commercial driveways" across a bike lane. Cross traffic is also more dangerous to cyclists in bike lanes. Meanwhile, the statistics are not of total deaths, but deaths per 100k cyclists. Amsterdam and Ultrect are among the most dangerous per 100k cyclists.

[@dernwine]

@@SavingCommunitiesDS Sure there are. nacto.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/DGUATI-protected-intersection-diagram.png

[@topolojack]

i promise that no matter how educated and confident i am, cycling in the middle of the vehicle lane will not stop motorists behind me from honking at me and speeding up and swerving past me. very safe and secure.

[@TrippinBusa]

That's because you are holding everyone else up being out there with pedal powered bs

[@itIsI988]

@@TrippinBusa Cry

[@Joesolo13]

@@TrippinBusa So you get why he's right

[@Alex-od7nl]

as a cyclist, you are entirely in your legal right in taking the middle of the lane. Also, it is safer than being on the side of the lane, where you risk being side-swiped by some a-hole who wants to squeeze past you at 50 mph. Or doored. If bikes have to use the center of the lane, it is only because that is the safest, most viable option for you. Who cares what the road-ragers think.

[@bulldozer8950]

Cyclists don’t want to be mixed in with cars, cars don’t want to be mixed in with cyclists. His whole point is incredibly stupid. It’s like saying we don’t sidewalks, we just need to teach people how to walk in the road with cars.

[@JHZech]

This is happening in my town. People are pushing hard for a protected bike lane and the city staff is trying but the cyclist club is giving them so much pushback that the city is hesitant to move forward. It's incredibly frustrating, like they see bikes as only being for enthusiasts and think kids and older people don't deserve to ride.

[@brianmiller5444]

That is unfortunate and so strange to see an organized cycling club so beholden to this ideology! Good luck!

[@stefanoberli5920]

Sounds like the typical road bike elitists. Bikes are for everyone!

[@77cicero77]

Lycra supremacists ruining it for everyone else. So frustrating.

[@rogerwilco2]

That is so weird. Have you tried talking to them?

[@mindstalk]

@@brianmiller5444 The people willing to bike _now_ in most North American cities are selected for being risk-tolerant and very physically fit. (They're not necessarily the majority of actual bikers, but poor laborers biking to work at 7 AM aren't showing up to city council meetings.) So if you ask current bikers what they like, a lot of them will happy with the status quo, because they're precisely the ones willing to bike in the status quo. But they're like 1-3% of the population. A majority of the population are potential bikers, but only if they can avoid fast cars.

[@maninthehills7134]

The notion of using "education" or "spreading awareness" as a solution unto itself is, in my opinion, the biggest reason a lot of these social issues don't get better. Teaching motorists to share the road is like teaching a thief not to steal. Protected bike infrastructure is worth orders of magnitude more than an awareness campaign.

[@placeholdername0000]

"Just say no", didn't fix drugs.

[@mariusfacktor3597]

It's so reactionary too. Like blaming mass homelessness on the individual instead of trying to fix the system that produces mass homelessness.

[@pendlera2959]

The issue is that there will always be bad actors or just plain accidents. It doesn't matter how much you teach someone to do the right thing when the stakes are this high. Cyclists need to be protected from knowledgeable yet fallible drivers, and sharing the road, no matter how cautiously, doesn't meet that need.

[@falkenfluegel]

Doesn't even matter how much people are educated. People driving cars are disctracted, stressed, angry ect. If a car hits a biker, the biker always loses... what else is there to talk about?

[@rosskgilmour]

At some point you get a critical mass of cyclist where motorist and cyclists share the road. That’s kind how cycling felt in London uk. Good infrastructure created a critical mass of cyclists that there was always a cyclist in traffic because the cycle network didn’t extend every where. I think cyclists and motorists will always share the road, especially with lower speed limits , and higher concentrations of cyclists due to better infrastructure

[@rotary65]

Vehicular cycling is exclusionary in that it is unsafe for all bicycle users. So it's a non-starter as an active transportation strategy.

[@derosa1989]

Ok, but 99% of the roads in North America have no dedicated bike infrastructure. So you're going to keep to the tiny minority of roads that only have separate bike lanes?

[@rotary65]

@derosa1989 you don't need dedicated bike infrastructure everywhere. You need it in corridors that form transportation networks. You need to slow traffic, reduce car trips, and emphasize active transportation in urban centers.

[@derosa1989]

@@rotary65 So what about cyclists who don't live in urban centers? Aren't you excluding them from your plan?

[@grahamturner2640]

@@derosa1989 rural highways, especially interstates, often have shoulders wider than urban bike lanes. Unfortunately, that’s about it, and intersections are probably difficult to navigate.

[@crassirus]

@@derosa1989 "What about the rural people?!" If I had a penny for each time I've heard this I'd have a respectable side hustle. I don't know, what about them? What exactly makes this exclusionary to them? Why can't we just talk about urban biking issues and let rural folk make their own decisions, exactly? Aren't you being a bit patronizing?

[@xouxoful]

« It’s an obsolete medieval city where you can’t even park your car » tells all you need to know about this guy. He can’t even imagine places where you don’t need to own a car.

[@rogerwilco2]

Indeed.

[@MrMarinus18]

This is overlooking that American cities predate cars as well.

[@mavadelo]

He was a moron, I suspect he worked for the car industry posing as a Cycling advocate. Of course you try to put down a city in the most succesful cycling country in the world where all the things you oppose proof to be a great succes.

[@LSOP-]

Not only that but it ignores the work done to undo the car centric changes to the city.

[@remko2]

Funny thing is, only the very core of Amsterdam is medieval, the famous canals were laid out and build after 1612 anyway ... they should have put the bugger on a bike and send him into motortraffic for a few hours, just so he could show his superior intelligence. btw, it's not cyclist that should be trained, it's the car drivers, they can easily maim and kill, so it's up to them to make sure that doesn't help. the clip has a rule at the start to ride some distance away from the curb as not to get hit by car doors opening .... every driver over here is taught to check behind him before opening his car door, it's almost second nature.

[@crashzila]

as someone who used to do allot of vehicular cycling in busy and not busy streets. its about dam near the most terrifying thing ive ever done. your literally praying the the drivers see you and dont look down at there phone and run you over. if there are bike paths or lanes i will go out of my way up to 30 mins extra of travel time to use them.

[@keithkeber5655]

That's how I ride. But I'm retired. I don't need to be places in the shortest time possible. If I have local appointments and I choose to ride the bike, it's easy for me to leave plenty of time to get there. I know for younger people, they don't always have the time. Drivers as well as bicyclists. It's really too damn bad that people don't often get to take their time… especially since it's their only truly valuable possesion.

[@blueguitar4419]

In Japan there are options to ride on the highways and almost everyone rides on the sidewalks. Because putting yourself next to fast two ton vehicles is suicidal in all countries at all times.

[@michielvoetberg4634]

This man, John Forester himself would not be capable of cycling in traffic. However, he would be able to cycle on bike lanes.

[@wclark3196]

Really? A bike lane will bring him back from the dead? Idiot.

[@CannedFishFiles]

Yeah, if he actually tried riding around in a modern city, he'd figure out he prefers bike lanes in about 5 minutes!

[@krob9145]

There are also people who identify for a cause when they are actually against it.

[@CannedFishFiles]

@@krob9145 Can you imagine being so miserable!?

[@nathanricci5765]

Well, he's dead now, so I don't think he can cycle any where.

[@poochyenarulez]

I regularly cycle on the road, and i've had many cars (including police SUVs!) come inches away from hitting me. Some even purposely pass by me as close as they can and honk on their horn and even yell at me. Oh, and its illegal for me to cycle on the sidewalk in my city.

[@Gleamings]

A police SUV was literally what got closest to hitting me ever

[@kdejvviihd6439]

Make good use of your U lock when you catch them at the red light. Also have a 360 camera . there are also bike rear view cameras that you mount the display on your handle bar. Cycliq Fly12 sport is also the best bicycle dash cam currently if you dont want to install a 360 camera. Quality of this camera is like go pro with 9 hr battery and easy to install and remove. you can also buy the Whizzzz bicycle reflector and mount it at the end of your handlebar to force drivers keep distance. Finally, use your recordings to file a police report, your police report will most likely not gen them any fines, but this will stay in the history of the car for later whenever they get pulled over or make any offense. Also a camera can help you sue the insurance as mich as you like with your lawyer of course. Im speaking for Toronto.

[@crassirus]

@@kdejvviihd6439 it's America, too. We can bike armed. They are driving lethal weapons, we can carry lethal weapons. It's not illegal. In fact; it's the next logical place we should all go. This nation is founded on defending one's rights and freedoms by any means neccesary, tbh.

[@eldermoose7938]

@@kdejvviihd6439 I live in Texas, so traffic induced shootings are a thing here. So I'm probably not clocking anyone with my U-lock.

[@appa609]

​@@crassirus rdx top tube. If they kill you, you take them with you. Put the fear of God in their eyes whenever you get within 2 ft of their vehicle

[@thomasthuene3173]

Veihuclar Cycling also depends on where you do it. I rode my bicycle in Japan for commuting. I actually liked bicycling so much there, that I chose a hotel about 18 M away from where I was working. There was one particularly dicey part where the bicycle lane simply ended because a gorge became so narrow. I usually just rode on the street. Cars behind me would line up, with respectful distance, not one honk in over 6 months. After about 1500 meters I was able to swerve across the street back to the bike lane. Oncoming traffic always understood what I was about to do ( I indicated diligently), flashing their lights to let me know it was safe to go back to the separated bicycle lane. After the first few days my stress levels were way low because I felt totally safe. Granted, I tried to ride as fast as possible so as not to impede too much on the patience of the people behind me, but still, I was impressed. I cannot even begin to imagine this kind of considerate driving in the US.

