only in your dream world. building more paths doesn’t equate to more people riding. your ignorance is showing.

Actually, you are demonstrably wrong. There is abundant empirical evidence that improving cycling infrastructure increases cycling use.
Just a couple of peer reviewed studies on this topic:
http://trrjournalonline.trb.org/doi/abs/10.3141/1828-14
http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/1307250/

Cyclists can have very different opinions of sharrows depending in part on how their local sharrows have been installed — this, for example, is taken from an official Seattle DOT explanation of how sharrows work, and accurately represents how SDOT installed sharrows for many years.

SDOT openly advocated that sharrows would encourage cyclists to ride in the door zone of parked cars, so that motorists could squeeze through in the same lane with less than two feet of clearance.

That’s how they installed them, and that’s how drivers interpreted them.

It took City Council intervention with a mandatory policy of centering sharrows in the travel lane to get SDOT to abandon this practice, but the vast majority of Seattle sharrows are still in the door zone, and SDOT does not intend to correct them until they’ve worn out.

If you’re a Seattle cyclist, and this is your experience of sharrows, you’re likely to think they’re worse than door zone bike lanes.

I would hesitate to claim that sharrows are 100% effective for the people who choose to use them.

A billion, you say?

I’ve read the study, although it was a difficult exercise. Why? Because the “nonsense” frequency gave me a headache from all the eye-rolling I did!

Example: The authors begin by claiming the only initial motivation for sharrows was to reduce dooring. That’s absolutely false. They then claim that dooring is a rare problem, despite saying that in Boston, doorings were 11% of car-bike crashes, and 29% of bike messenger-car crashes. Other sources say 20% of Chicago bike crashes are doorings. Those numbers don’t qualify as “relatively rare and benign.” And the author’s polemic question, “Why would we install sharrows that avoid doorings at the cost of of increasing risk for vehicle collisions?” is nonsense, because it displays the author’s hidden assumption that riding more prominently in the lane increases risk of collisions. Most truly competent cyclists have found the opposite to be true, and _that_ is a major point of sharrows!

Another example: The authors then suddenly switch to claiming that the intent of sharrows is (instead?) to increase passing clearance by cars. They claim the results are “highly variable,” but cite several studies in which that spacing was, indeed, found to increase, by anything from several inches up to 2 feet. They also mention studies correlating sharrows with less sidewalk riding, greatest benefit on four-lane roads, etc. Yet they disparage sharrows as ineffective.

It’s significant that the paper does not ever count actual cyclists using actual sharrows! (Nor bike lanes, nor plain streets, for that matter.) Instead, it uses approximate data on bike _commuting_ as a proxy for total ridership. And it generates its risk ratios by using _all_ cyclist injuries. In other words, a wrong-way midnight drunk’s crash is divided by the number who claim in surveys to be commuters.

And not the number of commuters on the street where the drunk crashed! The authors use approximate data on city “block areas” of unspecified size. If a “block area” has some streets with nothing special and one street with a short section of sharrows, it apparently counts as a sharrow “block area.” Furthermore, the before-after computations that purported to evaluate the cycling treatments don’t use even the same “block areas.” Those boundaries shifted over the study period, so the areas are only approximately similar.

Given all those shortcomings: What the authors actually found was that “block areas” with sharrows saw an increase in bike mode share (based on surveys, not on observation) from 0.69% to 1.32%. As with “block areas” with no changes (0.33% to 0.75%) or those with bike lanes OR recreational bike paths (0.64% to 1.78%), those changes might best be characterized as “from negligible to negligible.” However, all are increases.

Likewise, the injuries (of _all_ cyclists) per 100 bicycle commuters dropped from 33.3 to 21.1 for no treatment, from 31.2 to 25.1 for sharrow-containing “block areas,” and from 59.2 to 34.4 for bike lane “block areas.”

Now think about those magnitudes. 59.2 reported injuries for every 100 bike commuters! How can that be? Again, its’ _all_ reported bike injuries – the drunks, the kids falling off their bikes and rushed to ER by helicopter parents, the wrong-way-sidewalk riders, the stunt riders and more. It makes sense only because the commuters are a negligible portion of the total – yet that negligible portion is used as a denominator in evaluating safety. The logic is mathematically weird.

Note that the sharrow “block areas” did experience an increase in cycle commuting, as well as a decrease in (computed) crash rates. How, then, do the authors justify their statement that “sharrows have less than desirable outcomes”?

