Stability, slippage, being exposed to freezing cold and wet, the lack of an engine assist, no heat, two fewer wheels, and did I mention cold?

Just throw in the same effort that you do to keep car lanes open, and you’ll be fine.

Open for a car and open for a bike are different. You can drive through some snow, slush and ice, but I hate biking on ice and slush. In addition to the safety factor, it a miserable experience. It’s also not unheard of for roads to get too bad for cars, never mind bikes.

All in all I’m sort of disappointed that the reaction to raising obvious drawbacks is weapons-grade denial. Trying to sell people on a less safe, less comfortable, less reliable, means of transportation by throwing infrastructure projects at it is a problem, and why so many people are sick and tired of bike evangelists. Never mind the fact that a lot of people have disabilities that prevent that kind of hard work, have families and long commutes (please don’t throw another infrastructure project at that), are too old or infirm to bike through a Colorado summer, never mind winter, and so on.

It’s really a form of quiet elitism dressed up as environmentalism and social consciousness at worst, and a lack of understanding of just how huge the US is at best. Bikes probably do make more sense if a majority of your population lives in one or two cities, otherwise it just doesn’t.