[@jamesrosar3823]

It is the bicycle culture of the population at large that makes or breaks mass appeal in a population center. Intersections are the Achilles’ heel of separated facilities for bicycles. Separate does not result in equal, in civil rights or in traffic. Smoking cigarettes and hating gays were popular, too, but education improved those situations and made for undeniable progress. Where separation is impractical, wider right lanes are often workable, but the best improvement is a population that has been taught at an early age how to ride a bike as traffic, that would rather be riding a bike than driving but for whatever, and respects the cyclist that follows vehicular rules, responsibilities and regulations, and is predictable in traffic. Which is, sorry to say, not the typical USA road cyclist, or vehicle driver, either. Driver’s education needs to be started on a bicycle, as the rules are nearly entirely the same. Education is the key to these dilemma, once solved most other solutions become obvious.

[@micosstar]

I see your point with separation; now I am starting to form two ways to integrate cyclists with drivers: 1. separation through infrastructure (separated bike lanes) 2. integration with education (especially to drivers)

[@KevinFields777]

When I was cycling in the 1990s, I was very much a vehicular cyclist in Indianapolis. There were no bike lanes at all, you had no choice. But, still, bicyclists still found alternate routes where either there was low car traffic, or streets wide enough where bikes and vehicles could drive side-by-side rather than mixed in-line. Still, the evidence is clear that dedicated bicycle infrastructure is preferrable and should be the goal.

[@T13Nemo]

The worst part of Vehicular Cycling is that drivers hate when you take the full lane and honk at you all the time. And then they would try to teach you the rules telling you to move to the curb. Who is uneducated now?

[@Moses_VII]

Goofy starred in a cartoon called Motor Mania which shows how people become monsters behind the wheel.

[@dernwine]

No. The worst part of vehicular cycling is that car drivers will sweep past you close enough to knock you off your bike with their wing mirrors at 50mph, regardless of whether you take the primary or not.

[@adamlytle2615]

I'm still angry about the time I was in the left turn lane on my bike and this lady in a truck started yelling at me under the mistaken impression that I was in the wrong

[@rangersmith4652]

Many motorists are, quite simply, uninformed and selfish road users. They immediately become frustrated whenever they are behind a more slowly-moving vehicle, be it a tractor or a bicycle, and they think the only right thing to occur in such a situation is for the slower vehicle to move over and let them by. There is another answer, Mr. and Ms. impatience, selfish driver: wait behind the slower vehicle until a legal and safe opportunity to overtake presents itself, then overtake in a courteous, mature manner. Crossing a double yellow to overtake is always illegal, no matter how slowly the vehicle in front of you in going and no matter important you think your destination is.

[@snoopyloopy]

Yea, the irony of vehicular cycling is that in many places, if even the existing crowd of people biking were to actually adopt and start practicing it the "proper" way, then they would quickly turn some lanes into de facto bike-only lanes because after only like 20-30 bikes per hour, it effectively won't move much faster than bike speeds.

[@leeball4]

Forester had a lot of feelings, not a lot of facts. I wonder what his explanation was for the Dutch choice to move from car-centric culture of the 60's & 70's and transition to the bike culture of today. It's a common fallacy to believe that The Netherlands was always a biking utopia.

[@snoopyloopy]

The discussion at 12:12 is Forester's view of The Netherlands. Essentially, he believes that the reason the Dutch went (back) to biking is because when they started the cars, they didn't mix well with the Medieval cities and the backlash is what stopped the car plans-which is true. However, as was also pointed out, he fails to explain why new Dutch developments still prioritize bikes. Also, the Dutch never quite reached the level of complete collapse of bike ridership that other places e.g. London have. Even at the lowest points in the early 1970s, they still had about 10% ridership and that's about when they started to turn things around, well within the living memory of a time where biking were more accessible by many people. By contrast, most of our modern communities have always been car-centric so people can't envision bikes as a real option for themselves.

[@rishabhanand4973]

he'd probably consider it a "regression"

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

The dutch made many changes for general traffic safety. The smallest improvement in fatalities was to cyclists. There is no evidence that the bike lanes themselves made anything safer.

[@xouxoful]

Yet even if dutch culture is less car-centric, it’s not at all car free. The country has a lot of well maintained freeways and dutch drivers spread all over Europe for summer vacations.

[@t.vanoosterhout233]

​@@SavingCommunitiesDSYou're not making sense. From my own 50+ yrs experience on Dutch cycle lanes I can tell you that they make for a major improvement in cycling safety. But cyclists are, more or less by definition, a very vulnerable group of participants in traffic. Vulnerable, mainly, to collisions with cars. So more separate bicycle lanes are required!

[@Hurc7495]

The best way I can explain sharing the road with cars is this. I was out cycling with a group, one of us got a puncture so we all moved off the road and some of us set about fixing it, it was a nice day out in the country and the reast of us were having a pleasant conversation and generally enjoying our Sunday morning. An SUV passed and the passenger had her middle figure up. Her hatred was so intense that in spite of the fact that we were fully off of the road she felt compelled to show it. I actually feel pity for her, what an awful life she must lead that, zombie like, she must behave this way. Unfortunately, this rabid illogical hatred is widespread to the point that a sizable minority of divers will make a point of using their vehicle as a threat, passing as close as THEY think they can get away with in a deliberate attempt to terrify. The vast majority of the time they are stopped at the next traffic lights ang gain absolutely nothing. Its telling how enraged they become if you say nothing and just look them in the eye, after all they don’t expect there to be consequences for their actions!

[@bennathan7353]

I have worked as a professional driver, driving all sorts of vehicles in city’s and country side for upto 40 hours per week and have never been frustrated with a cyclist, Only a bad driver get confused how to safely pass a bicycle,

[@user-fm1em4qc7s]

I've had multiple occasions of drivers going the opposite direction yell at me, and one intentionally veer onto my side of the road and force me off it. Some people just hate everyone.

[@bennathan7353]

@@user-fm1em4qc7s i was on my bike, a driver was stuck behind me for no longer than 10 seconds, he told me he would kill as he passed, I court him up, kicked off his wing mirror and told him to pull over and try, he didn’t, looked very scared and drive off, I’m not sure why, maybe he wasn’t going to kill me after all. I’d to see him tell the story when he was asked what happened to his wing mirror

[@41052]

I told my mom how me and my sister went on a electric scooter (we go on the roads when we can as they aren’t allowed on sidewalks) and we told her how we were on the far side of a narrow bike lane cause on the other side are parked cars and we didn’t want to hit them, a car goes speeding past us and hocks their horn, while there were plenty of lanes open for cars, it was night time too so there were no other cars, and my mom kept trying to excuse the driver and blame us 😅 she said maybe they didn’t see us and that we need to be all the way in the middle of the bike lane. I wouldn’t have that much a problem with it though if it was a protected bike lane, but they were really close, like I felt the wind and we wobbled a bit cause of the vibrations on the ground. It was kinda scary lol 😂

[@mrcuttime22]

It IS sad. But people are prone to troll vehemently when anonymous, and merely complain when they are not. Besides, we're doing something they probably can't or won't. Let's have the last laugh.

[@smrfsrok]

It’d be one thing if it were cyclists who didn’t know how to be around cars, but I find it’s significantly more common that drivers don’t know how to be around bicyclists that are sharing their road. Even in downtown, urban areas that are two lanes and 25 mph max.

[@ambiarock590]

And I think that the person piloting a 2,000 rolling metal box should be the one who needs to take more responsibility than the person operating a 30 lbs bike. "With power, comes responsibility"

[@scruf153]

nearly all drives drive no les than 45 plus they love to pass stopped school busses

[@redknightsr69]

I drive a commercial truck for a living. I'm a huge supporter of this channel. I can tell you that sometimes it is hard to always see a cyclist. I mean that in the most safest and respectful way as I enjoy cycling myself. Things happen quickly and it's better when the two are separated on fast moving streets and roads. I'm that guy that people on bikes wave at because I treated them like a human being

[@nicokelly6453]

Yeah, Forrester and his folks seemed to also discount that there are plenty of big vehicle drivers who would prefer bikers to have seperate paths not to disadvantage them, but because it feels unsafe to drive so close to a person on a bike you could easily hit and injure or kill.

[@hollylockhart9423]

I was cycling in my city today near my downtown area and came into a street with two lanes, one in each direction, no street parking. Earlier in the road there was a bike lane in either direction but when the road narrows the city removes the bike lanes.... A large commercial truck came up behind me and gave me space while passing by going into the oncoming lane. Ahead of us was a smaller but still large truck (like a U-Haul size but for commercial goods). They were far enough ahead that there wasn't an issue for anyone but not so far ahead that I wasn't worried about it. It made me feel like one us didn't belong on this section of road and I'd like to think it wasn't me.

[@Jonas-Seiler]

I feel majorly uncomfortable around cyclists when driving because I, and I thought this was pretty normal, don’t want to accidentally injure or kill somebody. I feel like many drivers are simply unaware that they are operating heavy machinery that poses a major risk to everybody and everything around it. I also feel like truckers are commonly much safer drivers simply because they are abundantly aware of the danger they impose.

