If I could talk to those engineers or any proponents of bad design, I'd say something like, "would you let your 8-year old daughter ride her bike on here?" Specifically because it's a pretty common age for kids to walk/ride to school or down the street alone worldwide, and because parents are more protective of their daughters whereas they'd let their boys do more risky things. If it's not safe for the most vulnerable, then it's not safe enough.

Or they themselves since they think non-children wont ever ride a bike in the US

Their children? Are you implying these people get laid?

@@veelastname part of it would be education. Here in the Netherlands these roads are very common, even on roads with speeds up to 60 kmp/h. Only works on roads with light traffic though. It’s part of our driving lessons to drive on these roads and learn to anticipate and let ongoing traffic through. These roads are great, but probably wont ever work in a country where they were never used because i would be confused as a driver as well if it were my first time.

@@jelle27093 to be honest i would not want my 6 year old driving on a suggestiestrook on a 60 kpu road. they are still dangerous, and alot of times theres a seperate bike road.

All the signs are shape and color coded so the words are redundant.

Better yet, include both. Symbols can sometimes be ambiguous, so including words to clear any confusion will allow for the best of both worlds.

There is 1 word that should be allowed on road signs: STOP

⁠​⁠​⁠@@BHV_7 actually they are only ambiguous to those who haven’t learnt how to read the signs. Use both signs and text makes it even more confusing. The signs are being used worldwide, which also look similar, except for a few countries.

@@ar134_ How would both make signs more confusing? They provide redundancy; if one fails for some reason, the other is still there, guaranteeing that the driver doesn’t miss the message. Yes, symbols are easier to recognize, but sometimes they can have more than one possible interpretation (even if there is only one correct meaning). I can see a driver easily mixing up two symbol-only signs, so text in addition could clear this confusion.

You should have listened more It's still so bad that they're considering changing it

you missed the part where it's not even working in the netherlands. it's better than the us (extremely low bar) but the dutch are still so unhappy with how this street is functioning that they are considering further design changes.

Or maybe because this infrastructure is stupid 😂

It also helps that every dutch citizen who is taught to drive a car, is told that the Law is made in such a way, that cyclists get to go free in case of a collision. It is automatically assumed that the driver of the car is guilty, no matter what the actual situation was at the time. Police don't even bother showing up. Your car insurance, which is mandatory in order to drive a car, just raises your insurance level and you end up paying more. Even if it wasn't your fault, and even if you could somehow prove it in court, then the law states that you still have to pay for 50% of the damages. In effect it means it's to much fuss and you just pay up the full 100%. It also means that cyclists don't really care what the rules are, because they go free anyways. And considering cyclists can come from all sides, car drivers are usually exceptionally aware of their surroundings, and everything becomes a lot safer.

There is an error in your sentence, this isn't a street, it's a road that is masquerading as a street, it's still too wide, there is no traffic calming, and there is no separate bicycle path for cyclists to safely ride their bikes.

I mean if you low traffic, it might have anything to do with road design. I mean I live a subdivision NA but don't have sidewalks, this means the street of neighborhood is multi use automatically. In it's 35+ years we only had person hit.

We have some streets that are multi-use and they're perfectly fine because they average 6 cars and 10 cargo vans per day (most of which are in the 22-07 time window)

Theres a busy street in my parents town in NL where they just removed the seperated bike lanes and made it a bike street similar to the one in this video, except without the markings. The street connecting to it is a 50 km/h street. Its also one of the main traffic arteries into and out of the town center. Just goes to show, we can fuck up too.

@@TheSuperappelflap At least your country isn't just one gigantic fuck up like the US

You could do that, but that also means that we’re agreeing to give 90 percent of all space to cars, which would keep it as a busy through road which may not be something that is wanted. It really comes down to deciding what we want from the space, then designing exactly for that purpose. When we just “react” to just the present conditions we get largely the same setup with only a few tweaks. Again, I wouldn’t say there’s anything “wrong” with your suggestion, if we want to keep Mira mesa as a faster car speed area with through traffic I would agree with you. Tell us what you want out of the travel surface then we can deliver the correct design

@@buildthelanes But BTL, it is really about what the people want. Count the number of people in cars and count the number of people riding bikes. Children ride bikes because they are not allowed to drive cars. When they are old enough and earn enough money to buy and drive cars, that is what they do. People will vote to fund mass transit because 1) busses carry those who cannot afford cars or do not always wish to find parking for them. and 2) to get those OTHER cars off the freeway so we can drive at speed limit! Cars are very useful for certain things: It is much easier to carry a week's worth of groceries home with even a Mini Cooper than it is to carry it on a bike. You can use the municipal bus service but only if it has a stop next to the grocery store and another stop next to your house or apartment. And then you can only carry so much necessitating additional trips to the store. And you can irritate the other bus passengers. We also know how Crips, Bloods, Latin Kings, MS-13, and other fine upstanding citizens like to ride busses too! Cars are also useful for going anywhere more than 2 miles away. In the pouring rain. How is the bicycle in the rain? Even on sunny days, car is great for getting anywhere that is miles away from town and its bus system. If I want to go from Seattle to Ellensburg, I take the car. That is why people want cars and American cities are built for cars.

