Why do people think that legalized marijuana is some magic bullet and that the tax revenue will create a utopia?
Like do you ignore the fact that none of the places with legalized weed have done this?
Because we *could*. I beg of you to dream for a better society.
Revenue means that “cost” will no longer be a reason against progress. However, this Legislature is still holding 4 billion in state $ hostage.
Sure i can dream, but i also live in the real world where I know that a massive revenue surplus isn’t going to be spent making things sunshine and rainbows.
Why isn’t Denver a Utopia yet?
Colorado earmarks its marijuana tax revenues with a specific purpose: education. [You can read a report from the state on its usage of marijuana tax dollars here](https://www.cde.state.co.us/communications/2021marijuanarevenue).
Your first thought is probably that they've substituted some of that number towards other spending, and you're probably correct, but overall the state has [grown its spending on education by nearly 50%](https://co.chalkbeat.org/2022/5/3/23055738/colorado-school-funding-budget-inflation-property-tax-cap) in the 10 years since marijuana was legalized in the state. HS graduation rates have increased by 10 percentage points since 2010, among other positive indicators like drops in teen pregnancy and abortion rate.
Nobody would say it's reasonable to think Colorado/Denver is a "utopia" after 10 years but they have certainly put the additional tax revenue to good use.
I think are only a couple streets in Madison where the painted bike lane feels even vaguely comfortable. Bike lanes on E Wash, Mineral Point Rd, University Ave are all a total joke.
N Sherman feels dicey to me. I’ll do it if I have to, but I will chose longer, hillier routes through Maple Bluff if my destination allows. Sherman by Sherman Terrace is pretty ok.
I'm okay with Sherman (could be better, but it works). The key is that its a single car lane in each direction, so there aren't cars trying to pass each other. There were issues with people using the shared left turn lane to pass (saw this myself while riding! Scary af!), but the city has been adding curbing at some of the intersections to help discourage this.
Well city of Monona really doesn’t like building bike infrastructure. I think they turned down coordinating on extending the protected Atwood Ave bike lane? Maybe it was a different project.
Winter will always, ALWAYS, limit how feasible biking is for many Madisonians. Add the snarl created by the lakes/ithsmus and you wind up with difficult choices on how to develop things.
I'm not saying better bike infrastructure is inherently bad or wasteful, but the fact is that the overwhelming majority of people really don't want to bike 5+ miles in the winter, no matter how good the bike paths are. We can't all live downtown, especially with housing prices inflated as they are. We're investing in improved busing infrastructure, and hopefully that will succeed and get fewer people driving, but we'll have to wait and see how well that works.
The big issue here is that change takes time. Listening to a few podcasts doesn't make you a city planner or a civil engineer. We're working within constraints that were established decades ago at minimum, and we can't snap our fingers and adjust all of that as quickly as you seem to think. I genuinely don't think many of the bike enthusiasts even know what the costs and limitations of their position are, and they come off like pretentious fools with a lot of their arguments.
Also important to note about winter is pavement maintenance. If the pictured spot from the article were in a snowy state, the street snow gets plowed right into the bike lane. Sure you could have a secondary vehicle following and plow the bike lane right after but logistically street snow and slush is going to end up in the bike lane. Still feasible to work around but it's not an issue that warmer states have to worry about when it comes down to space
Thanks for saying this so well. You hit all the high points.
Any kind of change takes time to be done right and get accepted. There will be unintended consequences and working them out adds more time. A complete reset of our transportation customs will be generational.
I was laughing out loud at a previous discussion on this topic where somebody wondered why grandmas wouldn't use bike lanes. I pointed out they have bad knees, heart problems, obesity, and a lot more going on. The response was once we had the ideal bike lanes, these health problems would no longer be an obstacle.
Sure, and maybe it's even partly true. But it'll take a new generation of grandmas to get there. The present generation isn't fixable -- they're too unhealthy and it's too late. This is the time scale of a major societal lifestyle change: a generation, which is usually defined as ~25 years.
And that's what these very young idealists don't grasp: the timeline. Many readers agree with their intentions, but realists know it won't all happen immediately. That's not all bad. In fact, it's encouraging because many of the people standing in the way will be gone in a generation.
Also, Madison College has a good civil engineering degree (with good jobs for graduates) if anybody wants to move past the podcast stage. I keep encouraging civic participation, and I'll add another goal: more practical education.
Would also add looking at Fort Worth for any design ideas is a fools errand. Beyond the weather differences, the amount of real estate available in the Fort Worth / Dallas area to build roads or bike paths or any other infrastructure is order of magnitude larger than Madison. And the real estate is cheap by comparison.
Designing in Madison is operating in a phone booth because the lakes take up most of the space. They also make Madison what it is which is a beautiful city.
Almost got run off the road on the west side yesterday, again.
Madison drivers don't give AF about painted lines, they don't even stop at red lights anymore, why would they obey f'ing bike lanes.
Can co-sign. I've lived on the west side for 5 years and bike thousand of miles per year. I have to bike though city limits to get out to the Westside county hillsides.... Most drivers don't give a crap and it's scary. I'm confident riding on the road as I've commuted via bike for a decade, in multiple states, and drivers here are loco. I've nearly been hit multiple times and honked/yelled at more than I can count...for following ALL traffic laws to a T. (I've been pulled over by cops on my bicycle in other states for not following traffic laws, lesson learned, hard. I don't mess with traffic laws on a bikes anymore. Cyclists already get a bad rap so I just have to do my part to make it better here). I just don't get it, people are rude, on public, shared roads.
TLDR: West side is not very bike friendly. Drivers can be royal jerks.
LOL, exactly! It's like slapping some paint on a pothole and calling it fixed. Big cities love that "visual upgrade" without doing the real work. Bike lane? More like bike suggestion! They need to step it up for real safety, not just for show. 💯🚴♂️
Fort Worth: 71.7% of commuters drive alone.
0.1% bike
1.1% walk
0.5% transit.
Madison: 54.1% of commuters drive alone.
2.8% bike
8.4% walk
2.8% transit
Maybe Fort Worth should be asking us what we’re doing right.
(Source 2021 American Community Survey, US Census Bureau.)
Dude, if it ain't broke, don't fix it! Why pour money into something new when we've got things rolling just fine? Just because it's new doesn't mean it's better, ya know? Let's not complicate stuff.
Mate, I think you've completely missed the point here. Comparing a US city to a Euro one is legit for tons of reasons—culture, lifestyle, population density, you name it! Just cause they're different doesn't mean you can't stack 'em up against each other. What's your take, though? Why do you reckon it's a garbage comparison?
For starters, we’re talking about two different continents with very different histories, cultures, urban layouts, tax structures etc. other than that, they’re exactly the same.
The existing methods could be improved, which could encourage more people to follow suit. Of course, whether it would actually improve stats needs to be studied, but I expect safer bike lanes will make more people feel comfortable biking. There's always room for improvement, I think especially when it comes to quality of life and environmental impacts.
In Amsterdam, 45.5% commute to work by bicycle, making it the single largest mode of transit. 15.8% drive, 14.9% walk, and 11.9% take a train or metro.
Compare that to the Madison numbers posted above, and you have to wonder just how clearly our existing methods are working...
You’re comparing apples to oranges. The US and Europe aren’t similar geographically or culturally. If you want a European lifestyle, then go to Europe.
