A Bicycle Lane in San Jose

1. I can’t tell where this lane is, but it’s the same color/design as the foolish lane that was painted on the pedestrian boulevard on Avenue 2.

   These lanes will do absolutely nothing to further bicycle transporation, and in fact will be counterproductive. People will say, “Damn, we gave you folks your own lane, and you don’t even use it,” and sensibly conclude that it’s foolish to waste any more public funds on bicycle transportation.

   Meanwhile, as the photo shows, they’ll just be used for free parking for motorists. They already are. Montes de Oca has stupid bicycle lanes too. Bicyclists though can’t use them because of all the damn cars that park in them. They were also a dumb idea to begin with.

   I have some experience in planning for bicycle transportation (and as it happens was out on my bicycle today to the grocery store) and can tell you that people always do the wrong things–and Costa Rica is really doing the wrong things.

   Most of the people who do the wrong things never ride a bicycle and haven’t even bothered to read the literature on planning for bicycle transportation. Importantly, there is a literature–even a lot of research–but for some reason people don’t understand that they really ought to consult it before they start painting colors and stripes on a road.

   Actually, bike lanes are usually not a good idea. In addition to motorists using them for free parking, their problems are that they become unpassable because of the debris motor vehicles spew into them (just the physics of mortoring), they are outside of the normal line of sight of motorists, and they become problems at intersections, where most car/bike crashes happen. How exactly is a bicyclist suppose to turn left from a bike lane on the right side of the road?

   There are exceptions where bike lanes can work, but these are the exceptions.

   Anyway, it’s just sad to see Costa Rica doing dumb things while imagining that it’s promoting bicycling. It’s especially sad because these genuinely are dumb things. There is evidence-based research available out there to consult to understand how to incorporate bicycles into the transportation mix, but do ya think any of the transportation engineers have bothered to consult it? Nooooo.

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