[@joshbobst1629]

Fellow trucker here. I have a bicycle strapped to the back of my truck. I like to explore the cities I visit on it. Our country, the United States, has spent a truly astonishing amount of money on car infrastructure since Ike had his big idea. Something like $20 trillion, adjusted for inflation. I think some of that money should be used for bicycle highways.

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

No, @@nicokelly6453, big trucks are a major reason why bike lanes are unsafe. Many a cyclist has been crushed by a big truck turning right across the path of a cyclist who thought he had the right of way in his bike lane. This cyclist thought she could pass a tractor trailer on the right because the bike lane "belonged to her." kzbin.info/www/bejne/mIaZhoWVep6ZrNE

[@krombopulos_michael]

It's funny that he accuses cycling infrastructure advocates of being sleeper agents for the car lobby to trick cyclicts into wanting second rate infrastructure, but then also that their motivations are not even pro-bike but purely anti-car and that he actually gets along much better with the car lobby than with them. It's one thing to see someone hold very baffling and contradictory thoughts on something they don't really care about, but this guy seemingly campaigned for decades on this and managed to never realise his opinions were crazy.

[@kuriadams9138]

He, himself is likely an agent for the car lobby.

[@Mo-mu4er]

I think of Westly, from the Princess Bride, "Truly, you have a dizzying intellect!"

[@teuast]

His every accusation a confession.

[@rivergladesgardenrailroad8834]

the guy was an idiot....

[@MarioFanGamer659]

He certainly reminds me quite a bit of O'Toole whom OTU also made a video about.

[@aidanknight]

Important to remember that John Forester was ticketed for riding in the road in 1971 and then it became his entire personality for the next 50 years.

[@maxsievers8251]

It's his God given right to ride on the road!!!

[@commemorative]

That's illegal in the US?

[@user-gu9yq5sj7c]

Yet drivers are given a pass for parking in bike lanes?

[@user-gu9yq5sj7c]

@@maxsievers8251 Forester does the same shoving his views on others by being against separate bike paths.

[@SCHMALLZZZ]

​@a nope, it's illegal to park in a bicycle lane. They even have "no parking" on the same signs.

[@AbsolutePixelMaster]

I used to cycle in Vancouver. The key words there being "used to". The constant conflict with vehicle traffic was beyond absurd and no amount of education would make me safer. Even when doing everything right, the risk was still too high. We need to start treating cycling seriously like they do in the Netherlands.

[@keithkeber5655]

Oh, no. I drove through Vancouver on vacation in the 90s. It was a wonderful town. That trip made me want to take my bicycle on the Port Angeles Black Ball ferry to Victoria, then bicycle to Swartz Bay and take the Tsawwassen ferry and bicycle around Vancouver. Maybe spend a couple of nights there. I have only a limited amount of time before the vacation window closes … maybe June or July. Do you think it's a bad idea?

[@AbsolutePixelMaster]

@@keithkeber5655 Vancouver has a lot of great bike infrastructure. What I meant by my original comment was that it is not a complete network. If you stay in the bike friendly areas, it's pretty good. But if you need to travel around the city, you will have to ride on roads with traffic, so you will need to be comfortable with it. That being said, Vancouver does have quite a large bicycle population, so I'm sure there is plenty of good information out there to help you plan your trip!

[@TheInfectous]

@@keithkeber5655 For a vacation the city will work fine, there's plenty of routes you can take.

[@jarretgosbee7717]

I'm a frequent "vehicular cyclist" but there's no way I'm riding like that with my kid on the back in his trailer.

[@mremumerm]

i'm a frequent "vehicular cyclist" but there is no way i would advocate this is the way to go. Same way that as a pedestrian I am comfortable walking in the street, but there in no way i would advocate to remove sidewalks.

[@snoopyloopy]

Yes it's not a favorite at all.

[@AnotherDuck]

@@mremumerm I walk in the street as well, but yeah, that's my choice, and not what I would tell others to do. I used to be a vehicular cyclist back when I was biking regularly (Stockholm, Västerås, and between, in Sweden, for context). But I was a young sporty cyclist who often also went off-road on forest tracks, not a casual bike commuter. I never saw myself as a "normal" cyclist, because I knew that what I was doing wasn't what other people felt safe doing. I was cycling faster (often as fast as cars on slower streets) and paid more attention to my surroundings than the average cyclist. A large part of it was because I felt like at the speed I was going, it was safer in the middle of the street than closer to pedestrians, especially since there was often obstructions or other things to slow me down elsewhere. But most people are not aiming for high speed. Most people are aiming to safely get to work or school and back.

[@weksauce]

@@AnotherDuck "I felt like at the speed I was going, it was safer in the middle of the street than closer to pedestrians" You not only felt this way, which doesn't matter at all, you WERE safer. That's the central safety tenet for cyclists to learn. Take up your lane, get to the left of your lane before intersections. This makes you much, much more visible in all the situations where cyclists tend to get hit and killed by cars.

[@AnotherDuck]

@@weksauce It's harder to miss someone right in front of you than at the side of the road.

[@tduva]

13:45 In places where it's fairly safe to cycle (like the Netherlands) you can often see children cycling to school or activities. Can you imagine 10-year olds vehicular cycling on a busy road between big trucks and SUVs? The approach of not building any separated bicycle infrastructure seems to completely forget about more vulnerable or less confident groups of people, who may also want to enjoy the freedom of getting around by bicycle safely.

[@snoopyloopy]

Some vehicular cyclists ironically insist that children that age should be expected to vehicular cycle, though they also dismiss the "8-80" concept because they insist that kids don't belong in traffic.

[@shinnam]

Spot on. In Sweden it is "a right of passage" for kids to get themselves to school. I see many more +70 on biked than mobility scooters. We have pretty good bike lanes. Our bike lanes are shared with pedestrians in low traffic areas.

[@3of11]

Nothing screams discrimination wuite like telling people to cycle in a manner only capable by fit risk-averse fully abled adults age 21-45.

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

That's a lie, @@snoopyloopy. Vehicular cyclists don't say that kids don't belong in traffic. I started riding a bike on the street at four and rode on major arterial roads at 8.

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

@@3of11, that's also a lie. Almost anyone can learn to ride in traffic, and urban bike lanes are most dangerous to inexperienced cyclists.

[@johnsmiff8328]

The vast majority of the time, I'm a vehicular cyclist. When I can keep with traffic I don't mind it, and sometimes even enjoy it. But I won't be young and risk-tolerant forever, and I certainly wouldn't want my kids trying to meet up with their friends by biking the roads I often have to. We simply have to do better for our children

[@indoorkangaroo3431]

I did a 7 day bicycle tour last year from Melbourne to Sydney, getting out of Melbourne was easy enough and once on quiet back country gravel roads I had days where I would only have 10 cars passing by me. The last quarter of my trip though was on busy roads with heaps of traffic. I can remember the wave of relief I felt when I came across dedicated bicycle lanes around Camden on the outskirts of Sydney. I could ride relaxed, no longer having to constantly be under stress from cars and trucks approaching from behind. Some great points in this video, keep up the great work!

[@therotorooster]

13:09 "You can say the Dutch make driving more difficult...by failing to demolish half of the central city to build highways and surface parking..." I didn't hear the rest because I died laughing.

[@jammin023]

RIP Roto, another victim of the cycling advocacy anti-car mafia.

[@jamesphillips2285]

@@jammin023 Not Just Bikes did a video on the best country in the world for drivers. And it is not the United States.

[@hendman4083]

Plan Jokinen was downvoted in the Amsterdam city council with a 1 vote margin. If the plan had been accepted Amsterdam would have done just that: destroy neigbourhoods in the city centre and fill up canals to create the space to put highways in. If you hadn't guessed it, Mr. Jokinen was an american traffic engineer. 🙄

[@tomdonahoe3539]

​@Hendman It sounds like he was channeling Robert Moses.

[@hendman4083]

@@tomdonahoe3539 I guess it was the "modern" way of thinking by traffic engineers and city designers: rip out the heart of a city all in the name of progress. 😣

[@TheFarix2723]

I tried to "vehicular cycle" down the rural road that runs by my house when I was a teen a didn't feel a bit safe. Most drivers just blared their horns and yelled at me to "get off the road" and a couple of vehicles swarve as if they were going to run me over. Although "vehicular cycling" was heavily promoted in our school system, after the third attempt I quit for fear that it was only a matter of time before I would be hit by a car. About a year later, another cyclist was killed in a collision with a car on the same road I attempted to "vehicular cycle". In that case, the vehicle crossed the centerline at night to "cut the curve" and hit the cyclist head-on.

[@rogerwilco2]

If vehicular cycling was promoted in your school system, then there was something really wrong with it. It certainly doesn't have any basis in science as an education should have.

[@TrippinBusa]

Your first mistake was thinking it's a good idea to ride a bicycle on a road.