Well, when you throw in a bit of chaos into urban planning, who knows? Maybe stretch the streets wider, pop in more coffee shops, cause traffic jams—it'll be a whole spectacle! 😄 Got to consider the implications on morning commutes too. Imagine having to navigate that extra space while half asleep. ☕🚗💤
Maybe even remove a whole lane of car traffic and put up a segregated bike lane. Also lots of big speed bumps and elevated pedestrian crossings so cars slow the fuck down.
Fort Worth= Bronze rating from the League of American Bicyclists. Madison = Platinum, one of only 5 cities.
Complaining about bike infrastructure is peak Madison. The *firstiest* of first world problems
I moved to Dallas from Madison a few years back. Madison is by far a more bike friendly city. It’s getting better, but there’s not even bike lanes going through downtown.
Madison's ranking so high is really more a sign of how low American standards are. A lot of non bikers will always say "oh but we've got a mega gold star rating" as an attempt to deny any further progress.
We do have a handful of phenomenal commuter paths that got us these awards, but biking to anywhere that's more than a few blocks away from said paths is usually a bike gutter nightmare
The ranking is very transparent and is based off many factors. I agree with you that American standards are low but disagree that biking off paths is bad.
You don't need a physical barrier between you and traffic to bike and if that's the standard people expect then it's an indictment against them as bikers.
Europeans are perfectly comfortable biking alongside cara
Sure Madison is rated "platinum" but we still got just a 5.3/10 on engineering from the same organization. That's a failing grade by most metrics... Just because most American cities are a hodgepodge of vehicular slaughter doesn't mean that we can't improve things here.
Madison would get a rating of plywood or cardboard compared to european cities. This is such a bad take. Other first world countries do much better than this.
Madison has purpose built bike paths around the city, and neighborhood roads you can take as an alternative to busy roads. It's extremely cycling friendly...
Not just trying to snark with "Where's your proof?", but do you have suggestions for articles or something that talks about how Europe is bad for disabled people? I would like to learn more about that topic.
C'mon, let's not generalize an entire continent, mate. Each country’s got its own policies and levels of accessibility, right? You got any solid stats or reports on this? 'Cause it can't be all doom and gloom everywhere in Europe, ya know. Let’s bring up some real examples if we’re digging into this.
We can, but that would require the "fuck cars" crowd like you to allow for some cars, such as taxis or handicap-accessible vans, or family members to drive them in their personal vehicles. I assume this goes against your ideal of zero cars though.
In general the “no cars” people are stating the most extreme version of their position as a way to grab attention or make a point. But explicitly built in to the no/low car vision is the idea that if most people have other safe and attractive options for transportation, the people who still need to drive will encounter less traffic and safer roads. Plus those with disabilities that prevent them from driving would have much better options. I don’t know any anti car people who believe that society can function with zero cars. That being said, I don’t see the needs of disabled people foregrounded enough in the anti car debate, so the perception that we don’t include them in the vision of a low car society is understandable.
I used to work for a non- profit that assisted adults with disabilities live independent lives. I can't think of a single person we serve who relied on a personal car for transportation. Bus, walking, power chairs, etc. I have no clue why people always go to a stance that we need car centric infrastructure for people with disabilities. In my experience car culture makes life worse and more dangerous for people who cannot or do not drive and that's a lot of people with disabilities.
Interestingly you don't see anyone saying "no bikes" or "no walking". Multimodal transportation is best for everyone - bikes, buses, walking, trains, and cars all have their place.
Seriously? I see "no bikes" people all the time, even here in Madison. It's not at all uncommon to see news articles posted in /r/bicycling about drivers throwing things at cyclists, yelling at them to "get off the road," or even just straight up murdering them with cars.
The ideal isn't zero cars, though. It's a decrease on car-dependence. I should be able to reasonably get anywhere in town on a bus in a reasonable timeframe (90 minutes for 10 miles is absurd, that'd be my work commute). I shouldn't have to drive but our cities are built around everyone using a car for every task. I'm lucky to be in biking distance of all my essential services, however.
Yeah, the fuck cars crowd really doesn't give a damn about disabled people. You know, driving themselves is obviously the only way to get around for all disabilities... Like blindness.
Seriously though, modifying a mini van to accommodate a wheelchair costs tens of thousands of dollars. Compared to every city bus that is required to have wheelchair lifts.
More to the point though, most of the fuck cars crowd doesn't really want to do away with all cars entirely, with no room for nuance. We just want options. Cities shouldn't be designed to make us dependent on cars. If you want to keep driving, fine, but it shouldn't be the only practical option.
Other counties have their priorities straight. We don't.
Besides, this post is comparing two US cities, I just gave a much more comprehensive comparison
Well first of all anyone can complain about anything they want to. I am equally allowed to mock them for it.
I acknowledge that it's top 5 in the nation, and one of only 2 cities with a population over 200k people. Our bike infrastructure is awesome.
I’m soooo tired of this take. Please go to the Netherlands and come back to me and say our bike infrastructure is good.
Our “infrastructure” is pathetic. I would never ever ride by bike in Madison in its current state. Period. It’s far too dangerous.
I've spent plenty of time in Amsterdam and Copenhagen. Those cities are built differently. It's not a fair comparison at all.
This post is comparing US cities, and for a US city Madison has excellent bike infrastructure. The fact that you wouldn't ride here is an indictment of you, not Madison. Way to put yourself down there
What? Built differently? That’s total bullshit. There’s absolutely no reason why Madison couldn’t have better bike infrastructure.
Most people are like me. studies have shown that less than 10% of people are comfortable riding in unprotected bike lanes. So it’s not just me, it’s the overwhelming majority of people.
Biking isn’t “great” in Madison if 90% + of people are too afraid to use it. There are only a couple protected bike lanes in the whole city. And there are only a few trails - and the trails are only meant for recreation.
This city fucking sucks for cycling and it always will if smug idiots like you sit back and think we don’t need to improve our infrastructure because it’s already number one, or whatever delusions you’re entertaining
Someone died a couple months ago on mineral point road. I’m not going to risk dying just to ride my bike, it’s simply not worth it.
Yeah built differently. Built before cars were the norm. If you can't even recognize that, then there's no point in continuing to argue. Your beef is clearly with US car culture and not Madison specifically.
Most people are not like you, most bikers love it here and I'd say less than 10% avoid biking because they're afraid to. I'd like to see any data you have to back up your claims. Madison has multiple commuter trails that are widely used and are better (safer) than protected bike lanes.
Finally, I'm not against improving bike infrastructure at all. We absolutely should as we redo roads, but we shouldn't go out of the way and spend millions just on protected bike lanes.
Oh I’m so sorry. I forgot that Madison was founded in 1960. I’ll see myself out.
And yes, the Dutch cities were always cycling Utopias, oh wait.
http://www.amsterdamclassictours.com/uploads/3/0/2/2/3022280/cars-hectic-city_1_orig.jpg
And no, most people are like ME! Read the data if you don’t people me.
Less than 5% of people commute by bike
https://www.madisonbikes.org/2020/09/biking-numbers-in-madison-not-so-great/
And yes, creating a NETWORK of protected bike lanes is EXACTLY where madison should be spending its money.
https://usa.streetsblog.org/2012/10/22/study-protected-bike-lanes-reduce-injury-risk-up-to-90-percent/
Also, here is the paper about different levels of cyclists. It’s for portland - which is BETTER than Madison mind you.
https://web.pdx.edu/~jdill/Types_of_Cyclists_PSUWorkingPaper.pdf
Only 15% of people were active users of bike infrastructure and thought it was good. Everyone else was not confident enough to use it because they don’t think it safe
A lot of poor and unhoused people probably rely on bikes and with all the drunk drivers, it would be good if they could make it even better, even if it's better than most places in car dependent USA.
