This conference will accomplish nothing because it's just a robotic repetition of the same myths that have dominated this issue for decades in North America.
Here are a few points to illustrate the incompetence of the discussions.
First, as usual and except for a brief mention, cyclists and motorists were depicted as separate camps. In fact, probalby a majority of motorists ride bicycles sometime, and virtually all adult cyclists drive cars.
Second, Europe easily illustrates what can be done to blend motor vehicle and bicycle traffic to the benefit of everyone.
Third, as usual, cyclists were depicted as ignorant lawbreakers. While I agree far too many cyclists are too cavalier about the rules of the road, we all know that the overwhelming culture of motorists is lawlessness. How many of you speed virtually all the time? Roll through stop signs? Park illegally? Make illegal U-turns? Any driver who is unaware of the extent to which motorists break the traffic laws and criticizes cyclists as being lawless, is living a perfect example of prejudice.
Fourth, the Critical Mass ride takes only a few minutes to pass a given point, it happens for only a couple of hours once a month, it happens after work when motorists are similarly engaged in discretionary trips, and anyone can monitor its' location by using a road traffic radio station. I'm willing to bet 99% of the motorists who complain about it have never even seen it. At the same time, I know from experience that delays of hours are common in car traffic, and are caused by sheer numbers of motorists, or accidents caused by their incompetence. The hysterical reaction to Critical Mass is another example of prejudice.
While it is true most streets currently are designated for motor vehicles, there was a time when cyclists had to make way for the automobile.
Cyclists do not oppose education, insurance and licensing. Our car-oriented culture does not offer these services because then cyclists would be more difficult to marginalize as illegitimate road users.
It's too bad no one seems to have mentioned that the police virtually NEVER ticket motorists for endangering cyclists. They don't seem to get it that a close miss between a cyclist and a motorist is a more serious event than a fender bender between motorists. So the cyclists are subsidizing a police service that utterly fails to recognize the interests of cyclists.
I think the new bike paths in Vancouver are ugly and unnecessary. If we were serious about them, they'd be as attractive as the ones in European cities. Suburban and rural bike paths would be done properly, rather than cheapo incompetent dangerous jobs squeezed in between trees and hydro poles, with blind corners, steep hills, inconvenient intersections, etc. etc.
The way to integrate bicycle and motor vehicle traffic is based in respect. Only a minority of cyclists act out disrespect for motorists. They're in a fairly weak situation to do so. No, the main problem is that far too many motorists don't respect the right of cyclists to use the roads. Until that changes, no amount of bike paths and crackdowns on cyclists are going to solve anything. And since motorists are reluctant to volunteer that respect, it should be up to the police, as representatives of society, to crack down on motorists who endanger cyclists.
In most of Europe, motorists involved in ANY accident with cyclists, are assumed under the law to be at fault and dealt with accordingly. This is the best way to handle the imbalance between the physical weight being thrown around by the motorists. The result is that their city traffic "works" without this endless stupid debate we have here.
I was going to stop here, but then I read "life in the slow lane" raise another tired myth: that cyclists don't pay taxes. I probably can't convince this person that they are wrong, but if a proper analysis is done, you will find that cyclists are subsidizing motorists. For one thing, we already recognized that most adult cyclists are also drivers and so pay all those taxes. For another, cyclists cause very little wear and tear to roads, and require much less space than motorists. For another, most roads are paid by taxes that everyone pays and do not come from the gas tax. For another, I'd be happy to remove most of the gas taxes if the billions in subsidies to the oil industry were also removed. The subsidies that are never mentioned on the gas pumps beside where they list all the taxes on gas.
