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Comment by pavel_lishin | Hacker News Reader

They mention New York in this as well, and Sixth avenue. It's annoying to bike up due to the lack of a bike lane, but traffic is usually slow enough that you can get along pretty easily and safely. It's also better than 8th avenue, which does have one - but is always filled with pedestrians. (And which seems to disappear around Port Authority, forcing bicyclists to go into traffic anyway.)

Luckily, you can usually take the Hudson River Greenway by cutting all the way west. It's a more pleasant ride, but does take you out of your way, and once you get above 59th street, has limited access eastward and not a lot of signage to that effect.

If I don't mind pedaling through traffic, I'll take Sixth. If I'm angry and want to stay that way, I'll take 8th. If I've got time to kill, I'll take the greenway.

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I'll take the open street any day. Zombie pedestrians, head down in phone, step off the curb and into the protected lane thinking that they can get 1/5 of the way across the street without looking up. Oncoming auto traffic reduces this likelihood significantly, but disturbingly, not completely.

If you learn the traffic pattern of your route, you can reduce your concern primarily to red light runners.

Don't take away my fast-walker lanes on Sixth and on Broadway!

Don't forget the disaster that's the 2nd ave "shared" bike lane, especially from the Queensboro Bridge and below.

It's a deathtrap. The trick is to go over to 1st Avenue and ride south (against traffic) in its protected bike lane.

Biking against traffic (even in a bike lane) is a bad idea. It forces someone into traffic, either the guy going the wrong way or a bicyclist going the correct way. It surprises pedestrians jaywalking and it surprises cars pulling out of parking spots both of whom assume they only need to look one way. It's just a bad idea all around.

"jaywalking" is a slur against people walking. Just say "pedestrian in the street".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaywalking#Origin_of_the_term

"Pedestrian" is almost a slur, since the word is also used to mean "boring".

Yup definitely a bad idea. But a less bad idea than getting murdered by a cabbie on 2nd avenue while riding with traffic in the nonexistent bike lane.

Not really no. You increase the chance that you'll kill yourself and someone else. Ride in the lanes and with traffic. Everyone is safer when everyone can anticipate what's going to happen. This is especially true in the chaos of NYC traffic.

If there is no bike lane. Take the whole lane.

As a pedestrian it's a horrible idea. I've almost been struck 5 times (and counting) by cyclists riding the wrong way down avenues. It's incredibly frustrating - and definitely gives me a very jaded view of cyclists and their respect for traffic rules.

this is the thing about cyclists is they are scarier than they are dangerous.

in a collision between a cyclist and a pedestrian there is an almost equal potential for harm for both the cyclist and the pedestrian. the rates of rapid deceleration are just as forceful as the rate of acceleration.

the pedestrian could potentially be struck with a metal part of the bike. an almost equal potential exists for the cyclist to be injured by a metal part of the bicycle hitting the ground or a parked car before the cyclist does.

So while i'm sure that your close encounter with a scofflaw cyclist was scary, it was just as dangerous for you as it was for them.

That doesn't excuse the behavior. One is deciding to engage in it despite the danger the other is a passive unwilling participant. Or, to put it in auto terms, a reckless driver and other drivers have the roughly the same potential damage if a collision were to occur, but we definitely don't equate the reckless driver with the one who drives predictably.

It may be as dangerous to them as me, but I doubt they're considering that. And I'd rather not get hit by a bike; I was once, by a cyclist going at a decent clip and was lucky to leave with only minor injuries (if I'd fallen at a different angle my head would have hit the edge of a concrete stair.)

If you're worried about dying you really shouldn't be cycling at all.

contraflow bike lanes are common in paris

Some bike lanes in NYC have two lanes as well. I don't believe 1st Ave does though.

edit: I misunderstood. Yes, if the bike lane is contraflow of course use it that way. Everyone expects bikes from the "wrong way" in that situation. It's all about minimizing surprises to anyone in or near the street.

I'm confused by your comment. Sixth Avenue does have a bike lane for large sections. Did you mean a protected lane specifically?

In NYC, "unprotected bike lane" === "no bike lane at all" in 95% of all cases and 100% of dangerous cases.

I genuinely didn't remember it having one, but it's been awhile since I've biked that way.

And in any case, here's what it tends to look like in a lot of places: https://goo.gl/6nGUfz

* Open car door with a guy probably unaware of any bicyclists coming up behind him. I would 100% have to go into traffic to avoid him, to make sure he doesn't step back and elbow me.

* A truck half in the bike lane. I'd probably risk just riding up against it, since I can see them unloading - unless they're standing right next to the bike lane.

* Lady getting into a taxi cab. I have to either stop and wait, or cross an entire lane of traffic to go around them.

* Black SUV up ahead is also parked - in the intersection - doing god knows what with a passenger: http://goo.gl/3jYdOb

* http://goo.gl/gCkKVT Fresh Directly In The Bike Lane

* http://goo.gl/1cXmLX Goodbye, bike lane, and good riddance.

Now, you can say I cherry-picked the bad examples, and you'd be correct. But I cherry picked them by going down 6th Ave in Google Streetview. These are all examples I would run into on my daily bike commute. These aren't once-a-week or once-a-day examples; if I rode down today and counted, I'd probably see more examples of things that directly impact my safety.

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