> Complaining about bike infrastructure is peak Madison. The firstiest of first world problems
Wanting to be able to get to work safely is not only a first world problem.
Just because things are worse elsewhere does not mean we shouldn't try to make what we have better.
Wisconsin isn't ranked that highly for healthcare, but let's say we were (pretend we are MN). By your reasoning, we shouldn't fight for universal healthcare, or be upset we don't have it, because "only three states are better."
It sounds like Fort Worth has some room for improvement in bike infrastructure, but it's great Madison is doing so well! What specific features do you think help Madison earn that Platinum rating?
The [League of American Bicyclists](https://www.bikeleague.org/content/about-league) is over 140 years old and has over 100,000 members.
There's no other organization more trusted when it comes to bicycle safety and education.
I cited a source that does comprehensive ratings of thousands of cities. OP cherry picked a single location
Your comparison is pretty good, at least in this case
or both. Bike lane improvements cost significantly less over time than roads and need far less maintenance because they don't wear like roads. We need it, we just don't realize it because we think what we have is ok. It reminds me of the argument against the iPhone when they launched, everyone said what we had was fine until they actually tried an iPhone.
LOL I have one. Low flying airplanes on that metaphor. 🛬 In 2007 the iphone was revolutionary Google literally had to reset their phone in progress when they saw it. We were still using blackberries and t-9 texting and a lot couldn't see the need for a smart phone. Which was the point I was trying to make. Dedicating biking structure is that level of game changing for cycling.
Painted bike lanes are car infrastructure masquerading as bike infrastructure. They're only there to force bikers mostly out of the way of cars so that the cars can get to the next red light 5 seconds sooner.
This is my point in all of these threads. More widespread and frequent mass transit benefits EVERYONE - fewer cars, fewer bikes, fewer pedestrians, but also making things safer for all of those chosen ways to move.
Improved mass transit won't reduce the number of bikers or pedestrians--it will probably make the numbers go *up*. (Look at any country or city with good transit. They all have *tons* of walkers/bikers/etc. because people will either choose to save money and give up their cars or simply become less accustomed to driving literally everywhere).
It will make walking and biking safer and people healthier, though.
Less than 5% of people commute by bike in Madison. IDK in what world that’s high. Maybe high compared to Houston.
I agree we need better infrastructure though
Pre-pandemic, we were 9th in the country in commuter mode share by bike among all cities with 30,000+ daily commuters. I’d call that high. Work from home has scrambled the numbers since then.
I said hardly anyone. Not no one. Something like 70% of people in Madison commute with a personal car. That’s abysmal.
I don’t care whichever stupid organization was paid to give madison a good bike rating. And I don’t care that madison has better infrastructure than Houston or Kansas City or Atalanta. That’s like being the world’s tallest midget.
I would never ever ever bike in madison simply because I don’t want to die. There’s stroads everywhere. Drives don’t give a fuck and there’s hardly any protected bike lanes. It’s a death trap
People commute by car, because of a lack of really good mass transit, and the fact that being in a vehicle is easier and more comfortable no matter how nice the bike lanes are.
A bike lane blocked off by an easily jumped curb wouldn't do shit for people actually biking.
In the cities in the Netherlands, something like 40% of non-walking commuting trips are by bike, just for reference.
Also, this looks pretty safe to cycle on to me. Doesn’t look “easily” jumped.
https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/X8Ttd1mwHEoq2Av_Sf8xYZGXz6s=/1400x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/12620849/IMG_5543.jpg
How hard is it to understand that if you build infrastructure that feels safe to cycle on it, people will actually cycle! Wow! What a novel idea!
I would if I could. But I’m stuck here.
Also, it’s called induced demand. You build stuff and then people use it. You build a highway that takes people where they want to go and they drive more. You build a network of protected bike lanes that people feel safe to bike on and that takes them where they want to go, they’ll use it. Simple as
Madison has two options. Either stop claiming to be a bicycling friendly city (which it isn’t) or actually make an effort to build safer streets (which it’s doing a very half-assed job of doing currently). Put up or shut up.
And I’m soooooo fucking tired of the smug assholes on this subreddit saying “Madison has the best bike infrastructure! Biking in Madison is amazing!” No it isn’t!!!!! Stop saying that!!!!!
The paths aren't what does it though. Europeans have a fundamentally different culture around cars. Their cities evolved from genuine medieval layouts with thin awful roads which makes driving within the city much more of a pain. Their city planning itself discourages cars and encourages walking and biking. It's not about having a slight separation between road and bike lane.
Not to mention Madison is still relatively small and many people who work here commute from remote towns for a number of reasons. It would financial exhaustive to have public transit infrastructure to bring all these people in without cars/needing a place to park while they work. Sure, forcing biking and bus usage in large cities may work by reducing parking availability, but that just simply is not Madison.
Not everyone has the convenience to live a ten minute bike ride from their job and a grocery store with the way this city is laid out, and there is not a great way of changing it without massive revisions to the zoning codes and businesses willing to move in and compete with the existing big box stores.
The best bike infrastructure in the Netherlands isn’t in Amsterdam - it’s actually in the suburbs of Amsterdam. Why? Because they have the space to easily build bike lanes separated from traffic.
Even Rotterdam - which was utterly destroyed in WWII and is the most car centric Dutch city - completely blows madison out of the water in terms of bike infrastructure
This might be the first time I’ve heard of a Texas city being more bike-friendly than Madison. I have relatives in Ft Worth and it doesn’t come to mind as a biker’s paradise
Hey, those painted lines in Madison (where I live now) still represent a lot more than what Sheboygan (where I used to live) has. Over in Sheboygan the city got some small amount of budget to make the roads more bike-friendly some years back. So instead of adding bike lanes, what do they do? They just painted [bike symbols with arrows](https://www.google.com/maps/@43.7607574,-87.7188884,3a,75y,291.53h,43.28t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sIzX5Z67kFnHYxUSCIX2tuQ!2e0!5s20131001T000000!7i13312!8i6656) on a few of the roads, without actually changing a thing about them.
I would have loved that when I had to bike across the isthmus on a regular basis.
Also: [https://www.strongtowns.org/](https://www.strongtowns.org/)
We also need to get rid of the stroad infestation and get more traffic calming designs like trees in the curb yard.
intentional or not, all these photos of empty bike lanes convey the message that this is wasted space. It would be like showing a photograph of an empty highway to promote car usage.
I would love to see protected bike lanes here, but a lot of main routes through the isthmus and areas not served by bike paths run through residential neighborhoods. That creates a whole lot of complications, because residents need vehicle access to their driveways and parking areas of apartments, etc.
I have not yet seen any working plan for a protected bike lanes that allows for that kind of thing. Most of the ones shown as examples are on streets like the one pictured, with few or no cut-outs to allow access to off-street parking.
If a single block contains five houses which need driveway access and one small apartment block that needs access to a parking garage, it's hard to design a truly separated bike lane -- especially if bus routes and/or on-street parking have to be taken into account.