[@MikkiRose129]

@@TrippinBusa Where else you supposed to ride them? The pavement where it's illegal in many places including the UK where I live? The bike lanes that don't exist in most places? Please, do offer me a viable option of _where_ it's a good idea to ride a bike if not the road! :)

[@tgazza1587]

@@MikkiRose129 exactly, couldn't have said it better myself. Roads do NOT need to be wiedened. In some places they CANNOT be widened. Bike lanes are stupid and dangerous in themselves

[@MikkiRose129]

@@tgazza1587 I disagree, I'd love for there to be more bike lanes around, _especially_ segregated bike lanes or cycle routes. It would make cycling so much less stressful and more fun! But most places don't have them so we're forced to make do with riding on the road, as risky as it is

[@FrostyButter]

Vehicular cyclists: "Am I so out of touch? No, it's all the other bicyclists who are wrong"

[@usvalve]

I used to be a keen cyclist as a student, but after 35 years as a motorist in the UK I reckoned it was just too dangerous to cycle again. Then I was banned from driving (medical reasons!) and needed to cycle to get around. I entered a world of multiple lanes, roundabouts, heavy traffic, lorries turning off inches from railings... My motto (tongue in cheek, yet seriously useful) was "The other driver won't see you, and if they do, they won't take any avoiding action." So while I generally have no choice but to be 'vehicular', roundabouts and tricky junctions often make me choose to be 'pedestrian'. As for cycle lanes, yes, there are "painted gutters", towpaths, dual-use (pedestrian and cycle) paths and even one or two yards of super Netherlands-style segregated path. The trouble is, they don't join up! Another reason for dedicated cycle paths is that both motorists and pedestrians seem to resent cyclists as stealing THEIR space - I was once physically attacked by a pedestrian on a shared path! - and it would be nice not to be in conflict while we ride.

[@denali637]

Interpreting the philosophy as generously as possible, I'll agree this far: Vehicular cycling on low-traffic streets is preferable to cycling in painted bicycle gutters on high-traffic streets. But compared to actually high-quality bicycle infrastructure? No contest.

[@josephfisher426]

But is "high quality infrastructure" preferable to cycling on low-traffic streets? There's often a focus on main arteries that probably is not economically efficient because there is often an existing street that could be taken offline from thru car traffic. My city's planned bicycle infrastructure is almost all low-quality flexipost lanes on high-traffic streets. It's a poor use of the professional resources needed to create them, even if the improvement itself is inexpensive.

[@brianmiller5444]

@@josephfisher426 The problem is so many American cities are designed with arterials and loop de loops and cut de sacs, and there are often no alternative low traffic streets that provide through access. My California city is horrible that way...all the new subdivisions are literally mazes of looped streets. cup de sacs, and dead ends that go nowhere except within the "planned elite communities". Things are getting better now, but geez...thank good for good cycling computers with maps. Versus Chicago, which can be a surprisingly comfortable cycling city (not in January...or in gangland, but) because it is built on a street grid that provides lots of alternative routes. Which is good, because some of the main streets are godawful stroads...so

[@eechauch5522]

@@josephfisher426 yes, good bike infrastructure on arterials is absolutely superior. Because if the low-traffic street would be an efficient way to get from a to b, it wouldn’t be a low traffic street. It can be possible to dedicate side streets as bike streets, but this only works if they are useful through streets and requires making them either bike-only or at least heavily discourage car through traffic. These streets certainly exist, but they won’t be naturally low traffic streets. Getting cars mostly out of these streets is therefore going to be much more controversial then simply adding a bike lane to an existing arterial road. Side streets shouldn’t be designed in a way where going through them quickly feels good. And in any city with a reasonable amount of bike traffic, bikes are traffic and therefore need to be guided onto streets that can handle them. Ultimately you want to do both, but one is more about building infrastructure and the other about learning. If only arterials are great for biking, they are less useful, then if everything is already great. But the more people are biking in side streets to get to the arterial, the safer it’s going to be, even without changing the side streets. And if you have a sufficient amount of bike traffic, traffic calming measures are going to be much more popular.

[@josephfisher426]

@@eechauch5522 In a grid side streets will already have been manipulated in some way (e.g., one way or aggressive signal timing or both) to push car traffic onto an arterial. The bikes don't have to follow the same pattern. Even if bikes are traffic, they don't require anywhere close to the same degree of active management as cars. Add enough bikes and you can get significant conflicts with pedestrians, but how often is that happening? I'd rather stay away from the high-speed cars entirely. A safe, curbed lane doesn't eliminate the need to regulate the car-bike interaction in turns.

[@mindstalk]

On a grid like Chicago's, the side streets cross main streets every few blocks. You could have controlled intersections to let bikes through easily but that'll annoy the drivers on the main street. Which is fine by _me_ but politically problematic. You can, though, totally have grid streets that are friendly to bikes but not cars. Just throw in one-way loops (for cars) or modal filtering like diverters and bollards; bikes can go straight through, cars can't. I think the Dutch use this a lot, and I saw a lot in Vancouver BC as well.

[@jonwarland272]

Car drivers sometimes forget that they are in a sound insulated bubble which protects them from the very hell that they create for everyone around them. Being on the road is pleasant for them because they don't experience the 110db roar of vehicles speeding around them. They don't experience the sudden side gust of wind from a passing truck testing their balance. They don't experience the constant threat of injury or death.

[@jonwarland272]

Cars are insulated against sound because regulations state that the sound they produce is damaging to human hearing. UK statistics calculate that a busy road is measured around 80-100dB from 15m away. HSE statistics state that 90dB is a risk to health with a daily exposure of 1 hour, 100dB is a risk to health at 5 minutes. Also consider that road noise levels are measured at 15m, but a cyclist is usually closer to 1m from vehicles. I get told all the time that it is dangerous for me to cycle with my headphones on because i might not hear cars around me. In reality it is dangerous to cycle without hearing protection.

[@theultimatereductionist7592]

Exactly, Jon Warland!

[@ab-tf5fl]

Once, a few years ago, I joined an organized ride with thousands of other cyclists along a stretch of freeway which was being temporarily closed to cars, specifically for the ride. The problem: the other section of freeway, on the other side of the concrete wall, was still open, and when the freeway descended into a trench, the concrete walls acted as a sound chamber, and roar was deafening. I had driven this same stretch of freeway numerous times in a sound insulated bubble, and had no idea that the noise was this bad. When the same ride was offered again a year later, I declined to sign up - even though the "freeway" was being granted the same degree of separation as a bike trail - simply because the sound level was just too much. I pity motorcycle drivers who have to drive this freeway for their daily commute. They have to deal with this every day, yet *don't* get the sound insulated bubbles that cars offer.

[@SharienGaming]

dont forget all the toxic air cars produce as well....

[@allesdurchprobiert]

Don't drive on the ducking road then! Or at least make some room every 30 seconds or so. You don't have a special right to annoy the hell out of others by wasting their time and testing their patience. Not everyone has 24 hours spare time per day. Most people have to arrive at places at certain times. How would you feel if I got in front of you with my car and slowed you down to 0,00001 mph for minutes? Fun right?

[@thomasullmann7447]

The main problem is that in practice, in most countries I've cycled across or lived in, bike lanes are poorly made, and poorly managed, with unpredictable lighting and signing at intersections, often requring further interaction and communication between cyclists and drivers. In fact, I was hit and put in hospital because of a poor intersection. I've also lived in the netherlands, this is one of the few countries that is absolutely fantastic at building consistent and reliable bike lanes. The lesson I've learnt is to not accept compromised cyclelanes, otherwise it is best not to make them at all.

[@BenDurham]

Listening to Forester's constant flip flopping just makes me want to say "so what you're saying is..." constantly and have him admit that what he's saying is bollocks. Can't have that argument with him now though. Just shows that media exposure is key, though! Keep on putting this stuff out there, you two!

[@pdblouin]

Being forced into vehicular cycling (in a car-dominated city in my early 20s) radicalized me. The things I want to do to motorists would get my comment removed!

[@jooproos6559]

This is ludicrous!We in the Netherlands have far more experience with the two kinds of transport,and they just don't come along in practice!This is why we built so many cycle lanes!They are far more saver than the mix between cars and bikes!And we have a far longer experience with this.Since bike lanes were introduced the death of cyclist are rapidly lowered in the past 20 years! Now they can bike side by side and talk to each other without the danger of a car beside them.

[@marcvanderwee]

Not only during the last 20 years... The rapid decline of cycling deaths started in the mid 1970's... Watch also (for you did not watch it before) :How the Dutch got their cycle paths of BicycleDutch. En niet alleen tijdens de afgelopen 20 jaar... Het snel dalend aantal gedode fietsers begon midden jaren '70 al. Kijk ook (voor zover u deze nog niet gezien heeft) : How the Dutch got their cycle paths, van BicycleDutch.

[@buttvader]

Bike culture is practical where in your biking area, everyone can smell your farts.

[@yearginclarke]

I totally agree!

[@ambiarock590]

My brother questioned me when I said that I didn't wear a bike helmet when I took a vacation in the Netherlands. Bike helmets are a very American/Canadian thing cuz you're expected to "be a car". He tried to counter me with "You could slip and fall on the pavement, then you'd be glad you wore it." and considering the Netherlands doesn't have a massive brain damage crisis I don't think his arguments make any sense.

[@jooproos6559]

@@marcvanderweeOk,het is maar waar je prikt in de jaren..

[@TroubleshootGamingMeds]

I'm a daily rider and honestly I like "vehicular cycling". Being on the actual road is the most fun riding for me. I would still like more infrastructure built for those who don't feel safe on the road, however.