The authors do a fair job of listing the shortcomings of their methodology: the assumption that the impact of bike infrastructure would be experienced _thoughout_ a “block area” if any street gets some bike facility; the assumption that bike commuter survey responses accurately indicate _total_ bike use. They admit that the proper way to evaluate both ridership effects and safety effects would be by accurate before-after counts, but say they chose their strange methods because – well, because it was easier to get this data!

But they also hint at perhaps the biggest shortcoming: the implied direction of causality. The entire paper implies that the bike lanes _caused_ more increase in cycling than the sharrows, and _caused_ greater increases in safety. Segregation-promoting websites like Streetsblog have certainly taken up that cry. However, four paragraphs before the end, they say “the results of this research do not imply causality…”

Right. In effect, its an admission that their paper’s message is not justified by their own data, as weak as that data is.

To explain: There could be many undetected or ignored confounding factors behind the data. Did bike lanes increase cycling more where they were installed? Or were the bike lanes installed because those “block areas” had lots of cycling, good cycling conditions and lots of commuting potential via short trip lengths, hip local culture, accommodating businesses, etc.? Did those already cycling, and right on the edge of commuting, demand the bike lanes? Would the commuting have increased just as much during this period of growing bike fashion? We don’t know; but it would not be at all surprising if DOTs installed bike lanes where cycling was growing the fastest and requested the most – in other words, where cycling was already pretty good.

Finally, the authors tip their hand in their final three paragraphs. These young research assistants in Denver constructed this paper because, according to them, Denver is on track to completing its planned sharrow installations, but it is “falling behind” on other facilities. (Yes, gentlemen, installing any bike lane, especially a “protected” one, is more time consuming because of the need for acquiring and clearing right-of-way, or studying the effects of reducing traffic lanes. Separate bike trails are even more complicated. Who could be surprised that sharrow installation happens more quickly?)

Here’s their final polemic: “It is time that sharrows are exposed for what they really are, a cheap alternative that not only fails to solve a pressing safety issue, but actually makes the issue worse through a sense of false security.”

That’s what I call a “Danger! Danger!” argument. “Oooh, riding a bike is SO risky that it’s a pressing safety problem!”

Let’s keep in mind that data shows Americans ride over 10 million miles per year between fatalities. And that, per mile traveled, those walking experience three times as many fatalities as those riding bikes. Those numbers, BTW, come from John Pucher, who – despite the data’s message – is another “Danger! Danger!” proclaimer regarding bicycling.

It is flatly anti-cycling to exaggerate the danger of bicycling, and to claim that one dare not cycle until one has completely segregated infrastructure. It suppresses cycling here and now, and tends to blame those few victims who are injured while riding legally, using their rights to the road. “Advocates” of that stripe need to be exposed for the fear mongers they are.

Meanwhile, the main benefits of this paper are exposing those who buy its message. They place themselves firmly in the fear-mongering camp, and illustrate their gullibility and their bias.

That’s interesting. I wrote the author and asked for a copy to read myself. He said it was in peer review and couldn’t be distributed just yet. Obviously, it had been distributed so the answer wasn’t plausible. Nevertheless, thanks for this great analysis.

Agreed. I have seen some terrible examples, the last being door zone sharrows in Pittsfield MA. I was shocked to see it, because this would never happen anywhere in the State of Delaware. A memorandum from DelDOT (who controls 90% of all roads in the State) limits them to 25 mph multi-lane zones, 14′ from the edge line or curb which places them in the center of the lane.

As for checking the box, my example in Newark is anything but. It’s a 2 lane, one-way road through a downtown, with space only for cars and parallel parking. Sharrows combined with BMUFL is the last, best, and only treatment available. The rest of the City is balanced with a wide array of treatments, depending on available ROW, VMT, and other factors.

DelDOT has its problems, but they’re working through them on the input and advice of advocates. This means sticking to AASHTO guidance as well as developing new treatments that are a hybrid of dedicated space (shoulders/bike lanes) as well as full lane control at intersections. Maybe some of the time people spend commenting on these pages should be spent advocating their own DOTs to do the same.

I wouldn’t assume some of the above are bicyclists. At least one just looks like a hater trying to spread his ignorant views.

Thanks. Was having a tough time finding it on the TRB, especially w/o a title.

Does the M in BMUFL stand for “MAY” or “MUST?”

Still waiting to hear Angie Schmitt’s review of the study itself. May I share some statistics from the study that weren’t in the abstract? According to their data, which I think is flawed because they use census data for cyclist counts (which is number of census takers whose primary mode of transportation to work is bicycle), the injuries per year per 100 cyclists is 34.4 for census blocks with primarily bike lanes, 25.1 for census blocks with primarily sharrows and 21.1 for census blocks with no bicycle infrastructure. Think about that.

