Bicycle Lane Infrastructure

A protected bicycle lane the city installed on the avenue near my apartment has physically separated barriers between the bike path and car traffic. The difference between riding in a painted lane and riding behind a concrete curb is the difference between feeling tolerated and feeling safe. The old painted lane was functionally a suggestion that drivers ignored whenever they needed to double-park or make a turn. Now 6-inch concrete barriers and flexible bollards make encroachment physically difficult. More people are biking on this stretch, including older riders and families with children, who never would have used the painted lane. Intersections are where protected lanes get complicated. At every cross street the bike lane has to merge with turning car traffic. Colored pavement, bike-specific signals, and advanced stop boxes manage the conflict points. Bike signals give cyclists a 5-second head start before the car signal turns green, which solves the problem of right-turning drivers cutting off cyclists going straight. Backlash from drivers who lost a lane of car traffic was predictable and vocal. Data from cities that have installed similar infrastructure shows that protected lanes increase cycling rates by 75% or more while reducing injury crashes by about 50%.