[@timpekarek9159]

I have been a bicycle commuter for about 30 years, and I can identify two trends in very recent years that make mixing bikes with larger vehicles problematic. That would be the overall sizing up of cars and trucks, and distractive driving. I live in St. Louis, which has a really poor system of dedicated bike/pedestrian infrastructure, so if I am going to ride across town, then I have no choice but to use streets. In St. Louis it is only safe to ride on streets that are within about 4 or 5 miles of the CBD, beyond that zone, and out into the suburbs road riding is awful. It is nearly impossible to find a route using backroads, and the main streets are too busy and the speed limits encourage accidents. Missouri is one of only two states that does not have any laws covering distractive driving and it is apparent when I ride almost anywhere.

[@downhillupside]

I'm a pretty experienced vehicular cyclist, but I will always default to protected bike lanes when I can. I can make myself as car-like as possible, but if someone isn't paying attention and hits me from behind, what would be a minor fender bender for an actual car, might be a life-threatening situation for me. There's absolutely no real argument for degrading the cycling network in favour of vehicular cycling, given examples of successful implementations of the current thrust of pro-cycling infrastructure available in places like the Netherlands. Also Forester's claim that the bike lanes in Portland had no part in reducing cyclist accidents there because: "there's no physical reason that they reduce accidents!" Are we sure this guy isn't just trolling? What the hell?

[@rileynicholson2322]

I loved how they showed satellite images of the clearly safer intersection designs while he said that. It's pretty clear that properly designed intersections combined with cycle lanes actually do have plenty of physical reasons they reduce both the frequency and severity of collisions. The primary improvements are lower vehicle speeds and improved sightlines.

[@julianlaywine7453]

If drivers were forced to actually regard bicycles as fellow vehicles, with equal rights to use road space, they would have to slow way down and pass way less. Ironically, it would slow car traffic on major roads way more than bike lanes. In practice when you ride “like a vehicle” on a road with no bike infrastructure, the response of most drivers is to buzz you and maybe roll down the window to yell something nasty.

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

The only people who believe that are the people who haven't done it. Motorists buzz past cyclists who stupidly ride to the right and invite them to squeeze by. They don't buzz cyclists who ride in the center of the lane. This has been tested with measurements of passing distances.

[@nondescriptname]

​@@SavingCommunitiesDS Wrong. I cycle daily in a large city. I routinely have to take the primary and it routinely results in aggression from drivers. You are speaking from ignorance and you've already been caught out in another thread here straight up lying about how comparatively dangerous cities like Utrecht are. Give it a rest boomer.

[@The1trueDave]

Yeah, I get that sometimes, "why aren't you in the bike lane?" or gestures to that effect. If it's a fairly civil enquiry and I have time (eg at traffic lights) I'll say "because it's rubbish" or something similar. But the other day I had someone beeping and gesturing at the lane and he was in the outer lane at the time, I wasn't remotely slowing him down 🙄 Unfortunately being an idiot is no bar to gaining a driving licence, you just have to be a bit thick-skinned...

[@Joesolo13]

@@SavingCommunitiesDS Hi, you're a liar or worse, I've had exactly that happen while riding in the center, people will illegally pass you. Hell, people will do it to cars following the speed limit!

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

Maybe you are the liar, @@Joesolo13, or maybe you just don't understand the concept. Studies have shown that people who must cross the center line to pass will give the cyclist more clearance than motorists who think they can "squeeze by." The best place to ride, for a great number of reasons, is directly in front of the steering wheel of the driver behind you. That's what he most notices. You can also affect motorist behavior with the intelligent use of signals, such as signaling that he should slow down until it's safe to pass, and then waving him on when it is safe. If you look like you are ignoring the motorist, he is more likely to get frustrated and act accordingly.

[@TeamEXAngus]

"What we actually need to do is educate cyclists into sharing the roads with drivers". Nah, what we actually need to do is educate DRIVERS into sharing the road with cyclists.

[@notjohn456]

Really insightful (and understated) comment at 2:25 that “vehicular cycling is presented as an individual accomplishment” of the cyclist, and note the clip at 14:31 showing the athletic roadie zipping along with traffic. I have nothing against my road-riding friends, but I would consider that a pretty exclusionary vision for transportation!

[@ericbrunet644]

I used to do "vehicular cycling", and I was even able to find it kind of fun. But I really only did it because there was no real usefull cycling infrastructure and I just reaaaaaally enjoyed biking. Now that I can use the REV, guess what? I'm ALWAYS on the REV, even if it means making my trip a bit longer. Cycling on a safe corridor is just that much more fun.

[@thespanishinquisiton8306]

His very last quote in the video is crazy. People talk all the time about how building bike lanes is good for motorists because it gets cyclists separated from the road and moves some people to voluntarily cycle, so congestion will reduce

[@MustraOrdo]

This is the only time where segregation is a good thing.

[@AntonWongVideo]

I wasn't expecting you

[@jasonriddell]

he "hated" traffic calming BUT advocated SLOWING traffic by "inserting" slow moving 2 wheels "vehicles" into traffic and IMHO having "slow moving" with fast moving is a way to SLOW down the average traffic speed (not a SAFE WAY but a way)

[@steemlenn8797]

I don't even want to imagine how a small child would do with "vehicular cycling" when between those super high trucks and their 12m can't-see-children death zone. Also Forrester didn't seem to realize that removing bikes from car traffic also makes it better for cars (at the end)

[@Queque2524]

I see enough watch for motorcycles bumper stickers and signs, and they can keep up with traffic. I don't see how bikes could even be considered safe to ride on the road.

[@thomas7365]

Even unprotected bike lanes aren't sufficient for children. Growing up I knew a neighbor's kid that got into a nearly fatal accident while in an unprotected bike lane due to a driver making a right turn.

[@Aubreykun]

The simple answer is that children don't need to ride on high speed roadways, they can stick to side streets. Reflective flags are also a key accessory for small children. A parent will not let their under-10 cross main thoroughfares or ride the bus without supervision, "riding in traffic" is no different. Also, no pedestrian is going to get mad at a kid for riding on the sidewalk unless they're being a nuisance. PS: I see late-middle-thru-highschoolers riding in traffic all the time (often without helmets which is technically illegal), usually on BMX bikes. Occasionally you spot some doing manuals down the road. The only cycling fatality involving a child in recent years within appreciable distance of me, to my knowledge, was in a crosswalk.

[@thomas7365]

@@Aubreykun the kid I knew got into his accident on a two-lane 25 mph road with a designated bike lane. Cars on side streets go the same speeds. You offer no solution and and then place blame on children for using the road in a manner that is their legal right. Then to claim the only fatal accident you've heard of took place on a crosswalk? It's likely that many such incidents take place on crosswalks because they have high pedestrian traffic, not that there is no solution to making roads safe for other forms of transit. I personally don't want my tax dollars going to subsidize roads, parking, and housing for low density suburbanites.

[@Aubreykun]

@@thomas7365 The only place a kid *on a bike* was fatally struck, I should have specified. It's evident that our definitions of "side street" differ in terms of how busy they are - 1 car every 10-20 minutes with stopsigns at the ends makes a fine road for kids to play ball in. But the overall point is: If the streets are unsafe, the parents should have the kids ride on the sidewalk. It's your right to decide if you want to food out of dented, bulged cans, but it's a horrible risk that nobody should be taking and no amount of "It's my right to eat it!" will stop botulism from paralyzing your face. Externalizing your locus of control is bad. Cycling is always a mild risk, cars or not. A cyclist-pedestrian, object-cyclist, or C-C accident can be mutilating, if not fatal. Land your head, teeth, nose, wrist, collarbone, etc just right and that's permanent, disfiguring or life-ending damage. But it's only a MILD risk, no more dangerous than driving is.

[@BartAnderson_writer]

Great video. I live in the city where Forester was inspired on his mission - he was given a ticket for ridibg in the street. I learned "Vehicular Cycling" and have used the suggestions., but as you say, it's of limited help. I ride on bike lanes and paths whenever I can. Forester is best seen as a creature of his time, who sadly couldn't change as conditions changed.

[@johnbolen5807]

Every time I listen to Forester it's astonishing how angry he is. I've never seen someone dig into such a contrarian position. It's like he wanted to be seen by drivers as "one of the good ones" and was more worried about being liked by them than building safe streets.

[@Nouvellecosse]

Yep. He's basically to cyclists what Candace Owens is to Black people.

[@sheridanwilde]

There was certainly a lot of anger in the sentence: "Amsterdam is an obsolete city" - weird for a supposed cycle advocate to say (as well as being hugely disrespectful to the people of Amsterdam).

[@Hurc7495]

He appears to be a fantastic example of how people become right wing, they are just seeking approval from the most obnoxious voices they can find. Tragically it can become circular, a whole group can become ever crazier in an effort to win each other’s approval!

[@weksauce]

You can't "build safe streets". There's no such thing. You CAN "build" safeR cyclists and drivers. Riding the way he advocates is safer. It's very important for drivers of vehicles to act like drivers of vehicles, regardless of whether the vehicle is a car or bike.

[@Nouvellecosse]

@@weksauce You can't build streets that eliminate all risk but you can definitely make street changes that reduce risk. Which is the same thing that can be said for training. You can use education to reduce the rate of accidents but that will never eliminate all accidents because people aren't infallible. And as the video points out, most people aren't comfortable riding bikes in traffic as if they're in a car and they _won't do it_. So whether or not that _would_ improve safety is kind of irrelevant. It's like if there's a sharp turn on a highway which results in lots of accidents. It would eliminate most accidents if everyone cut their speed in half thru that section avoiding the need to straighten it. But that doesn't mean that straightening the road can't reduce accidents as well. Especially if you can't actually get most people to reduce their speed enough. If telling people to cut their speed in half doesn't work you need to move on and try something else rather than dwelling on the fact that it _would_ work... if it worked.