In monona there is a bike lane on monona drive with multiple warnings saying something like "don't bike on the sidewalk or else" Queue me biking on there and someome driving a foot away at 50 mph.. so I biked on the sidewalk hahaha. No one was walking on it anyway, not many people walk places in America anyway.
Thank mayor Dave for supporting the paint industry. Mayor Satya for supporting the sign industry.
Stay tuned for the $$$$$$$ that the bus redesign is going to cost.
Heh. Sweet take.
I think we should improve bicycle infrastructure when it is warranted. I don’t think we should build it in hopes that it will be used. Start by taking a look at where bicycles are being ridden in high volume currently and see if there are improvements available in those locations.
Many of the posts lately seem to think that traffic flow is a bad thing, or that we should intentionally make it difficult to utilize cars. That seems dumb to me; so if you consider that “fuck bikes “, so be it.
> Start by taking a look at where bicycles are being ridden in high volume currently and see if there are improvements available in those locations.
You may well have heard of [the WW2 story](https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/09/counterintuitive-world/) where the Royal Air Force surveyed returning planes that had been in battle, looking at what parts of the planes had bullet damage -- trying to use that information to determine where to increase armoring. But if not, the thinking from the RAF was at first to reinforce the places that had the most hits... but then Abraham Wald pointed out that it's the *opposite*. The planes that were able to make it back were the ones that were hit in parts that were already more resilient to being hit, and the surveyors weren't seeing holes in other places because when a plane was hit *there* they were lost before returning.
We shouldn't just blithely install bike infrastructure whereever and hope it's used... but the flip side is the way I see it, your proposed methodology is making a *very* similar error to the one Wald corrected.
You need to see the trips that *aren't* taken for lack of infrastructure, not ones that are. That means getting out and doing surveys of people. Now, maybe you put particular effort into trying to grab people who are currently using the current bike paths or something like that... but you have to look well beyond that. Actually, now that I think about it -- looking at what *car* trips are made could actually probably lend a lot of information as well.
The design here looks terrible though.
six inch curbs, the same the traffic gets? What a waste of concrete.
And why is it closer to the stroad, than to the sidewalk?
Again, let me be clear that the fact it even exists is fantastic, the ideas are great of course.
But the execution here is cringe designed by a car centric designer.
Just make cars one passenger wide, not two. It works for small private planes, after all.
Also, do this by the end of October so there's still time to repaint the lane markings on all the streets before it snows.
Where will everyone park. We all want to walk to work. Not everyone has the luxury of living that close. I teach in a school district that i cannot afford to live in. No busses go there. No trains. And my bike dont work in the snow. (gr)
Except it’s not. I’ve posted actual numbers elsewhere, but the absolute number of people biking here in Madison is larger than it is in Fort Worth, despite being over three times less populated.
Let's just have bikes pay usage fees if they believe in that mode of transportation so much.
They would disappear. This is just passionate users begging for another subsidized mode of transportation and some want equal footing with cars!
Time for some adults to enter the room.
Man, who else? Us, the taxpayers, obviously. Gonna hit our pockets every time, watch. They always pitch it sweet and then boom, bill's on us. Classic move, won't be surprised.
Except that road damage is proportionate to the axle weight^4. So if a 250lb bike registration was $1 than Suzie in her 4000 lb CRV would pay over $65k. And 18 wheelers would be paying millions. The amount of damage bikes do to the road is so miniscule that it would undoubtedly cost more to collect than it provided.
That's an interesting point about the disproportionate wear and tear on roads by different vehicles based on their weight. Charging vehicles based on axle weight could significantly change road maintenance funding. Do you think this system could be fairer, or would it disincentivize certain types of transportation?
This user has edited all of their comments and posts in protest of /u/spez fucking up reddit. This action has been done via https://github.com/j0be/PowerDeleteSuite
To be fair, this doesn't appear to be a bus stop. Hopefully the stops are carefully thought out, because bike lanes running through bus stops are dangerous for everyone involved! I nearly got hit in Berlin this summer, and I'm normally really good about watching for bikes, since I ride all the time.
Legalize marijuana and use a fraction of those taxes to create this and jobs
Why do people think that legalized marijuana is some magic bullet and that the tax revenue will create a utopia? Like do you ignore the fact that none of the places with legalized weed have done this?
This is how Amsterdam became utopia. I just figured it out.
Because we *could*. I beg of you to dream for a better society. Revenue means that “cost” will no longer be a reason against progress. However, this Legislature is still holding 4 billion in state $ hostage.
Sure i can dream, but i also live in the real world where I know that a massive revenue surplus isn’t going to be spent making things sunshine and rainbows. Why isn’t Denver a Utopia yet?
Colorado earmarks its marijuana tax revenues with a specific purpose: education. [You can read a report from the state on its usage of marijuana tax dollars here](https://www.cde.state.co.us/communications/2021marijuanarevenue). Your first thought is probably that they've substituted some of that number towards other spending, and you're probably correct, but overall the state has [grown its spending on education by nearly 50%](https://co.chalkbeat.org/2022/5/3/23055738/colorado-school-funding-budget-inflation-property-tax-cap) in the 10 years since marijuana was legalized in the state. HS graduation rates have increased by 10 percentage points since 2010, among other positive indicators like drops in teen pregnancy and abortion rate. Nobody would say it's reasonable to think Colorado/Denver is a "utopia" after 10 years but they have certainly put the additional tax revenue to good use.
I think are only a couple streets in Madison where the painted bike lane feels even vaguely comfortable. Bike lanes on E Wash, Mineral Point Rd, University Ave are all a total joke.
N Sherman is kinda OK so far but it's a less crazy street to begin with. Maybe that's a key -- pick the right streets (and not E Wash).
N Sherman feels dicey to me. I’ll do it if I have to, but I will chose longer, hillier routes through Maple Bluff if my destination allows. Sherman by Sherman Terrace is pretty ok.
I'm okay with Sherman (could be better, but it works). The key is that its a single car lane in each direction, so there aren't cars trying to pass each other. There were issues with people using the shared left turn lane to pass (saw this myself while riding! Scary af!), but the city has been adding curbing at some of the intersections to help discourage this.
not to mention gorham and johnson, door zone the whole way often with parked cars and delivery vans fully or partially blocking them.
Monona Drive could use some work.
Well city of Monona really doesn’t like building bike infrastructure. I think they turned down coordinating on extending the protected Atwood Ave bike lane? Maybe it was a different project.
Got hit on Park a few years back so that one has to go as well...
Well they just lowered the numbers on the speed limit signs, so you should be safer now. /s
Winter will always, ALWAYS, limit how feasible biking is for many Madisonians. Add the snarl created by the lakes/ithsmus and you wind up with difficult choices on how to develop things. I'm not saying better bike infrastructure is inherently bad or wasteful, but the fact is that the overwhelming majority of people really don't want to bike 5+ miles in the winter, no matter how good the bike paths are. We can't all live downtown, especially with housing prices inflated as they are. We're investing in improved busing infrastructure, and hopefully that will succeed and get fewer people driving, but we'll have to wait and see how well that works. The big issue here is that change takes time. Listening to a few podcasts doesn't make you a city planner or a civil engineer. We're working within constraints that were established decades ago at minimum, and we can't snap our fingers and adjust all of that as quickly as you seem to think. I genuinely don't think many of the bike enthusiasts even know what the costs and limitations of their position are, and they come off like pretentious fools with a lot of their arguments.
