Cycle lanes what do we think?

[Jodee1kenobi]

I remain ambivalent about cycle lanes. I find some are useful, most are not. I selfishly use the ones that benefit me and forget the rest. I get fed up with the bloomin' things just ending whenever they feel like it! Others like to take you on a magical mystery tour miles out of your way, when all you want to do is go to town.
I ask out of curiosity really. I read a typical, why do cyclists......? letter in my local rag and of course it got the usual 'lump all cyclists together' replies and the subject of cyclists not using cycle lanes came up. I am assuming (I know I shouldn't but...) that the majority of comments are being made by people who don't cycle and me being me couldn't help but put my tuppence worth in

So what does everyone think? (Apologies if this has been asked before) Do you use them? Do you loathe them?

 

[Norm]

If I know where it runs and where it ends, I'll use w cycle lane. There's a couple locally which I use regularly, running alongside NSL roads with few driveways. However, there's not many which are like that, most of them I avoid as the roads are safer.

 

[Arch]

There are paths and tracks which run alongside a road, or completely away from the, which can be useful, IF you know where they go, as Norm says. They can be more direct, or just nicer, if you're prepared to watch your speed and share.

Cycle lanes on roads, the strips of green at the side of the road, are often useless (and downright dangerous when they encourage novices to ride down the left of queueing traffic, if that includes HGVs and buses). Too narrow, full of crap, too close to the kerb. If one is wide enough and not crap, I'll be in it, by default, in secondary. If it's rubbish, I'll ride in the position I choose, and if that's outside the lane, so be it...

 

[marinyork]

Love 'em. Endless entertainment

 

[vernon]

Try the cycle lanes in Germany, Austria, Slovakia and Hungary and enjoy the enhanced status of cyclists like I've dine overthrow past two Weeks and you'll be enlightened into the way it ought to be Grasshopper.

 

[MrJamie]

This is my personal favourite one near me, it was very kind of them to put refreshments right on the cycle path If you look at the little blue sign i believe its NCR 6 http://goo.gl/maps/Nre3j

 

[sittingbull]

Not keen. Some local ones run along wide pavements (on the road side) and people standing at the bus stops are often in the cycle lane, creating a randomly moving hazard. There is an on/off bump each time the cycle lane crosses a road junction so speeds are curtailed. Broken glass hangs around for ages 'cos it's not swept or broken up by car wheels.

Those in the road are often non-continuous and I've punctured in one after a hawthorn hedge along the roadside had been trimmed and again the thorns remained longer than if the cycle lane hadn't been there.

Those at traffic lights are excellent as long as there isn't a car that's overshot his white line and stopped in the box.

 

[Risex4]

Infuriating pointless, poorly planned, layed out by someone who has never cycled around the area, dangerous, mis-leading, slapped down just to meet some quota of cycle lane milage so the council can harp on about being cycle friendly...

Seriously, where I am, I dont think there is a decently useful stretch.

The canal path is marked out as cycle path - well that's genius. Its a nice scenic route for tourists and for a casual spin, but it starts no where and leads nowhere. They've literally taken the original 5 meter wide footpath and just split it into two so that footies and cyclists can swap glares at each other for being on the wrong side.

Then theres a stretch through a residential area. It starts as an outside divide of a pre-existing pavement, but is barely narrow enough to cycle down, without the fact that the orignal sign posts and bollards are still in situ slap bang in the middle of the bleedy thing. It then jumps on and off the path at various drop kerbs - at one point it goes from the pavement onto the road on a swinging corner which I've always thought was a masterstroke - before stopping for no good reason, only to start up again 200 meters up the road... outside a row of busy shops and skirts the on-road parking spaces nicely.

Then theres the seperate stretch of road which hits a fork. The 'natural' right hand curve of the road takes you to the bypass to circumvent the city. The 'left' fork offshoot takes you towards the motorway. Both highly used lanes of transit. Someone's wisdom was to pop in a cycle path starting 30 yards short of this fork, the cycle lane itself forking to match the road layout, meaning that cyclists are encouraged to hug the curb to the fork, then dart across the turning if they intend to follow the bypass route. The cycle lane then stops abrupty 20 yards past this point in both directions.

The latest one is that throught the downtown trading estate, the council have made the footpaths wider on the sidestreets and added nice little cyclepath logos to them. These sidestreets are not overly busy and are plenty wide enough for safe passing in any situation. The main trunk route, of course, has nothing.

Blah, Im too tired to ramble and rant and keep it coherent...

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

I'll use cycle lanes if the surface is decent enough and I know when I am going.

I, however, make really good use of the local cycletracks as they generally are quite good in my area, and they take you to places too! Also, Pat was really impressed with them on Monday there, so what else can I say really?

 

[Pat "5mph"]

Yes, MDB is really lucky: a cycle ring road that links about a dozen small towns. Great! No broken glass as well, what more could you ask for?
While, in my bit, before finding a proper cycling lane, I have to go on the road for a couple of miles in each direction. It's more a matter to find alternative traffic calmed down streets, than proper lanes.
In saying that, once you get to the Clyde walkway, it's all good.
I noticed on my exploring trips, the nearby towns of Cambuslang and Hamilton have good cycling facilities. Also the area surrounding Hampden Park has been kitted out with cycling lanes.
In general, I will use paths if I know where I'm gonna end up and, most important, if I know they are not sprinkled with broken glass.

 

[PBancroft]

There are paths and tracks which run alongside a road, or completely away from the, which can be useful, IF you know where they go, as Norm says. They can be more direct, or just nicer, if you're prepared to watch your speed and share.

Cycle lanes on roads, the strips of green at the side of the road, are often useless (and downright dangerous when they encourage novices to ride down the left of queueing traffic, if that includes HGVs and buses). Too narrow, full of crap, too close to the kerb. If one is wide enough and not crap, I'll be in it, by default, in secondary. If it's rubbish, I'll ride in the position I choose, and if that's outside the lane, so be it...

This. One thousand times this.

 

[ComedyPilot]

I, like so many others, will use cycle paths if they are well constructed, clear of debris, clearly signed and actually go where I want to go. A bit of paint splashed in the gutter does not a cyle path maketh.

Trouble is in this country, a LOT of money has been wasted on carp cycle lanes, we don't use them because they're carp, drivers see us not using them (because they're carp), so we struggle to get more. They are thought out and designed (clearly) by cretins who have NEVER ridden a bike, and have no idea of the needs of cyclists.

I tend to harp on about The Netherlands and their cycle lanes, but that is because they are SO good. A downside is that if there are good, wide off-road cycle paths, then riding on the road is frowned upon. But because the lanes were there, they were good, wide and actually went where I wanted to go and were VERY WELL signposted, I didn't feel the need to ride on the road. And here's the good part, (excuse the Pulp Fiction-esqueness of it) you know the cycle paths in Holland, well, get this, when they are painted on a road, the cars have to give way to cyclists - no 6" flypast at 60mph. Also they have laws in Holland (NL) about liability being perceived the car driver is in the wrong if they hit a cyclist. "oh that's it man, I'm going, I'm zarking going"

 

[ComedyPilot]

Excuse me if I go all 'google maps' on yo ass, but to illustrate my point I would like to offer a few views of typical paths I encountered on my 1200km ride round the NL.

 

[ComedyPilot]

https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=e...FjB3Dlgonklj9BvKRyg0iw&cbp=12,206.56,,0,-1.23

After leaving the ferry terminal, the path immediately is there to the right

 

[ComedyPilot]

https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=e...uZJs_L991WEjCmS8ytcEFA&cbp=12,127.17,,0,-5.44

A mile or so down the road, and the path is now seperated from the road