[@JimEatsPlants]

Cyclists struck from behind, I believe, is the single biggest crash type leading to cyclist fatalities. I think it is around 40%. How many people have been killed because of Forester? Vehicular cycling techniques, as mentioned in the video, can be used as a survival tool in a hostile environment, but in a cruel state of irony, is also the reason the hostile environment exists.

[@knarf_on_a_bike]

My last two major collisions were being hit from behind while riding exactly where the law said I should be on a stroad. Resulted in a broken ankle about 8 years ago, and a trip to the hospital (all x-rays negative) and destroyed back wheel about a year ago. Helmet saved my life (or at least major brain injury) each time. I have no doubt your statistics are accurate.

[@PeevedLatias]

@@nunyabidness3075 A car passing too close to you is a major threat to your life. Of course I'm hostile.

[@snoopyloopy]

Yes exactly. Vehicular cyclists have spent literal decades obsessing over the danger of intersections but while it is true that more people get hit at intersections than in overtaking crashes, as you have noted, the latter remain the largest source of fatal crashes by far, making it that much more critical to addressing them & stop them from occurring-even if the infrastructure used results in more intersection crashes. (There of course are plenty of ways to avoid that.)

[@theultimatereductionist7592]

@@nunyabidness3075 Obviously. Self-important self-entitled hostile car / SUV drivers. And, I am a car driver.

[@Schlabbeflicker]

Same reason why lane splitting and filtering on motorcycles is so important to legalize. Motorcyclists are every bit as vulnerable, but are not allowed to avoid heavy traffic in most of the US.

[@evanegley8696]

I love that you found the Fort Collins video of the woman repeating Forester's motto. I live in Fort Collins and there are still folks who want to educate our way out of cyclists deaths. Fortunately, we have a new active modes plan with a substantial increase in dedicated active mode lanes coming in the near future.

[@Catswhiskerdetector]

That is just amazing. I want this mans confidence. It must be great being so certain about your opinions that you write books about it and give lectures

[@este_2013]

"Cyclists should act and be considered as vehicles" Yeah and surely you expect that a 12 year old cycling to school in the middle of the road will be considered an equal by the truck driver behind him (if even seen)

[@cjgeist]

Do you really think a truck driver is more likely to drive more aggressively around a 12-year-old cycling in the lane than they would around an adult doing the same?

[@brianmiller5444]

@@cjgeist Given how angry and entitled drivers often seem to be, I agree with you. The truck driver wouldn't care who he hit. But of course it was accident. Or the kid's fault.

[@coweatsman]

I am going to walk into a lion enclosure and act like a lion and be respected like a lion. And then I'll play a game of Russian roulette.

[@weksauce]

This is the same stupid emotion (fear) that prevents people from cycling by mandating (or tricking parents into mandating) fake helmets for cyclists. Since I was very young, I wondered why we weren't required to wear real helmets in cars, just seat belts. The answer is, car manufacturers lobbied hard to prevent this common-sense safety law because it would make driving cars uncool. Well, now we have useless helmets for cyclists because parents are scared of their 12 year old getting hit by a truck driver. It's worth far more to teach your kid to cycle in the middle of the LANE (not road, that's stupid), or better yet, the LEFT side of the lane, than to teach your kid to wear a BIKE (fake) helmet. If you want to avoid getting into collisions, which is the most important safety measure, you act and be considered as a vehicle on a bike. If you want to barely reduce head injury (and maybe not even reduce head injury at all) AFTER you've already gotten into collisions, which is the least important safety measure, then let your mommy and daddy's fear make you wear a fake helmet and ride on the sidewalk like a moronic clown.

[@brianmiller5444]

@@weksauce fake helmet. hahaha. i bet you refuse to wear seatbelts too

[@petersilva037]

I really prefer to use cyling paths, but when I'm stuck on the road, vehicular cycling is generally a good approach. 1/100 drivers get hugely annoyed and rude, and it's hugely dangerous, but it's less dangerous than driving in the gutter or the door zone. Vehicular cycling is an essential mitigation for being stuck in traffic, not something to be advocated as a positive thing. We can't function as vehicles when we weigh 1% of the other vehicles, people having a bad day, again maybe just 1/1000 but it's enough, just make it super dangerous because 4000 lb vehicles win every argument. Otoh... there are huge numbers of crappy cycling paths, where the path just ends and dumps you in traffic (in the west island of Montreal, the cycling path along 5th avenue is awful, the great path along the west island, that ends by just dumping you on de Salaberry & Lake.) Bike lanes need to be a lot better... but vehicular cycling is not a cure, it's coping strategy. bikes need priority when they meet vehicular traffic. #DutchBikePathsNow!

[@skleroosis]

Drivers are more distracted than ever. Plus what if I hit a pothole or an icy patch and fall. It only takes a moment. I live in Stockholm and almost all of my 10km route to work is separated from traffic which is why I cycle to work, I wouldn't do it if I had to fear for my life the whole way every day.

[@xanthoptica]

And, to be utterly obvious, you just can't get everywhere on a dedicated bike path. You will *have* to ride with traffic at some point, and the strategies of vehicular cycling are the way to do that safely. Further, many quite effective bike routes are simply calmer streets paralleling busy arterials ("bike boulevards"), where you should equally be using effective cycling strategies to be safe.

[@1981menso]

I REFUSE to ride in a gutter. It's has debris and cars don't see me and will turn right in front of me.

[@ambiarock590]

Exactly! "With power comes responsibility" and the person operating a 4,000 lb metal box should be forced to let the person operating a 30 lbs machine pass without danger.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

Advocates of vehicular cycling might notice that many of the cyclists shot riding in traffic in our video were not following Forester's teachings (for example, riding on the side instead of the middle of the lane). That's because it's not very common so we don't have a lot of footage of it! We've shot tons of footage of cyclists in bike lanes (because bike lanes are very popular where we've lived), but we don't have as much footage of people riding in traffic, and it's a smaller subset of people who ride in traffic and closely follow Forester's teachings. This should tell us something about how vehicular cycling works for some people but isn't a scalable community-level solution.

[@JohnFromAccounting]

Here in Melbourne, I know two people that would cycle to work who were hit by cars. They lived, but suffered scary injuries. As a cyclist, even if you follow all the rules, it takes one person not paying attention to send you to hospital or to heaven. Protected bike lanes are necessary.

[@Mafik326]

I wonder if that guy has ever ridden a bike in traffic. I have and it's scary.

[@dtape]

He looks old in the video but he used to be really fit when he was young and rode very fast. (source: a video featuring NotJustBikes that I linked as an edit at the bottom of this comment) That's how he ended up preferring riding on the street with cars instead of in bike paths. Totally ego-centric and didn't account for all walks of life to be able to bike safely. He's indirectly caused sooooo many people to be killed helping vehicular cycling be the norm instead of real bike paths that would have offered real protection. I'm glad he's dead now and can't spread his stupidity anymore. Edit: video I referenced: kzbin.info/www/bejne/sJ6VapmaYthqqrM

[@scb2scb2]

@@dtape he does look old but not older than many people of higher age i see daily on my bicycle rides but at that age very few seem to be training for the tour da france.

[@wernerrietveld]

That this crazy man had his opinions is something, but that he apparently kept on being invited for speaking is something else!

[@inventor121]

If you've ever been tailgated by a lifted RAM 3500 with a "Cyclist hit count" sticker that's constantly flashing high beams and honking on the horn because you're riding 60km/h below the speed limit you'd consider it a high stress environment too.

[@theepimountainbiker6551]

Its people like this why theres a camera facing front and rear on my bike. Idiots like this can be reported to local police for dangerous driving. Takes 2 minutes to do online, I must send 10 a week

[@justaguy6216]

As a suburban melburnian I'd love to cycle, but I don't wanna cross a 4/6 stroad or take a 1.5 km detour just to get to my nearest megamall that doesn't have any bike parking. It's either that or take the bus that comes every 40 mins or count on my dad not needing his car. I'm moving to Melbourne's inner city as soon as I can afford it.

[@_SpamMe]

Historically, the attitude probably isn't too wrong. Early on streets were for everybody. That space then got claimed by cars, and banned for everybody else. Bike lanes genuinely were tools by the car industry, same as jaywalking laws and whatnot. Pedestrians and cyclists were now interlopers in something that was meant for cars - even though originally it wasn't. Maybe one day the streets will be like that again. But the current reality is that streets are primarily spaces for cars. And we need to do policy that acknowledges that current reality, and not one that made sense a century ago.

[@jagvillani338]

I am usually confident riding on the roads in a vehicular fashion and haven't had problems in many years of doing so -- that said, I would prefer not to have to do so and while I may be able to do so that doesn't make it safe for riders 8 to 80 years old. My partner and I only take the road where there is no safe and legal alternative, but when we do so, we make sure to take the lane as necessary, stay out of the door zone follow the laws to the greatest extent possible.

[@mattslaboratory5996]

I've been cringing at and disagreeing with Forester for 60 years. His book used to be about the only one about cycling you would find in the library, as if it were some sort of standard. It seemed really dangerous. I see people practicing it around Portland, where there are many alternatives, and I'm just disgusted.

