London to build super-cycleways

[cedric]

London is likely to become one of the most cycle-friendly places in the world, with a series of two-wheeler superhighways cutting a swath through traffic and congestion. Plans for the super-cycleways will be unveiled next week as part of an initiative to stimulate a 400% increase in the number of people pedalling round the capital by 2025.
At a cost of £400m, the 12 routes are intended to be the motorways of cycling and are likely to be emulated by other cities across the UK. Londoners without bikes will be able to use one of the city's free bicycles.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/transport/Story/0,,2254962,00.html

[DS1]

1. Healther, on free bikes, in cleaner air

What could possibly go wrong?


Just make sure Arby's isn't allowed to open shop

[Prophet 451]

7. I can think of one thing that can go wrong

Cambridge tried something similar to this about twenty years ago. All the "community" bikes were stolen or destroyed within weeks.

If they can come up with some way around that (GPS tracking maybe?), then it might work but I suspect that virtually everyone will continue to use the tube as they currently do simply because getting across London during the work day on foot or by bike is currently either impossible or incredibly slow. Still, the new cycle paths might make it easier and at the very least, it'll make London a more pleasent place.

[DS1]

8. GPS, hopefully, by 2025 will be obsolete

Miniaturization and technology like wi-fi will be so prevalent, it will be difficult to steal anything.

I hope, anyway.

[lynnertic]

18. CCTV n/t

[phantom power]

2. dedicated junctions

I wonder what it feels like to take a left turn and not risk your life. I guess in London that would be a right turn.

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. Easy to do if you're building a town from scratch

I grew up in Stevenage, the first 'New Town' built in Britain after WW2, when they wanted to get people out of crowded, bombed, city centres into newly developed (and planned) satellite towns. All major road junctions were designed as roundabouts (ie traffic circles) - the population of the town got to about 80,000, in 1980 or so, before they finally had to include a few traffic lights at places where the traffic flow wasn't what they had planned. And the main routes have cycle ways beside them, which dip down underneath the roundabouts so the cyclists never have to interact with the major roads at all.

http://www.cafebabel.com.nyud.net:8080/photos/stevenage240907.jpg

Note the cycleway coming in from the far side of the roundabout, underneath it, to what looks like a 3 way junction in the centre.

Far harder to do in an established city, of course.

[phantom power]

11. That looks very pleasurable to use.

They installed a few roundabouts in the Phoenix metro area. To my knowledge nobody has killed themselves on one yet. Which is a surprise to me since many Phoenix drivers can't share the road safely even while driving in a straight line. I was sure the whole roundabout thing would give them a massive seg-fault.

[tinrobot]

3. We need that here in Los Angeles.

If they did, I'd be on my bike all the time, rather than just for exercise.

As it stands now, if you ride city streets, everyone tries to run you over, particularly the bus drivers.

[kestrel91316]

9. Them and the tricked-out black beemers........

[kentauros]

4. We could do things like this in North America

by simply using existing utility, pipeline and rail right-of-ways (ROWs.) Pipeline ROWs are often at least 30 feet wide, while high-power and rail ROWs are at least 100' wide. Most don't allow roads or parking lots built on them for obvious reasons (you don't want heavy equipment rolling over pipelines that are often only a few feet below the surface.) But bikeways would have no more impact weightwise than the horse and cattle I often see on some of the pipeline and high-power ROWs around Houston. You could fence off the bikeways so people don't decide to go mountain-biking down the RR tracks or under the power lines and you would only have to install dedicated traffic light crossings (which they should do anyway like they do for some pedestrian crossings.)

The only thing I have ever seen done like this are for abandoned or out of service rail lines that are cross country. I'm really surprised no one has implemented this by now...

[OKIsItJustMe]

6. Here's how to start

http://www.railtrails.org/whatwedo/trailbuilding/technicalassistance/toolbox/toolbox_index.html

[kentauros]

12. Okay, that covers railways...

but what about pipeline and utility ROWs? They don't have the "problem" of being in use by something that can run you over. I am glad to see people are working to get their ROWs used, too. For the rest, I have searched but never found anyone covering the aspect of the other ROW-forms of usable land. Any ideas?

[OKIsItJustMe]

15. Actually, these are for unused railway right-of-ways

Here's where to start for these other solutions:
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/tea21/factsheets/b-ped.htm
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/bikeped/bp-broch.htm
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/bikeped/index.htm

http://www.bicyclinginfo.org/

[OKIsItJustMe]

5. Thank You London! (Listen up Washington!)

There are several urban bicycle trails in various cities, but not nearly enough.

[4_TN_TITANS]

13. Hey, could we borrow some creative

and innovative leaders from the motherland?

[cedric]

14. This should be only the start

in 2006 I went to the German city of Munster and there they have really got their act together. There is a large underground store for cycles adjacent to the railway station where you can hire bikes and which also possesses a repair shop. The old city walls and been removed and replaced by a cycle route which has been expanded now to over 275 KM of cycle paths.

There is more information on the following link though the English is a little stunted at times.

http://www.presse-service.de/data.cfm/static/675606.html

[phantom power]

16. bike-dedicated infrastructure is cool, but the future is probably this:

[OKIsItJustMe]

17. Bicycle-dedicated infrastructure will be useful for some time

Many more people would commute by bicycle if they didn't have to compete with automobiles.

Even if everything goes to hell tomorrow, roadways engineered for bicycles are different from roadways engineered for automobiles.