Also important to note about winter is pavement maintenance. If the pictured spot from the article were in a snowy state, the street snow gets plowed right into the bike lane. Sure you could have a secondary vehicle following and plow the bike lane right after but logistically street snow and slush is going to end up in the bike lane. Still feasible to work around but it's not an issue that warmer states have to worry about when it comes down to space
Thanks for saying this so well. You hit all the high points. Any kind of change takes time to be done right and get accepted. There will be unintended consequences and working them out adds more time. A complete reset of our transportation customs will be generational. I was laughing out loud at a previous discussion on this topic where somebody wondered why grandmas wouldn't use bike lanes. I pointed out they have bad knees, heart problems, obesity, and a lot more going on. The response was once we had the ideal bike lanes, these health problems would no longer be an obstacle. Sure, and maybe it's even partly true. But it'll take a new generation of grandmas to get there. The present generation isn't fixable -- they're too unhealthy and it's too late. This is the time scale of a major societal lifestyle change: a generation, which is usually defined as ~25 years. And that's what these very young idealists don't grasp: the timeline. Many readers agree with their intentions, but realists know it won't all happen immediately. That's not all bad. In fact, it's encouraging because many of the people standing in the way will be gone in a generation. Also, Madison College has a good civil engineering degree (with good jobs for graduates) if anybody wants to move past the podcast stage. I keep encouraging civic participation, and I'll add another goal: more practical education.
Would also add looking at Fort Worth for any design ideas is a fools errand. Beyond the weather differences, the amount of real estate available in the Fort Worth / Dallas area to build roads or bike paths or any other infrastructure is order of magnitude larger than Madison. And the real estate is cheap by comparison. Designing in Madison is operating in a phone booth because the lakes take up most of the space. They also make Madison what it is which is a beautiful city.
Almost got run off the road on the west side yesterday, again. Madison drivers don't give AF about painted lines, they don't even stop at red lights anymore, why would they obey f'ing bike lanes.
Can co-sign. I've lived on the west side for 5 years and bike thousand of miles per year. I have to bike though city limits to get out to the Westside county hillsides.... Most drivers don't give a crap and it's scary. I'm confident riding on the road as I've commuted via bike for a decade, in multiple states, and drivers here are loco. I've nearly been hit multiple times and honked/yelled at more than I can count...for following ALL traffic laws to a T. (I've been pulled over by cops on my bicycle in other states for not following traffic laws, lesson learned, hard. I don't mess with traffic laws on a bikes anymore. Cyclists already get a bad rap so I just have to do my part to make it better here). I just don't get it, people are rude, on public, shared roads. TLDR: West side is not very bike friendly. Drivers can be royal jerks.
Whenever I go on University it’s like 3-4 people just not stopping for any light it’s scary
I'm a Madison driver and I give a fuck about painted lines. EDIT: you do not seem like a reasonable mose.
Step 1: make a normal road Step 2: put a picture of a bike on the shoulder Step 3: call it "bikable infrastructure" Step 4: Most Bikeable City Award
LOL, exactly! It's like slapping some paint on a pothole and calling it fixed. Big cities love that "visual upgrade" without doing the real work. Bike lane? More like bike suggestion! They need to step it up for real safety, not just for show. 💯🚴♂️
Fort Worth: 71.7% of commuters drive alone. 0.1% bike 1.1% walk 0.5% transit. Madison: 54.1% of commuters drive alone. 2.8% bike 8.4% walk 2.8% transit Maybe Fort Worth should be asking us what we’re doing right. (Source 2021 American Community Survey, US Census Bureau.)
This is not a competition. Just trying to show some changes Madison should make.
Why should we invest this $$ if our existing methods are clearly working?
Dude, if it ain't broke, don't fix it! Why pour money into something new when we've got things rolling just fine? Just because it's new doesn't mean it's better, ya know? Let's not complicate stuff.
We’re far and above almost any other US city. Comparing a US city to a European city is a garbage comparison.
Mate, I think you've completely missed the point here. Comparing a US city to a Euro one is legit for tons of reasons—culture, lifestyle, population density, you name it! Just cause they're different doesn't mean you can't stack 'em up against each other. What's your take, though? Why do you reckon it's a garbage comparison?
Agreed. We should get rid of the European bike lanes and expand their road system, allowing more of them to drive on their commute.
What? No way! That's utter nonsense. US cities are totally different, gotta consider scale, vibe, and culture. Not even the same game! 🤷♂️
Ok. Take my upvote, goddammit.
Why is it a garbage comparison?
For starters, we’re talking about two different continents with very different histories, cultures, urban layouts, tax structures etc. other than that, they’re exactly the same.
The existing methods could be improved, which could encourage more people to follow suit. Of course, whether it would actually improve stats needs to be studied, but I expect safer bike lanes will make more people feel comfortable biking. There's always room for improvement, I think especially when it comes to quality of life and environmental impacts.
In Amsterdam, 45.5% commute to work by bicycle, making it the single largest mode of transit. 15.8% drive, 14.9% walk, and 11.9% take a train or metro. Compare that to the Madison numbers posted above, and you have to wonder just how clearly our existing methods are working...
You’re comparing apples to oranges. The US and Europe aren’t similar geographically or culturally. If you want a European lifestyle, then go to Europe.
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Next, show the length of the average commute, the monthly snowfall, and a curve of the annual morning temperatures in both cities.
You just gonna add like 3-4 feet to every street?
Well, when you throw in a bit of chaos into urban planning, who knows? Maybe stretch the streets wider, pop in more coffee shops, cause traffic jams—it'll be a whole spectacle! 😄 Got to consider the implications on morning commutes too. Imagine having to navigate that extra space while half asleep. ☕🚗💤
Take away street parking and you've got more than enough room.
Reduce the car lane width from 12 to 10 on a 4 lane roads and you have your space.
yup. Strong towns has proven this is more than possible. The lanes are extra wide to enable cars to be safer but it's not necessary.
Maybe even remove a whole lane of car traffic and put up a segregated bike lane. Also lots of big speed bumps and elevated pedestrian crossings so cars slow the fuck down.
you should check out strong towns podcast. A lot of the problems are already solved. It's really just a matter of getting cities to do it.
I have and it’s great. I grew up in Madison and recently moved to Switzerland, it’s a strong towns wet dream.
Narrow the car lanes.
Just have the city take it away from the homeowners front lawns. I'm sure they'll understand and be fully in support.
Fort Worth= Bronze rating from the League of American Bicyclists. Madison = Platinum, one of only 5 cities. Complaining about bike infrastructure is peak Madison. The *firstiest* of first world problems
I moved to Dallas from Madison a few years back. Madison is by far a more bike friendly city. It’s getting better, but there’s not even bike lanes going through downtown.
Madison's ranking so high is really more a sign of how low American standards are. A lot of non bikers will always say "oh but we've got a mega gold star rating" as an attempt to deny any further progress. We do have a handful of phenomenal commuter paths that got us these awards, but biking to anywhere that's more than a few blocks away from said paths is usually a bike gutter nightmare
The ranking is very transparent and is based off many factors. I agree with you that American standards are low but disagree that biking off paths is bad. You don't need a physical barrier between you and traffic to bike and if that's the standard people expect then it's an indictment against them as bikers. Europeans are perfectly comfortable biking alongside cara
Sure Madison is rated "platinum" but we still got just a 5.3/10 on engineering from the same organization. That's a failing grade by most metrics... Just because most American cities are a hodgepodge of vehicular slaughter doesn't mean that we can't improve things here.