Well, that is the clear impression one is left with. I challenge you to read any of their pages or forums, and see if you can glean what they are actually in favor of. There is the very occasional mention of a “good” bike lane, for example, but never do they define what exactly that is, or what they see as acceptable for on-road infra. Even Sharrows draw the ire of some. Most everything discussed revolves around how horrible everything is. Even the Vulnerable Road Users Law somehow became offensive, because it suggests inequality (I swear it was on a page I was reading, probably “Bicyclists Belong in the Traffic Lane”).

The other problem I have with these groups is, they love to complain, but rarely – if ever do they advocate for whatever it is they do want. Every time I pose the question “have you taken the time to know your legislators, DOT planners & engineers, your MPO (if you have one) and work with them to implement properly designed infra”. Or if you can’t do that, join your local or state advocacy org and demand that they do. When these questions are posed, it’s the last comment of the thread.

The article is my review of the study. Are you saying the author of the study misinterpreted his own findings and that both the Transportation Research Board and I failed to notice it? I think it’s more likely that you made a mistake reviewing and interpreting it. I don’t have time to respond to every comment in this thread. But defend sharrows all you want if you like them. It’s just one study. The author acknowledges there are limitations.

“…Here’s their final polemic: “It is time that sharrows are exposed for what they really are, a cheap alternative that not only fails to solve a pressing safety issue, but actually makes the issue worse through a sense of false security…”

An unbiased study should not have such statements. That sends up a big red flag.

I believe that the methodology of the study was flawed because it compared census block groups rather than specific streets with infrastructure. Also, I don’t think census takers who use their bicycle as their primary mode of transportation is a good measure for ridership. Does a census taker bicycle only in their census block? Of course not. When I asked how the author derived the numbers of crashes per 100 cyclists, he told me that the data for those statistics was for a different period than the data for the injuries per year per block group and he said it was confusing. Yes I do question the data. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Studies about bike infrastructure should be looking at before and after cyclist counts and crashes on the street with the infrastructure. I am not saying that sharrows are safer than bike lanes. But I am saying that sharrows increase ridership and decrease crashes, and are a good choice for streets that are appropriate for cycling to guide cyclists to proper lane position and educate motorists that we belong on the roadway.

Holy thread resurrection, Batman!
Looks you spent 22 days trying to come up with a rebuttal, which is basically a wordier re-statement of your original, evidence-free opinion. Sad.

We use sharrows where we don’t have the room to do anything else. If the study shows a 27% increase in ridership that is a significant improvement – much better than nothing at all. Sharrows are inexpensive and are politically acceptable. Yes, other treatments likely to more, but cost more and require more space. The study shouldn’t be interpreted to say sharrows are worthless. They are a tool to use where nothing else fits. And we use them not expecting too much. Greenback sharrows are likely more effective and are a tool to be used on busier streets.

That’s not necessarily true. Infrastructure does not always increase mode share and usually doesn’t increase it by as much as infrastructure advocates optimistically predict.

The Dutch didn’t get mode share from infrastructure. They got infrastructure from mode share.

Concur. When we installed sharrows on Coast Highway 101 in Encinitas, we also had Bicycles May Use Full Lane signs to help drive the point across. The sharrows have been extremely successful in the downtown area, with its diagonal parking.

I tried to download it and the price was $20. Forget it!

The findings that streets with shared lanes had even less growing of cycle traffic and less decrease of injuries then streets where nothing had been changed, raises the question, in what types of streets shared lanes had been installed.

It is an error that cycling on separate infrastructure were safer than mixed traffic, as most accidents accur at intersections. There the various modes of mix necessarily, and coming from a cycle track behind parking cars, you are not visible well.
And separate cycling infrastructure can be more comfortable or less comfortable than cycling on the roadway.
Where cars are congesting, cycle tracks can make cycling quicker, but on many crossroads cycling infrastructure (especially cycling traffic lights) impedes cycling. That’s an outcome that many peopla in the daministration consider motor traffic more important – sometimes in spite of cycling themselves.
I live in Bremen that has twice as much length of cycletracks than Copenhagen.
Bremen is one of those cities, where cycle tracks were built, because there were always lots of cyclists.
Today it is normal that mothers carry their children to kindergarten by bike, often with a trailor. Though the model split of cycling is as low as about 26 % (Bremen has has an extension of 39 km = 24 miles), also a significant number of bankers cycle to work. ((A City where cycling bankers are almost dominant, is Parma in Italy))