Non-Existent Bicyclists

Are you one of the "non-existent bicyclists?" Apparently I am, maybe you are too!

"...Bicyclists: well, the overwhelming vast majority of people do not want to be out bicycling. The next time you are driving down Foothill Boulevard, count the number of bicyclists you see using those multimillion-dollar Class 4 bicycle lanes the city just installed. I guarantee you your grand total will be zero..."

So what does it take, a minute to drive Foothill Boulevard along the separated bike lanes? An opinion letter writer to the most recent edition of the Claremont Courier suggests driving down Foothill and counting the number of bicyclists you see using the lanes (the opinion letter concerns the proposed changes too Mountain Avenue). Mr. Lyon is confident the number will be zero. Whether one rider, ten, or indeed zero riders happen to be using the lanes at any given moment of a day, that one minute could hardly be considered representative of the other one-thousand three-hundred ninety-nine minutes.

That opinion is typical of what is often referred to as "windshield perspective," or what I have always called "motor dependence." When driving is all you do, all you know, you begin to believe that no one could possibly want to get around by any other means. It distorts one's view of the world. If a vast majority of people do not want to be out bicycling, maybe we need to ask why. Clearly giving carte blanche to the motor vehicle over the past hundred years has done nothing to encourage, and has instead hindered anything else.

I went to CCA tonight and there were a lot of bicycles parked there. It was the monthly get together social hour of Claremont Streets for People, but the thing is, most of the people who rode were not there for that gathering, but had simply rode there because... Shock! maybe they did not want to drive. I wondered how many of them, like myself, belong to Mr. Lyon's group of "non-existent bicyclists." Then I wondered how many of the bikes parked in racks at the local schools belong to "non-existent bicyclists," I wondered how many of the college students getting around by bike are really, "non-existent bicyclists," or how many people who ride to patronize one local business or another are actually "non-existent bicyclists."

Mr. Lyon is keen on separating out pedestrians and bicyclists, but gives pedestrians a pass because, well "we already have sidewalks." Maybe he doesn't pay attention, but even with sidewalks pedestrian deaths are at unacceptably high levels, and not going down. As for cyclists... it seems as though every week there is another rider down. Just one if we are so lucky, which is not often.

So, tell me what exactly is "colossally stupid" about trying to do something better. To be frank, Mr. Lyon, there is nothing "cutesy" about saving lives, which is exactly what "road diets" and "complete streets" do. To me, colossally stupid is knowing there is a problem, and doing nothing about it.

I presume at least a few of these belong to "non-existent bicyclists"