Electric assist bikes could serve you well if the distance works out
There are probably many reasons for this that are not directly related to cars or traffic, but rather to general worldviews, politics, prejudices, aspiration and many others, including seeing bicycles in particular as toys and for recreation by Tour de France-inspired cyclists.
However, I think one of the biggest factors is the insistence on "vehicular cycling"[1], which is the foundation for forcing bicycles to follow traffic laws in place for motorized traffic, instead of having bicycle-specific laws that take into account the properties and limitations of human-powered transport.[2][3]
Forcing cyclists to "take the lane" and perform left turns as if they were cars (and having to cross multiple lanes of traffic) is ridiculous, because of the speed and weight disparity. It's extremely dangerous to the cyclists and aggravating to motorists, because of the huge speed differentials and because a collision will almost always result in severe injuries for the cyclist.
Even the most basic changes, such as making hook turns[4] the mandated method for left-turning cyclists, would make a gigantic improvement in safety and traffic flow. After that comes the bike lanes and paths, plus tweaks to intersections to avoid right turn accidents and reduce the number of times different types of traffic have to cross paths.
The cultural issues of entitlement and refusal to share common infrastructure are a separate issue, but I believe at least some of that tension could be reduced with a few sensible tweaks to traffic laws and road planning.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicular_cycling [2] http://shifter.info/vehicular-cycling-is-dead-just-dont-bury... [3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H75jnRW23X8 [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hook_turn
> Good drivers and reckless drivers are both traffic. Doesn't mean they are both automatically justified.
My counter point is that "being part of traffic does not preclude you from disrupting traffic. See reckless driver example."
Did I misunderstand your original comment?
Car-only people identify so strongly with their cars, it's weird. And for some reason they are over-represented on the Internet and argue all this "they are dangerous" nonsense about everyone else. In real life, people commonly accept small inefficiencies in order to perform small acts of kindness for each other.
I drive an SUV, ride my motorcycle, and also bicycle so I've had the fortune of seeing how people interact with me on all these modes of transportation. In San Francisco, most people are kind¹. Here are some anecdotes from the last couple of months:
* Riding in the Richmond to Hawk Hill on my bicycle. At most stop signs, drivers prioritized not forcing cyclists to stop. They do this by approaching a stop sign slower so that they force themselves to not have right-of-way and wave. This is what I do, and I notice it in a lot of others.
* On my motorcycle on a steep hill, I stalled right as the light turned green (engine wasn't anywhere near warm enough for me to have taken the choke off, old bike). No one honked. They were fairly patient.
* Took an exit off the freeway into the city late at night and there was a car wedged on the median. Got off to go help the driver and the three of us got it off. Most people let me in when I signal. It's so much the default that I get mildly offended when someone doesn't. I always let people in.
¹ or at least if they're angry they hide it behind the interface with others, which is enough
I'm glad you brought this up because according to SWITRS cyclists are involved in ~8 percent of injuries while only making up ~1 percent of commuters.
Almost everything I can find online claims that cycling is more dangerous per mile, per hour, and per trip. Additionally, I am willing to bet that most cycling accidents are not reported to the police.
> Here are some anecdotes from the last couple of months:
While were using anecdotes, here mine - I know many more people who have been hurt cycling than driving. This doesn't even adjust for the much greater miles/hours spend driving vs cycling.
Even besides the statistics, you should be able to use common sense to understand that bicycling is more dangerous than multi-ton steel cages equipped with seat belts and airbags.
I am all for better cycling infrastructure and have no beef with cyclists themselves.
We might admittedly not have the same kinds of roads in mind, but from the perspective of the city I'm living in (where most city streets have just one or at most two lanes per direction excluding turning lanes, which I guess might shape my perspective, as it naturally makes reaching the left turning lane easier) – please, no! Every hook turn means I have to wait an additional traffic light cycle on the cross street as well.
Cyclists have to ride on the bike paths where present, and keep to the right in the rightmost lane anywhere else. The reasoning is that you want different types of traffic to mix as little as possible, because of the size and speed differential.
Even reaching the left turn lane means crossing a lane of car traffic, which is basically impossible in moderate to heavy traffic, which is why the hook turn is prescribed.
In practice it works quite well. Cyclists don't have to shoulder check for traffic that is potentially closing very fast from behind, and drivers don't have to worry about slow traffic cutting across their lane.
The light cycles usually aren't overly long, so by the time it takes to go across from sitting at a red light to the opposite corner, you'll only have to wait a few seconds for the light to turn green in the other direction. If you roll through a green light to the corner, the wait is even shorter.
Compared to sitting exposed in the middle of the intersection waiting for oncoming traffic to let up or stop at the red light, I would much rather take the 2-3 seconds extra and do a hook turn.