When most people in the US need to go somewhere, they reach for their car keys. There are plenty of reasons for this: driving is easy, it’s comfortable, and it requires very little preparation. But also, it’s hard to do anything else, and maybe the hardest of those hard things is cycling.
But plenty of people do it anyway. Whether by choice or because it’s their only option, millions of Americans bike to get where they’re going — around 50 million people in 2022 And when they do, they’re facing the very real chance they might be run down by someone driving a car who either couldn’t see them or just didn’t bother to look — which happens far too often, leading to recent cyclist death counts not seen since the 1970s.
That’s because US cycling infrastructure has a long way to go before it can catch up with European cities like Copenhagen, Denmark, the bicycle paragon where the streets reflect that cycling is the norm for most people. At least in the US, bike lanes and trails are rare in the suburbs, and in cities, they can be unevenly dispersed or frustratingly disconnected, forcing cyclists to get creative to go anywhere safely. Plenty of factors get in the way here: political or cultural opposition to the very idea of bikes; resistance to changes perceived as taking space away from cars; and neighborhoods worried about the sanctity of trees as new traffic patterns are considered.
US cycling infrastructure has a long way to go before it can catch up with European cities like Copenhagen
Even for places perceived as bike-friendly, bike lanes aren’t a given. In Portland, Oregon, a city famous for its bike culture, a newly painted bike lane is in “limbo” because the city didn’t do the proper parking studies. Local cyclists blocked the crews that went to remove it after residents protested.
The US, like most of the world, is straining under the weight of cars and their baggage. People are buying bigger, heavier vehicles, causing roads to crack and deteriorate. EVs cause less atmospheric harm, but their production is deeply problematic, and they’re too heavy for the country’s crumbling roads. Car tires still create unhealthy pollution. Even setting aside environmental, social, and structural concerns, the US’s swollen SUVs and trucks are killing people more often and more effectively, and Black people and people of color are dying at disproportionate rates.
Roads and highways are also expensive. A list of Florida Department of Transportation reports on various projects, for example, puts new construction of a two-lane urban arterial road with a four-foot bike lane at very nearly $6 million per mile. Widening it can cost even more. By contrast, the most expensive pedestrian and cyclist improvement — a two-way, 12-foot shared-use path — is listed at about $410,000. Cycling infrastructure also doesn’t cost nearly as much to maintain. In fact, it’s likely a net financial benefit instead, owing to the reduced healthcare debt of more active people.
A world with fewer cars would be plainly better for the climate, and not just because of emissions. The world’s climate is barreling toward a nightmare scenario — for some, it’s already there — and cars are still rolling off of lots and onto roads in massive numbers. More cars mean more road wear, more construction, and more emissions. And as cities tear away greenery to make way for that construction or create the components to make cars and then replace it with heat-absorbing concrete, the vicious cycle continues as people use more energy to cool businesses and homes in the ever-hotter weather.
- Buffered bike lanes — Like a normal striped lane, buffered lanes often have no physical barriers. They exist as two stripes that create a larger visual separation between bike lanes and car lanes, sometimes with diagonal stripes connecting them.
- Car-buffered bike lanes — Instead of using simple visual indicators, city planners sometimes put bike lanes on the outside of a road, with parallel parking spaces separating them from traffic. This is generally great for protection but can also make it harder to see a cyclist before turning right.
- “Car door” lanes — An inversion of the car-buffered lane that creates a potentially dangerous situation. A fast-moving cyclist can be badly injured if someone abruptly opens their door without checking behind them, either because the rider doesn’t have time to react or because they’re forced to take their chances by swerving into the traffic lane. Drivers could use the Dutch reach — that is, making a habit of opening their door with the hand farthest from it, making it easier to check over their shoulder for bikes — as a potential solution to avoid injuring a cyclist.
- Cycle tracks — Another term for protected bike lanes, a cycle track is a bike lane that’s protected by a physical barrier, often a curb. These can be single-direction lanes or bidirectional.
- Bike box — Bike boxes are marked boxes indicating a space for cyclists to wait ahead of where drivers are expected to stop at traffic signals. They’re often painted bright green but can occasionally be other colors. Typically, the bike lane leading up to them is also painted.
- Sharrow — These are street markings intended to communicate to drivers that cyclists are allowed the use of a full roadway. They’re normally used on roads without enough space for a bike lane.
- Bike boulevard — Stretches of roads, normally through neighborhoods, where traffic-calming measures are employed to keep driver speeds low, making the road safer for vulnerable road users. These often feature things like sharrows, speed humps, fewer stop signs, and traffic circles.