Bicycles don’t delay cars

Comments

A handful of views—what do you reckon?

1. Chris L — 13 November 2006 #

   The thing is, we all knew this, but that doesn’t stop people from having a whine about it. If, for example, you’ve ever seen the propoganda from people claiming to “support” public transport as a traffic congestion solution, most of their claims are based around the idea that someone else will use it. In the end, cyclists make a convenient scapegoat for people whining like this largely because there are so few cyclists on the road. Most people don’t want solutions, they just want someone to blame.

   That said, I don’t mind if people just sit in their cars and whine about traffic congestion. For a sprightly and moderately skilled cyclist, passing hundreds of even thousands of stationary gridlocked cars on the way to work each day is the easiest thing in the world.

2. Treadly and Me — 13 November 2006 #

   Well, I don’t think I’m making any profound new observation here—I just thought that was an amusing sequence of photos. I especially like the contrast from “Here are 35 drivers” to “And here they are on a bus”.

   But I think if someone is going to complain about road congestion, they need to consider their own contribution to their problem. I really don’t care about the seething masses gridlocked on urban tollways either, but I do care when their self-made frustration is taken out on other road users, and this is the more-or-less the starting point of Urban Commuter’s entry:

   Some drivers appear to maintain whatever illegal speed they are obliviously trundling along at, regardless that they also have to safely pass a cyclist somehow, within a tight & hazardous urban landscape.

   I’d also note that “celebrity” opinion-makers and other people who actually possess more than one brain cell—eminent economists, for instance—are not immune from this stunning lack of insight. And it don’t make the roads any safer for anyone.

3. kimbofo — 14 November 2006 #

   I love this picture. How ridiculous do all those people look?

   Mind you, it’s the best feeling in the world when you are able to cycle past lanes of gridlocked traffic!

4. Treadly and Me — 14 November 2006 #

   It feels like it should come with a John Cleese voiceover, doesn’t it?

5. lelak — 19 November 2006 #

   I kind of wish that image was available as a poster. Fantastic!

6. Treadly and Me — 19 November 2006 #

   What a brilliant idea. But I doubt that the City of Denver ever considered that photo set as a possible revenue stream!