I think the idea here is that there isn't space for cars to pass each other without one of them going into the bike lane. So if the bike lanes were protected by parking, it wouldn't be possible to pass an oncoming car (the parked cars aren't moving). I agree that protected bike lanes are best and if there is room to pass with them, then I am mistaken.

@@RogerWKnight That is not really fair. You acknowledge yourself that American citites are designed for cars, of course people are going to use the car in such a case. If cities and suburbs would get designed with other modes of transportation in mind (say cycling but also walking or public-transport) then those *will* go up in popularity. Like you example is pretty much saying 'No one uses the train' when there isn't any rail for the train to go on. The same goes for your shopping example. You can absolutely do shopping with a bicycle. In the big citites you should be good with a bag and every day or two shopping. in the suburbs, because of car orientated design, the mall is probably going to be a bit further away. That is a shame but is also a problem caused the focus on cars. However even despite that you can always get a cargo-bike (or bakfiets), and use that for the once in a week shopping. The 2-mile limit you mention is not a thing, you can absolutely cycle more than that, in fact a 13 mile trip (two-way) should not be out of the question at all for the standard individual. One last thing I want to touch on is your thoughts on the public-transport (mainly busses). Busses do not just get used by 'people who can't afford cars'. In some places busses are just the superior (whether its because its quicker, more efficient or just way more relaxed) form of transportation, and they get used by everyone. Normal people like you and I. Putting a stigma on public transport is not a good look. Also funny side note, encouraging people to use other modes of transportation also reduces the amount of cars on the road. Which is great for car drivers, and yes I'll admit: cars have their place on the road, but so does everything else.

@@ehoops31 yup that is correct. Switching the bike lane and the parking places would not leave enough room for two cars to pass at the same time.

I've been told by people who live there that even seeing another car in a drive is a "busy road" in northern Finland!

This would be considered inequity in America because bicyclists here are also as reckless as vehicular drivers. Disregarding very simple regulations, especially when they fail to yield to pedestrians.

​@@traffic.engineer I get you but I promise you pedestrians and cyclists can be just as reckless here in europe (can speak for switzerland, idk about the netherlands). In our laws, the 'heavier' vehicule is always at fault because no matter what the weaker party does wrong it only turns into a more dangerous situation once a bigger/heavier one is involved. For example accident between bycicle and pedestrian => cyclists fault because they didn't pay attention enough and always have to prepared of the unexpected. Same then goes for the bigger vehicules.

​@@traffic.engineerThe "inequity" we currently have is that cars end the lives of cyclists, but cyclists never end the life of cars. Funny how nobody cares about that.

@@vcaesium That would be a very cumbersome process for a not-at-fault driver that did everything by the book, including the additional maneuvering and insurance they took. And that is on top of the mental trauma the drivers will experience. Especially in America where a majority of avid bicyclists are rich and white, those who use cars/trucks for business (a large number who are non-white and/or middle-class) would only consider the system being rigged against them. Trucks may cause more damage than a car, but over two-thirds of car-truck crashes are fault of the car in America. Unless the truckers are paying the same rate of insurance as the car driver, such a system would only be double-jeopardy to the truck driver.

@@cebruthius And the drivers have to live with that mental trauma for the rest of their life, despite taking all measures to drive legally and safely. They already proving their innocence under extreme duress. What is the equity of punishing them more, legally and/or financially?

Also in Mira Mesa's case, more human scale and mixed use development that doesn't put such a wide physical separation between residents and businesses. Almost all the commercial space in MM is along Mira Mesa Blvd, and even the drive through there is loud from car noises and hot in the summer so I can only imagine the walk! People shouldn't have to walk across 10 lanes of traffic just to get to Target or the grocery store, and we don't need gas stations or fast food drive thrus on literally every corner.

I've been to Mira Mesa while visiting family. Nice suburb, incredibly difficult to walk to any destination. There's plenty of space to make changes, but it won't be really pleasant without reworking the land use to give active modes some way to punch through cul-de-sacs. Really, it's another one I file under "please let robotaxis and ebikes take over so that there are fewer car owners to protest changes that impact parking".

​@@veelastname The thing about Mira Mesa is that the amount of retail in the center far exceeds the number of residents nearby. Its a major shopping center that has more people from outside Mira Mesa shopping at than Mira Mesa residents, which is why it has to be so car based. If you want to have walkable neighborhoods you would have to scale down the amount of retail to an amount that is only necessary to the residents, and spread it out across the suburb. You cant have major shopping centers and a walkable suburb.