[@paulwoodman5131]

I've done a lot of bicycling in Phoenix, Arizona so I had to learn how to do vehicular cycling it can be done. It's not always pleasant ,car drivers don't like it when you Beat them to the light. Slightly wider shoulder would make it a lot easier. Eventually we all do some vehicular cycling cuz bike lanes don't always go where you want when you go, so you better learn how to do it or get comfortable doing it or end up driving your car to the bike park.

[@bitterbikeboy]

im one of those adventurous cyclists that commutes in a non car friendly city, but never once have I thought this is the way to do things.

[@Sythemn]

Rural roads range from "This is quite pleasant" to "I've almost been hit 3 ft off the road 4 times in the past 15 minutes...." I personally would need a better description to rank that :P

[@ab-tf5fl]

For rural roads, the shoulder is everything. A wide shoulder is effectively a bike lane, and in many ways safer than an urban bike lane. No parked cars to deal with. Less traffic. Far fewer intersections. Also, lots of rural roads have rumble strips to wake up sleepy drivers drifting onto the shoulder, which urban roads typically do not. But, if a rural road combines heavy traffic with no shoulder, as many do, the road quickly becomes nearly unusable as a bike route.

[@Ladadadada]

I'm lucky enough to live in the east of London and use both CS2 and CS3 (along with Q1 and C27) to get me 95% of the way to work on protected cycleways. And yet the scariest location and the one in which I encounter the most close passes and overtake/merge/brake combos is the last 100m where there are no cycle lanes. I've spent plenty of time cycling in traffic back when I was younger and had a faster bike and I definitely prefer protected cycleways.

[@Itried20takennames]

On-street bike lanes….those just painted on the side of the road with no barrier….will always lead to deaths, and from my local experience, nothing to do with “biker education” or “be the car.” Our 2 most recent deaths were due to a driver coming home from a night shift falling asleep at the wheel and crushing a biker well within the bike area, and a young mom was killed, baby survived, from someone speeding excessively. People in cars make mistakes, and if no separation, then some deaths and injuries will be a sad regular occurrence.

[@CasioSilver]

My uncle (cycling since the 70's boom) once told me about John Forester and compared him to Ancel Keys, the world is still feeling the negative affects of their words but even Ancel regretted doing what he did to the American diet in the end. Now that John is gone, I hope people stop pushing vehicular cycling so much... heck, I still have people telling me to ride like John wants me to and I say no thank you, I'll take it easy in this protected cycle path 👍

[@AardvarkDK]

Check out that last interview he gave. Forester: "I’ve been active in bicycling affairs since 1970. Before that, I was an active cyclist." Did he admit that he didn't actually ride a bike for the last 50 years of his life? I think he did.

[@peacemaster8117]

@@AardvarkDK No, the way the sentence is constructed doesn't say that he stopped cycling once he got involved in bicycling affairs.

[@AardvarkDK]

@@peacemaster8117 Ok. Where did he cycle? How often? Did he cycle in the last, say, ten years of his life? Was he also willing to DOMINATE the road at the age of 80?

[@NotHeresrsly]

When I finally heard/read about Forester, I assumed he was a spandex bicyclist in his 20's, (in the 70's, when his work seemed to take off) - but no, he was raised in the God damn 1930's? Ugh. What a piece of old idiot garbage. Edit: I mean, he's dead now (hoorayyy) but you know what I mean

[@mrbear9822]

Ironically I've heard a story of someone getting thrown off the bridge in Ottawa you were walking along saying it was only uncomfortable. It was in the winter by a snow plow.

[@gordonlbelyea4409]

St. Laurent Blvd, I believe. It's scary enough in a car, let alone on a bike.

[@SalvatorePalmaJ]

You guys do such a great job! Evidence based arguments for better urban living

[@groomboek1978]

REgarding Forrester's last argument: Having adequate cycling infrastructure takes a lot of cars of the road, making life easier for the remaining cars.

[@AlecMuller]

Completely nuts that he avocated mixing modes of transportation that have 3x+ differences in average speed.

[@dumnor]

and mass difference in 10x+ range.

[@ambiarock590]

And 10x the difference in weight

I think vehicular cycling is almost always a subsitute for something that is missing on the bike lines such as maintenance service in winter.

[@ChrisCoxCycling]

So much this. "Vehicular cycling" is a useful skill to be able (and confident enough) to use, but god it's unpleasant. If we want the "interested but concerned" people to take up cycling, there's no way you're going to encourage them to ride like that. I'm pretty comfortable riding in most environments, but it's not about me, it's about people like my wife, or my kids, who don't feel comfortable riding because the streets are unsafe, and "taking the lane" is intimidating.

[@Aubreykun]

The streets are not unsafe and you get used to taking the lane. If they are out riding with you, they should be able to trust your judgement of when it's ideal to take the lane and so on. This "biking is unsafe" attitude is what gets people into the biggest, tallest, crossovers with terrible visibility instead, as it extends from a belief about bikes to thinking "small cars are unsafe." Cyclists have higher life expectancies and no greater fatality rates per mile than drivers do.

[@wenxuanteoh6186]

One of your best videos yet, thank you for explaining this confusing topic

[@kittycatpilot]

Not Just Bikes was a guest on the Well There's Your Problem podcast (with slides) for a great episode on John Forrester and vehicular cycling. Definitely worth a listen/watch.

[@bruce8443]

Let anyone who supports the Forester position do what I'll call the "Forester Challenge". From say the east end of your city, start driving a normal golf cart on the normal roads to the west end of the city. Obey traffic rules, and drive like a 'normal car'. See how far you can go before you get arrested or harassed. This is why driving slow vehicles on city roads is illegal almost everywhere. The Forster position might have made sense when he was growing up in rural England in the 1930s. But it would be insane today.

[@cjgeist]

Wouldn't it make more sense to just do it on a bike?

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

I do it on a bike all the time, but I was never successfully fearmongered by the bike land dogmatists, so it never occurred to me that I couldn't. Incidentally, vehicular cycling does not mean driving like a normal car. It means obeying the same rules of the road as cars. One of those rules is that slower traffic should let faster traffic go by. That means pulling over from time to time, but it does not mean riding far to the right all of the time.

[@JoseppiAJ]

@@cjgeist I think the point is to demonstrate that driving a slow vehicle on the road is illegal in most places and obviously shouldn’t be allowed in the middle of high speed traffic, unless of course that vehicle is a bike, (where the user is far more vulnerable), and we only allow this because it’s our lazy way of accommodating cyclists.

[@inventor121]

I do this regularly, I haven't been arrested but get harassed constantly and pulled over a few times but I say "officer it isn't illegal to cycle here" and usually they just give a sigh and let me continue on my way. I have absolutely been the cause of several dozen traffic jams, road rage incidents, and general mayhem. And I refuse to stop this behaviour until the city gives me my bus route back.

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

@@JoseppiAJ It is legal on all roads that are not posted "limited access." Even with those roads, some segments are legal for cycling because they closed existing rights of way to build those roads. Some roads are hazardous to bike on, even though they are legal. Side paths for cyclists would usually be big improvements on those roads.

[@alonknaan4536]

Fascinating subject!! Thank you for making this video

[@steveshea7725]

Vehicular cycling.... what i learned directly from Forester-- is probably a big reason I am alive after almost 40 years of nearly daily cycling. I stopped having conflicts with other vehicles almost the moment I started practicing this. I am not against bike lanes and prefer them, barring some occasional potentially dangerous features and know to guard against.. . Which I recognize but untutored cyclists might not recognize as few will put the effort into learning this stuff and it is definitely not very present in the us cycling culture so you can't just absorb it from others. .

[@NinjaElephant]

What we really need is cycular driving

[@derosa1989]

One of the benefits of more people riding bikes is ultimately they become drivers that also know what it's like to pedal.

[@jammin023]

This is one of the reasons why cycling in the Netherlands is so safe, even in spaces shared with cars. Just about every driver is also a cyclist.

[@onorebakasama]

I'll walk my bike through the intersection when drivers have to walk their cars through an intersection!

[@jasonriddell]

@@jammin023 I imagine having a "driving" network that is ALSO efficient and "smartly" designed FOR DRIVING helps a LOT as American "stroads" and constant "stress" of high conflict driving environments causing "low level road rage" and the shared with car/bike spaces are at the start/end NOT the BULK MIDDLE where speed differentials are greater the "perfect" trip is one where once you HAVE LEFT the LOCAL area and are in the bulk of the transit portion it should be FAST and LOW mental effort IE LOW conflict / decision making

[@DSAhmed]

@@derosa1989 so true. I no longer get angry at bikes in any way now that i've biked in the city on car infested roads. This includes running traffic lights.

[@tubeyou443]

Nice to see some clips of St. John's. We're really lacking here in bicycle infrastructure. The main street of the downtown core is closed to vehicle traffic during the summer to create a 'pedestrian mall' which has been a huge, huge success. Thousands visit the street every day. People want walkable and bikeable cities even though they may not realize it.

[@xanthoptica]

As somebody who has been riding long enough in the US to have no alternative to vehicular cycling (as in, there was no bike infrastructure, so it was the only safe method), I can say that yes, bike-specific spaces are great for encouraging cyclists (and indeed I happily use some myself on my commute). But it is also true that intersection design can be problematic, putting bikes in places where drivers do not expect them to be (here in Portland, OR, we have had some kinda dangerous experiments in bike-priority infrastructure). The other reason not to give up on vehicular cycling strategies is that there are plenty of cyclists capable of using them, and with the rise of e-bikes, almost anybody can be fast enough to mix safely with vehicles. Finally (and this is not the fault of bike advocates) there is the sense among drivers that because there is bike infrastructure, cyclists don't have the right to be on the same streets as cars, which leaves rural riders and strong cyclists who like to train outdoors at the mercy of angry drivers. That's extra-ironic, becase in old neighborhoods that are not designed in a car-centric way, the lower number of cars on the road means that everybody (including drivers) gets around faster and easier.

