I remember the first time I visited Amsterdam, and marveling at their fantastic bike lanes. If you've been there, you probably also thought, "why don't we have those in the US?"
Well, be careful what you wish for, because now....we have them.
You see..... one thing you don't think when you fantasize about a utopian society of pedaling citizens is that in order to have a bike lane, something has to go. It's a matter of space.
On Motor Ave below Cheviot Hills, and Ocean Park Blvd (above) in Santa Monica, what has gone is an entire lane of vehicle traffic.
In both cases, we now have horrible bottlenecks and bumper to bumper traffic.
The truth about bike lanes is that very few of us can use them. Here is what's required:
- trip must be short
- you can't be carrying anything that can't fit on a bike
- you can't have your kids with you, or any passengers
- it can't be cold, rainy, or hot
- you can't be too old
- you can't be handicapped or unfit in some way
- you can't be going anywhere you can't arrive sweaty
And above all, you must be willing to share the road with cars. Because unlike Amsterdam, our bike lanes are not separate from where the cars travel. (There, they have a little rock wall barrier.)
While I certainly would LOVE to have REAL bike lanes here, these bike lanes are a total disaster. Let's not even talk about the shade of green they chose, or the fact that they are just little spotty routes that aren't connected to each other. The main problem is that these bike lanes benefit a tiny minority while inconveniencing everybody else. Traffic here is already so bad they almost considered making Pico and Olympic one way to increase lanes. And they also wanted to restrict parking on those roads. Now they want to TAKE AWAY lanes?
There must be some way to fit safe bike lanes (separated from traffic) onto roads without reducing the lanes for cars. Maybe the sidewalks can be thinner? I would definitely bike around if it were safe.
But just paining new lines on the street?.....they really didn't put much thought into it. (Though I'm sure the "budget" for dumping green paint on the street was in the thousands.)
Anyhow, rant over, but if you get stuck on either of these roads, you will agree. Banish the bike lanes!