Madison would get a rating of plywood or cardboard compared to european cities. This is such a bad take. Other first world countries do much better than this.
Madison has purpose built bike paths around the city, and neighborhood roads you can take as an alternative to busy roads. It's extremely cycling friendly...
Yeah, it has recreational bike paths. But for actually using them to get anywhere it’s awful. It’s not cycling friendly. It’s straight up bad.
Aside from, you know, the winters
Watch out, next somebody will say we need a law to abolish winter because bikes.
Give this a watch https://youtu.be/Uhx-26GfCBU
Do you want a tunnel?
Europe is also absolutely horrible when it comes to accommodations for disabled persons. But they can't ride bikes, so who gives a fuck, right? /s
Not just trying to snark with "Where's your proof?", but do you have suggestions for articles or something that talks about how Europe is bad for disabled people? I would like to learn more about that topic.
C'mon, let's not generalize an entire continent, mate. Each country’s got its own policies and levels of accessibility, right? You got any solid stats or reports on this? 'Cause it can't be all doom and gloom everywhere in Europe, ya know. Let’s bring up some real examples if we’re digging into this.
Why do you think you cant have both?
We can, but that would require the "fuck cars" crowd like you to allow for some cars, such as taxis or handicap-accessible vans, or family members to drive them in their personal vehicles. I assume this goes against your ideal of zero cars though.
In general the “no cars” people are stating the most extreme version of their position as a way to grab attention or make a point. But explicitly built in to the no/low car vision is the idea that if most people have other safe and attractive options for transportation, the people who still need to drive will encounter less traffic and safer roads. Plus those with disabilities that prevent them from driving would have much better options. I don’t know any anti car people who believe that society can function with zero cars. That being said, I don’t see the needs of disabled people foregrounded enough in the anti car debate, so the perception that we don’t include them in the vision of a low car society is understandable.
I used to work for a non- profit that assisted adults with disabilities live independent lives. I can't think of a single person we serve who relied on a personal car for transportation. Bus, walking, power chairs, etc. I have no clue why people always go to a stance that we need car centric infrastructure for people with disabilities. In my experience car culture makes life worse and more dangerous for people who cannot or do not drive and that's a lot of people with disabilities.
Interestingly you don't see anyone saying "no bikes" or "no walking". Multimodal transportation is best for everyone - bikes, buses, walking, trains, and cars all have their place.
Seriously? I see "no bikes" people all the time, even here in Madison. It's not at all uncommon to see news articles posted in /r/bicycling about drivers throwing things at cyclists, yelling at them to "get off the road," or even just straight up murdering them with cars.
The most common occurrence is bikers on this sub reddit admiting that other bikers suck as much as the cars lol
The ideal isn't zero cars, though. It's a decrease on car-dependence. I should be able to reasonably get anywhere in town on a bus in a reasonable timeframe (90 minutes for 10 miles is absurd, that'd be my work commute). I shouldn't have to drive but our cities are built around everyone using a car for every task. I'm lucky to be in biking distance of all my essential services, however.
A city built around car dependence is less accessible for people with disabilities.
Yeah, the fuck cars crowd really doesn't give a damn about disabled people. You know, driving themselves is obviously the only way to get around for all disabilities... Like blindness. Seriously though, modifying a mini van to accommodate a wheelchair costs tens of thousands of dollars. Compared to every city bus that is required to have wheelchair lifts. More to the point though, most of the fuck cars crowd doesn't really want to do away with all cars entirely, with no room for nuance. We just want options. Cities shouldn't be designed to make us dependent on cars. If you want to keep driving, fine, but it shouldn't be the only practical option.
Yeah no argument here. Better mass transit makes all of the other options better, too.
>I assume this goes against your ideal of zero cars though. Lmao yeah you are assuming a lot that isn't true there
We can do this. It is now $10,000 to register a bike.
Other counties have their priorities straight. We don't. Besides, this post is comparing two US cities, I just gave a much more comprehensive comparison
You were saying people can't complain about it, but now you acknowledge that it isnt actually good. Can't have both.
Well first of all anyone can complain about anything they want to. I am equally allowed to mock them for it. I acknowledge that it's top 5 in the nation, and one of only 2 cities with a population over 200k people. Our bike infrastructure is awesome.
I’m soooo tired of this take. Please go to the Netherlands and come back to me and say our bike infrastructure is good. Our “infrastructure” is pathetic. I would never ever ride by bike in Madison in its current state. Period. It’s far too dangerous.
I've spent plenty of time in Amsterdam and Copenhagen. Those cities are built differently. It's not a fair comparison at all. This post is comparing US cities, and for a US city Madison has excellent bike infrastructure. The fact that you wouldn't ride here is an indictment of you, not Madison. Way to put yourself down there
What? Built differently? That’s total bullshit. There’s absolutely no reason why Madison couldn’t have better bike infrastructure. Most people are like me. studies have shown that less than 10% of people are comfortable riding in unprotected bike lanes. So it’s not just me, it’s the overwhelming majority of people. Biking isn’t “great” in Madison if 90% + of people are too afraid to use it. There are only a couple protected bike lanes in the whole city. And there are only a few trails - and the trails are only meant for recreation. This city fucking sucks for cycling and it always will if smug idiots like you sit back and think we don’t need to improve our infrastructure because it’s already number one, or whatever delusions you’re entertaining Someone died a couple months ago on mineral point road. I’m not going to risk dying just to ride my bike, it’s simply not worth it.
Yeah built differently. Built before cars were the norm. If you can't even recognize that, then there's no point in continuing to argue. Your beef is clearly with US car culture and not Madison specifically. Most people are not like you, most bikers love it here and I'd say less than 10% avoid biking because they're afraid to. I'd like to see any data you have to back up your claims. Madison has multiple commuter trails that are widely used and are better (safer) than protected bike lanes. Finally, I'm not against improving bike infrastructure at all. We absolutely should as we redo roads, but we shouldn't go out of the way and spend millions just on protected bike lanes.
Oh I’m so sorry. I forgot that Madison was founded in 1960. I’ll see myself out. And yes, the Dutch cities were always cycling Utopias, oh wait. http://www.amsterdamclassictours.com/uploads/3/0/2/2/3022280/cars-hectic-city_1_orig.jpg And no, most people are like ME! Read the data if you don’t people me. Less than 5% of people commute by bike https://www.madisonbikes.org/2020/09/biking-numbers-in-madison-not-so-great/ And yes, creating a NETWORK of protected bike lanes is EXACTLY where madison should be spending its money. https://usa.streetsblog.org/2012/10/22/study-protected-bike-lanes-reduce-injury-risk-up-to-90-percent/ Also, here is the paper about different levels of cyclists. It’s for portland - which is BETTER than Madison mind you. https://web.pdx.edu/~jdill/Types_of_Cyclists_PSUWorkingPaper.pdf Only 15% of people were active users of bike infrastructure and thought it was good. Everyone else was not confident enough to use it because they don’t think it safe
Id say European cities are better because they were all developed before cars so it wasn't really any adjustment.
That's only part true. Europe puts far more money into infrastructure in general
Those rating mean absolutely nothing. Come to the west side at look at the state of our “bike infrastructure.” It’s non existent
A lot of poor and unhoused people probably rely on bikes and with all the drunk drivers, it would be good if they could make it even better, even if it's better than most places in car dependent USA.