The entire concept of those cul-de-sack like American suburbs is horrible. Just like grids are horrible. There should at least be way more bike and pedestrian paths as shortcuts to get from A to B while avoiding cars. And for the cars, there should at least be 2 directions in which you can get out of the neighbourhood instead of just 1.

@@JH-pe3ro Robotaxis are a strictly inferior solution compared to existing public transport, bikes, and the option of having on-demand public transport that stops at your front door using an app. Call it a robo-bus, make it fit more than 4 people, and then we can talk.

An advisory edge lane is completely different than a bike lane. The purpose of an edge lane is to reduce traffic speeds so the entire travel surface can be used by bikes. Only ETWs outside of the built up area may have actually bike lanes

​@@steffenberr6760 they're a waste of time and an increase in risk

@@angrydragonslayer Well not so much. Any improvement is good, but as the video stated, and it is clear to see if you look at the American road, you need to have a clear distinction between all parts. The Dutch road has 3 different colours. The US one is the same all across.

@@metalhead6604 we have black advisory lanes here in Germany (with a different concept), maybe they've mixed up both - but still all the dimensions are so completely wrong.

I'm pretty sure it is against the regulations for streets (for low speed access, as opposed to roads) in the Netherlands to have a bike lane. The whole street is the bike lane. Folks confusing advisory lane markings with bike lanes is an ongoing problem there (and everywhere else apparently).

I have winter where I live and between snow and salt the paint becomes very hard to see.

@@scottmccullough8030 that’s true, that’s why advisory lanes suck

Well I think with the faster bicycles like electric bikes it might actually be better to create more suggestions lanes and reduce the car speed to 30kph. So the faster cyclists will get more space in traffic and be able to use the center of the road when it is really crowded. In Rotterdam you see those streets more and more. For example Walenburg in Rotterdam. Or just extremely wide bicycle lanes like the Coolsingel.

@@sebastiaansiemensma that’s in the city, i’m talking about the advisory lanes in the buiten bebouwde kom that’re on roads with speeds up to 60 km/h but most people drive way faster than 60 which is very dangerous. There’ve been numerous times where i was almost hit.

@@scottmccullough8030 We have that problem in the Netherlands as well, believe it or not, we also have winter here and it does snow. Not as much as it used to because we are experiencing temperature increases due to climate change at about 3x the global average rate, but between december and march it can and does snow. For reference, were at about the same latitude as Toronto. Most busy roads are swept and salted, but you can run into a situation where the advisory lanes are covered in salty snowy mud. In that case the solution is to cycle in the middle of the road where it isnt slippery and flip off every driver that honks at you.

One of the worst things about these American culdesack suburbs is the parking. Why dont you just put a parking lot at the front of the culdesack and walk the last 50 yards? Cars should only be in the culdesacks for delivery and pickup of heavy goods.

Definitely! My own expertise is in Dutch design so I try to heavily focus on that. I don’t know much I could add to the outreach part other then “they didn’t do enough outreach”. I think though if there’s a bad design all of the outreach in the world wouldn’t have helped. Maybe fewer people would have protested but it’s be just as dangerous and not move the needle on vision 0 I think. One things the Netherlands does really well is public outreach on projects and they’re redoing my street right now. I’m thinking of making a video on the process once it’s done

I have a hard time understanding the neighborhood backlash as being anything other than outreach failure and neighborhood misunderstanding. Despite what people think, we are all incredibly used to this layout: it's just how our neighborhood streets look normally, but with a bit more paint. If you took any scenario from an unpainted neighborhood and put it on the street, everyone would/should respond the same way. It LOOKS scary because it's so new and foreign, but the reality is that it is just a more delineated neighborhood street design. If I remember right, I think they ended up re-striping this street to have the center line again, but I would have been curious to have seen the neighborhood's response to NO striping.

Just looking at those signs, you know the design has failed. I notice this a lot in North America: Signs with a lot of words on them trying to compensate for failing design elsewhere. In general North American traffic signs are horrible. Lot's of hard to read words, where a single symbol would be much easier. Many cannot be read at the speeds being travelled.

@@buildthelanes You could have reached out to the city for comment but they would likely decline

There are few ETW with official bicycle other on them because doing so is illegal. There are many streets with suggestion lanes which is not how Lange nieuwstraat is operating nor what is present in San Diego

"real" drivers licenses I have a hard time understanding why you're so obsessed with a country that's not yours

How can I live in the Netherlands? I wish my ancestors never left there :( Life is not great in the US if one cannot operate a car, as is my case.