[@grindupBaker]

Hey my home London where I bicycled 1957-65, sometimes with Actonia CC. Hey my home Toronto where I bicycled 1982-2003, sometimes with the TBN. Hey my home Vancouver where I bicycled 2003-2018, sometimes with the Vancouver Velo Vets. Much nostalgia. I remember many of those streets there. I think I recognized several of the cars that I've collided with (the ones with dents in them).

[@elaiej]

I always thought of vehicular cycling as something that you have to do in the absence of proper bicycle infrastructure (bike lanes, or even just a road margin). An incomplete bicycle lane network might cause drivers to see bicycles taking the lane and get really aggressive with them "Why aren't you on the bike lane, you have one?!". I had this experience once in melbourne. I chose not to use the painted bike lane on one street to get away from the turning lane. Wanted to go straight so I slipped out, and took the second lane. The only car driver on the road really didnt like that at all (it was late at night). The solution here is traffic light timings allowing bikes to go first, so you dont get sandwiched by the turning vehicles ('turn when possible'). But sometimes 'taking the lane' is necessary. But no arguments about the existence of bike lanes. Just that the political will to build one might not always be there, and you might have to make do with defensive cycling.

[@leopoldleoleo]

One of the things I really appreciate from this channel is how even-tempered your deliveries are. I wouldn’t have been able to hide my contempt for advocates of vehicular cycling

[@snoopyloopy]

Yes they're infuriating.

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

Contempt and ignorance are often partners.

[@tomdonahoe3539]

​​@@SavingCommunitiesDS Right along with arrogance.

[@SavingCommunitiesDS]

Of course, you are not referring to your own,@@tomdonahoe3539?

[@live2groove]

I live in Chicago and have been biking for almost 50 years. There are more and more bikes on the streets, which make bike lanes more important. They encourage more people to bike instead of drive and they make both drivers and cyclists abide by the rules.

[@dhgerber67]

I'm living in a small city in France (300.000 people) and here cycling has been promoted for more than 30 y. Highly comfortable bike lanes, one way streets authorized and so on. It's so easy and nice that I don't own a car anymore since then. When I really need one I rent.

[@frankhooper7871]

I lived in the LA area of California until I was in my 20s and first cycled there. I've been back in England since 1973 and still cycle regularly. I'm not particularly bothered cycling in traffic, but it's certainly more pleasant in the Netherlands with its separate cycle infrastructure. And I do realize that many people aren't comfortable cycling alongside vehicles.

[@Sivah_Akash]

I have been slowly becoming more comfortable with vehicular cycling due to having no choice riding in most roads in North America. And it does indeed become a bit dull and boring for me nowadays when I ride on bike paths. But I still know how I felt when I initially started on this sad journey and also totally prefer more people picking up cycling. It's sometimes nice to have strength in numbers and peace of mind!

[@rakino4418]

"Bike advocates are just anti-car!!" - you're right about that old man.

[@ambiarock590]

Not entirely. I'm a car enthusiast and even I advocate for better cycling infrastructure. I even bike to work cuz I don't particularly like constant car maintenance. Maintaining a bike is way easier and cheaper. There are plenty of car enthusiasts in urbanism circles. One car enthusiast KZbinr, Bladed Angle advocates for better cycling infrastructure.

[@Hendrixski]

Why not both? Have bike lanes and teach people how to ride in traffic when necessary. I'm a bike commuter in NYC and I **LOVE** the bike lanes, but let's be real: a third of my biking is in traffic. I'm thankful for the bike lanes that exist and I'm thankful for the techniques I learned in order to cycle like a vehicle.

[@TheStrangeBloke]

My dude literally looks at bikes (which top out at like 20 mph and 100 kg with the rider) and cars (which barely ever move slower than 35 mph and bottom out at 1000 kg) and says "skill issue."

[@kudosbudo]

Personally I'd prefer if if they just made vehicle speeds slower. Between town roads I UK can be up to 60 mph and there's often no provision for cyclist on them so slow the drivers down I say. I don't go fast now in certain spots cos of cyclist using them roads. It's just not safe to drive certain roads marked as 60 at 60 mph.

[@hannahcornell9056]

If vehicular cycling worked as well as Forrester claimed it does then we wouldn’t have issues with people choosing to cycle on the pavements (sidewalks) instead of on the road. I would also like to know how much time Forrester put into educating vehicle drivers about patience, passing distance and how you should treat a bike like a slow moving vehicle instead of annoying impediment to getting to the next red traffic light as quickly as possible.

[@SharienGaming]

people like forrester are always going for the victim of a problem as the side that should change... his whole spiel is basically "dont be such a victim! behave like a car! be big and fast and imagine you are heavy!" its the same kind of person who goes "boys will be boys" and "she really shouldnt have worn something like that" ... its the exact same type of rhetoric

[@beepbop6542]

@@SharienGaming 1. No one says "boys will be boys" (Except maybe lawyers, but protecting criminals is their entire job) 2. Unfortunately yes, sometimes we have to restrict our freedom in favor of common sense self preservation. I SHOULD be able to walk around downtown Detroit at night while counting my money as a fit young man, but if you were with me you would DEFINITELY say "Put away the money!". Flaunting yourself in dangerous places is unsafe.

[@SharienGaming]

@@beepbop6542 as someone living in a pretty safe place... no i wouldnt say that... because you know... people arent out to get me... but you might want to at least step somewhere with decent light, so you can actually see what you are counting... and maybe not walk at the same time so you dont accidentally drop stuff but feel free to justify keeping your environment as dangerous as it is right now, rather than making it safer... im sure thats a sensible way forward

[@beepbop6542]

@@SharienGaming I live in an 80% white suburb of Augusta, Georgia, my environment is probably one of the safest on Earth. Ironically the most dangerous thing to me in my daily life is cars.

[@SharienGaming]

@@beepbop6542 if you are living in the US, i am strongly doubting that "one of the safest on earth" statement... cause that country as a whole is not what i would consider even safe adjacent... also interesting that you brought up the racial makeup of your neighbourhood... as an indication of safety... im sure you didnt mean anything by that... but it might be good to reflect on that being the first thing you thought off when you wanted to imply "safety"

[@anticyclingclub]

You have to wonder if John Forrester is just one of those roadies that has never actually ridden to work with a bike.

[@drill_fiend1097]

I am surprised if he can even ride road bikes with that physique. I only began to ride one when I lost a lot of weight from eating only one meal per day.

[@petesig93]

Bike-lanes in the US and where I live in Australia are very much the big joke, when compared with the high quality lanes of the Netherlands as shown in your first scene. Our bike lanes are SO often very poorly executed, and they do NOT cover every place where people may wish to ride (and never will) so riding in traffic is something that nearly everyone must be prepared to do. If you are riding in traffic, the skills of vehicular cycling are a very good thing to know how to practice. In particular..... *Stay Safer; Ride Wider!*

[@applewater5436]

I'm a vehicular cyclist, and I bike many miles every year on the road. I do it because there aren't alternatives, and I'm stubborn. Nobody should be forced into danger just to get from point a to point b

[@mremumerm]

curious he quotes " provided adequate capacity, provided it is not specifically for one mode rather than the other", so I assume he fought against highways, bridge and tunnels that do not allow bikes.

[@brokenrecord3095]

... and don't get him started about those damned "rail" roads that you can't even drive a car on.

[@OnkelJajusBahn]

A big reason, why some people choose road over bike lanes, is because a lot of bike lanes are just bad. You have to constantly wait at traffic signals. Especially when doing a left turn. A lot of the lanes are in the dooring zone. or have to share a way too small sidewalk with pedestrians. But given a really good bike path, and people will choose that.

[@fgh2756]

Thank you for this!

[@geoff5623]

This was one of the frustrating perspectives on Vancouver's Stanley Park bike lane - that the seawall was for recreational cyclists and only experienced cyclists used the road and they liked it better without a dedicated cycling lane. As an avid cyclist, I pretty much always passed more casual cyclists on the road than I saw people in Lycra over the last few years, and having two vehicle lanes only encourages drivers to go further above the park's 30km/h speed limit (and pass without providing enough space even when a full other lane is available 😮‍💨) making it ever more precarious for less avid cyclists. One spot that's of my biggest concerns is near the top of the hill to Prospect Point, where there is a long straight before a turn and I fully expect a speeding driver to not see a slower cyclist in time. Yeah, I may have to slow down, ring my bell, and wait for a good time to pass a group of slower cyclists in the lane, so it's harder to get a new PR time around the park. I always had to watch out for pedestrians at the many crosswalks, and I'd much rather see more cyclists safely using the park than it being slightly better for confident cyclists to go as fast as possible.

[@markovermeer1394]

Only place right for "Vehicular Cycling" is the Fietsstraat: bikes and cars with same priority and

[@Diptera_Larvae]

I love seeing all those families riding together 2:18, reminds of the "walking bus" a idea started in Japan I believe.

[@akarayan]

In my city, Royal Oak, MI, they gave us a few bike lanes. Each one routes over multiple popped-up manhole covers, supermassive potholes, missing pavement, and parking spaces. Top notch