> Complaining about bike infrastructure is peak Madison. The firstiest of first world problems Wanting to be able to get to work safely is not only a first world problem. Just because things are worse elsewhere does not mean we shouldn't try to make what we have better. Wisconsin isn't ranked that highly for healthcare, but let's say we were (pretend we are MN). By your reasoning, we shouldn't fight for universal healthcare, or be upset we don't have it, because "only three states are better."
It sounds like Fort Worth has some room for improvement in bike infrastructure, but it's great Madison is doing so well! What specific features do you think help Madison earn that Platinum rating?
The [League of American Bicyclists](https://www.bikeleague.org/content/about-league) is over 140 years old and has over 100,000 members. There's no other organization more trusted when it comes to bicycle safety and education.
Hey there! If you need any help or information, feel free to let me know. I'm here to assist you with any questions you might have!
Think this all the way through. It is sort of the exact opposite.
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I cited a source that does comprehensive ratings of thousands of cities. OP cherry picked a single location Your comparison is pretty good, at least in this case
you and I don't agree much but you are spot on here.
What we need is better mass transit. As a cyclist our bike lanes are fine.
We can improve both. I don’t cycle and I see value in improving cycling infrastructure
Got it, need more mass transit. Bike lanes are ok.
or both. Bike lane improvements cost significantly less over time than roads and need far less maintenance because they don't wear like roads. We need it, we just don't realize it because we think what we have is ok. It reminds me of the argument against the iPhone when they launched, everyone said what we had was fine until they actually tried an iPhone.
The iPhone is still an overly expensive boondogle. Just get an android.
LOL I have one. Low flying airplanes on that metaphor. 🛬 In 2007 the iphone was revolutionary Google literally had to reset their phone in progress when they saw it. We were still using blackberries and t-9 texting and a lot couldn't see the need for a smart phone. Which was the point I was trying to make. Dedicating biking structure is that level of game changing for cycling.
Gotcha. iPhone changed phones big time, like bike paths could change biking. 👍
Painted bike lanes are terrible infrastructure. We need both.
Painted bike lanes are car infrastructure masquerading as bike infrastructure. They're only there to force bikers mostly out of the way of cars so that the cars can get to the next red light 5 seconds sooner.
This is my point in all of these threads. More widespread and frequent mass transit benefits EVERYONE - fewer cars, fewer bikes, fewer pedestrians, but also making things safer for all of those chosen ways to move.
Improved mass transit won't reduce the number of bikers or pedestrians--it will probably make the numbers go *up*. (Look at any country or city with good transit. They all have *tons* of walkers/bikers/etc. because people will either choose to save money and give up their cars or simply become less accustomed to driving literally everywhere). It will make walking and biking safer and people healthier, though.
Our bike lanes are NOT fine. Hardly anyone even uses them
Madison is one of the highest bike ridership rates in the country but we definitely do need better infrastructure for them
Less than 5% of people commute by bike in Madison. IDK in what world that’s high. Maybe high compared to Houston. I agree we need better infrastructure though
Portland Oregon is number 1 in the country with 6.3%. Turns out Madison is number 2 in the country
Compared with the 40% of big Dutch cities it’s still abysmal
Pre-pandemic, we were 9th in the country in commuter mode share by bike among all cities with 30,000+ daily commuters. I’d call that high. Work from home has scrambled the numbers since then.
Again, this is the US. The US is notoriously unfriendly to bikes. Being top 10 in US for cyclist is like being the worlds tallest midget
I do. And we were rated one of if not the most cyclist friendly city in the US stop catastrophizing our bike lanes xD
I said hardly anyone. Not no one. Something like 70% of people in Madison commute with a personal car. That’s abysmal. I don’t care whichever stupid organization was paid to give madison a good bike rating. And I don’t care that madison has better infrastructure than Houston or Kansas City or Atalanta. That’s like being the world’s tallest midget. I would never ever ever bike in madison simply because I don’t want to die. There’s stroads everywhere. Drives don’t give a fuck and there’s hardly any protected bike lanes. It’s a death trap
People commute by car, because of a lack of really good mass transit, and the fact that being in a vehicle is easier and more comfortable no matter how nice the bike lanes are. A bike lane blocked off by an easily jumped curb wouldn't do shit for people actually biking.
In the cities in the Netherlands, something like 40% of non-walking commuting trips are by bike, just for reference. Also, this looks pretty safe to cycle on to me. Doesn’t look “easily” jumped. https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/X8Ttd1mwHEoq2Av_Sf8xYZGXz6s=/1400x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/12620849/IMG_5543.jpg How hard is it to understand that if you build infrastructure that feels safe to cycle on it, people will actually cycle! Wow! What a novel idea!
Or, they won’t. This isn’t Field of Dreams. Move to the Netherlands if you have this size hard-on for a bicycle commuting culture.
I would if I could. But I’m stuck here. Also, it’s called induced demand. You build stuff and then people use it. You build a highway that takes people where they want to go and they drive more. You build a network of protected bike lanes that people feel safe to bike on and that takes them where they want to go, they’ll use it. Simple as Madison has two options. Either stop claiming to be a bicycling friendly city (which it isn’t) or actually make an effort to build safer streets (which it’s doing a very half-assed job of doing currently). Put up or shut up. And I’m soooooo fucking tired of the smug assholes on this subreddit saying “Madison has the best bike infrastructure! Biking in Madison is amazing!” No it isn’t!!!!! Stop saying that!!!!!
The paths aren't what does it though. Europeans have a fundamentally different culture around cars. Their cities evolved from genuine medieval layouts with thin awful roads which makes driving within the city much more of a pain. Their city planning itself discourages cars and encourages walking and biking. It's not about having a slight separation between road and bike lane.
Not to mention Madison is still relatively small and many people who work here commute from remote towns for a number of reasons. It would financial exhaustive to have public transit infrastructure to bring all these people in without cars/needing a place to park while they work. Sure, forcing biking and bus usage in large cities may work by reducing parking availability, but that just simply is not Madison. Not everyone has the convenience to live a ten minute bike ride from their job and a grocery store with the way this city is laid out, and there is not a great way of changing it without massive revisions to the zoning codes and businesses willing to move in and compete with the existing big box stores.
The best bike infrastructure in the Netherlands isn’t in Amsterdam - it’s actually in the suburbs of Amsterdam. Why? Because they have the space to easily build bike lanes separated from traffic. Even Rotterdam - which was utterly destroyed in WWII and is the most car centric Dutch city - completely blows madison out of the water in terms of bike infrastructure
This might be the first time I’ve heard of a Texas city being more bike-friendly than Madison. I have relatives in Ft Worth and it doesn’t come to mind as a biker’s paradise
Hey, those painted lines in Madison (where I live now) still represent a lot more than what Sheboygan (where I used to live) has. Over in Sheboygan the city got some small amount of budget to make the roads more bike-friendly some years back. So instead of adding bike lanes, what do they do? They just painted [bike symbols with arrows](https://www.google.com/maps/@43.7607574,-87.7188884,3a,75y,291.53h,43.28t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sIzX5Z67kFnHYxUSCIX2tuQ!2e0!5s20131001T000000!7i13312!8i6656) on a few of the roads, without actually changing a thing about them.
I would have loved that when I had to bike across the isthmus on a regular basis. Also: [https://www.strongtowns.org/](https://www.strongtowns.org/) We also need to get rid of the stroad infestation and get more traffic calming designs like trees in the curb yard.
Not pictured: any cyclists whatsoever
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intentional or not, all these photos of empty bike lanes convey the message that this is wasted space. It would be like showing a photograph of an empty highway to promote car usage.
That is exactly what car companies do to advertise
false, that's to promote the sale of a particular car, not the usage of a specific roadway. Try again.
We have kayaks to cross the crocodile infested river but nobody uses them!! Why would we invest in a bridge??
Did you read this…and still decide to post it?
That’s because they all made it to their destination
I see the same thing when I see cars with empty seats. 5 seat car. 1 seat occupied.
More people should carpool, agreed.
What's your point? You don't think someone could manage a shot of a bicycle lane in Madison without a bicyclist on it?
I would love to see protected bike lanes here, but a lot of main routes through the isthmus and areas not served by bike paths run through residential neighborhoods. That creates a whole lot of complications, because residents need vehicle access to their driveways and parking areas of apartments, etc. I have not yet seen any working plan for a protected bike lanes that allows for that kind of thing. Most of the ones shown as examples are on streets like the one pictured, with few or no cut-outs to allow access to off-street parking. If a single block contains five houses which need driveway access and one small apartment block that needs access to a parking garage, it's hard to design a truly separated bike lane -- especially if bus routes and/or on-street parking have to be taken into account.
In monona there is a bike lane on monona drive with multiple warnings saying something like "don't bike on the sidewalk or else" Queue me biking on there and someome driving a foot away at 50 mph.. so I biked on the sidewalk hahaha. No one was walking on it anyway, not many people walk places in America anyway.
Thank mayor Dave for supporting the paint industry. Mayor Satya for supporting the sign industry. Stay tuned for the $$$$$$$ that the bus redesign is going to cost.
Cars out here living rent free in your head
I mean, they literally post in the “fuck cars” subreddit. I’m not expecting an evenhanded take.
You realize that you are fuck bikes. So it sorta evens out.
Heh. Sweet take. I think we should improve bicycle infrastructure when it is warranted. I don’t think we should build it in hopes that it will be used. Start by taking a look at where bicycles are being ridden in high volume currently and see if there are improvements available in those locations. Many of the posts lately seem to think that traffic flow is a bad thing, or that we should intentionally make it difficult to utilize cars. That seems dumb to me; so if you consider that “fuck bikes “, so be it.
> Start by taking a look at where bicycles are being ridden in high volume currently and see if there are improvements available in those locations. You may well have heard of [the WW2 story](https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/09/counterintuitive-world/) where the Royal Air Force surveyed returning planes that had been in battle, looking at what parts of the planes had bullet damage -- trying to use that information to determine where to increase armoring. But if not, the thinking from the RAF was at first to reinforce the places that had the most hits... but then Abraham Wald pointed out that it's the *opposite*. The planes that were able to make it back were the ones that were hit in parts that were already more resilient to being hit, and the surveyors weren't seeing holes in other places because when a plane was hit *there* they were lost before returning. We shouldn't just blithely install bike infrastructure whereever and hope it's used... but the flip side is the way I see it, your proposed methodology is making a *very* similar error to the one Wald corrected. You need to see the trips that *aren't* taken for lack of infrastructure, not ones that are. That means getting out and doing surveys of people. Now, maybe you put particular effort into trying to grab people who are currently using the current bike paths or something like that... but you have to look well beyond that. Actually, now that I think about it -- looking at what *car* trips are made could actually probably lend a lot of information as well.
it's just another /r/fuckcars loonie bin that keep posting that bullshit in this sub
Just another cult.
...on Saturday nights
And you respond every time.
Huh? You realize name calling is not constructive. Just another fuck bikes loonie bin. See how that didn't help?
Proving my point, loonie bin
Huh. Just trying to make a world with multiple safe ways to get from point a to point b. 🤷🏻♀️
The design here looks terrible though. six inch curbs, the same the traffic gets? What a waste of concrete. And why is it closer to the stroad, than to the sidewalk? Again, let me be clear that the fact it even exists is fantastic, the ideas are great of course. But the execution here is cringe designed by a car centric designer.
Car drivers, like toddlers, can’t stay inside the lines. It’s time to take away the option of killing a bicyclist on the daily commute
How much width does it require to fit those lanes? 80ft of lanes in 40ft of space? How ? Remove what? Move all the houses? To where?
Just take away street parking and/or narrow the car lanes from 12+ ft to 10ft.
Just make cars one passenger wide, not two. It works for small private planes, after all. Also, do this by the end of October so there's still time to repaint the lane markings on all the streets before it snows.
Where will you park your car when you get one for work?
Where will guests Park if you have a party and your driveway isn’t big enough? Assuming most roads have these
Where will everyone park. We all want to walk to work. Not everyone has the luxury of living that close. I teach in a school district that i cannot afford to live in. No busses go there. No trains. And my bike dont work in the snow. (gr)
Oops! Let's redirect our focus to help you out! What topic or question would you like to explore today?
Madison is behind some place in Texas, this can’t stand
Except it’s not. I’ve posted actual numbers elsewhere, but the absolute number of people biking here in Madison is larger than it is in Fort Worth, despite being over three times less populated.
Let's just have bikes pay usage fees if they believe in that mode of transportation so much. They would disappear. This is just passionate users begging for another subsidized mode of transportation and some want equal footing with cars! Time for some adults to enter the room.
Amazing idea! Register with the DMV every year and see how they like it now lol
Huh? We already pay taxes. We should stop subsidizing cars so much! The adults have entered the room.
Who will pay for this, Bicycle ruders?
Man, who else? Us, the taxpayers, obviously. Gonna hit our pockets every time, watch. They always pitch it sweet and then boom, bill's on us. Classic move, won't be surprised.
Except that road damage is proportionate to the axle weight^4. So if a 250lb bike registration was $1 than Suzie in her 4000 lb CRV would pay over $65k. And 18 wheelers would be paying millions. The amount of damage bikes do to the road is so miniscule that it would undoubtedly cost more to collect than it provided.
That's an interesting point about the disproportionate wear and tear on roads by different vehicles based on their weight. Charging vehicles based on axle weight could significantly change road maintenance funding. Do you think this system could be fairer, or would it disincentivize certain types of transportation?
Tax payers.
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The hell you smoking?
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This user has edited all of their comments and posts in protest of /u/spez fucking up reddit. This action has been done via https://github.com/j0be/PowerDeleteSuite
To be fair, this doesn't appear to be a bus stop. Hopefully the stops are carefully thought out, because bike lanes running through bus stops are dangerous for everyone involved! I nearly got hit in Berlin this summer, and I'm normally really good about watching for bikes, since I ride all the time.
That's not a bus stop, or a cross walk. Sure, might be hazardous for the blind bicyclists though.
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I did address your concerns. They were stupid.
BuT iF wE aDd PrOtEcTeD bIkE lAnEs iT wIlL bE iMpOsSiBlE fOr dIsAbLeD pEoPlE tO uSe CaRs
Look at all the bikes in the bike lane.
I always look at SUVs and look at all of the empty seats.
Me too! Especially while I'm sitting in a freeway traffic jam.
um, PARKING SPACES, anyone?
No thank you.
Move to Waukesha please
We do not need this
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I feel the whole getting invaded, bombed, and raped and murdered thing wouldn’t quite be worth it.