@@seanthe100 Getting a drivers license in the netherlands usually costs a few thousand euros for driving lessons, those lessons usually take between a few months and a year to complete and then you need to take a written test where you need to score about a 90% on each test subject and an 35-minute long driving test in the city and highway where one error usually means you fail your test. That is what he means by a real drivers license.

"Freedom!" Don't take away our cars, or our guns for that matter. Maybe slightly unrelated, but it is a different mentality toward government imposing rules or limiting citizens, I feel.

Purely in of themselves I don't have a huge problem with suggestie stroken. But what i tried to communicate is that they get used as a compensatory measure when its hard to get an older street to behave like a proper ETW. And then they get copied in North America who dont realize theyre copying the " its not great but we can sorta get away with it because its such a calmer and low intensity traffic environment" Then of course it falls flat on its face because its brought to a place like gold coast drive wither higher traffic speeds and intensities. Suggestie strooks truly arent meant to be real bike lanes (this is why they arent syupposed to put a bike symbol on it), I know many cities go ahead and make them look eactly like bike lanes anyway and I wouldnt blame anyone for mistaking them and using it as one. But CROW is also aware of it is actively discussing scrapping it since theres probably better ways.

A lot of US drivers are NOT cyclists. Cycling is more of a recreational hobby in the USA. Many of the US cities are not designed for cyclists, partially due to the layouts of the land. We don't have good public transit in many cities. In a lot of cities people need to use their cars due to the distances between homes, offices, shopping districts, and other attractions. I think until cities deploy good metro and light rail systems to ALL major residential and commercial areas of the cities, I don't think that drivers are going to give up their cars. Simply building bike lanes, removing for on-street parking, or getting landlords to charge for parking is not going to do much unless cities have reliable public transportation to most areas of town. Cities will have to stop segregating housing by residents income level if they want sustainable transportation, and instead do mixed income neighborhoods where rich and poor people live on the same streets in the same neighborhoods or apartment complexes.

But you know the residents would have complained just as much about eliminating on street parking as they did to the shared lane design.

3,5m for a single lane? That's wide enough for going 130km/h! I'ld make it like this: sidewalk: 1,5m bikelane: 1,5m parked cars: 2m car lane: 2,5m => 7,5m. So double that in mirror and you have everything you need.

@@Robbedem the 7m for both lanes is the measurement taken from the actual gold coast drive . Since the minimums depend on local laws, i'm just going with that number assume the designers picked that for a reason. It is also the width of most similar roads here in the Netherlands. So it seems pretty standard. Parking lot width in the US is also has a minimum requirement of 2.74 meters i believe. Which means without changes, you are 3.5 meters over budget.

@@Elementalism. 2,74m for parking? That's wide enough for a 40ton truck!. I didn't see any parked on that street, so that would seem a bit overkill to me... On the other hand, I already knew that the USA road manuals are in dire need of a modern update.

@@Robbedem The average seems to be 8-9 feet according to a large number of sources. So between 2.43 and 2.74 meters. So, even if we took the lower end of that, you would still be short 2.88 meters. And you would have tight parking on one of the busier streets in this area+direction, likely sees higher speeds and bigger vehicles. If we were talking about one of it's neighboring streets, then i would agree with the 2.43, but for this road, i'd definitely want something a little bigger. (or, like i said, none at all)

Agreed

If they just made those lanes a bit less ridiculously wide theyd have plenty of space for dedicated bike lanes everywhere without an extra cm, i mean inch, of asphalt, i mean tarmac

to be fair, the acid rain caused by all their exhaust fumes IS lethal

This was not an improvement. The only thing that changed now is that car are going the same speed but they are entering the bike lane more frequently now.

I dislike the term “advisory bike lane” because it communicates the wrong thing I think. An “advisory bike lane” suggests where it’s where cyclists should ride. What you see in the Netherlands are suggestion lane. But not lanes for bicycles. They’re markings to visually narrow the street so cars slow down enough so cyclists may safely use the entire travel surface width. In short a proper suggestion lane calms traffic enough for cyclists to use the entire width whereas a “bike advisory lane” uses cyclists themselves as a traffic calming measure to try to get cars to slow down in a game of chicken. There’s a huge difference and that’s exactly why Lange niuewestraat is so dangerous because they did something illegal but tweaked it enough in a way where it operates exactly in that dangerous manner but they can’t be sued for it.

The old setup had bike lanes and parking

actually in this case asphalt is better. Asphalt is also better to cycle on and having one narrow street of asphalt in a neighborhood with klinkers is better for wayfinding and cyclist comfort i think

Hey Javier, So the main thing that stops the setup you’re talking about is a sight equation engineers use to calculate the perception of things coming from the left and the right and then braking appropriately. So basically the number of driveways along your typical residential road plus the fact someone can move pretty fast in a car during this transition prevents a lot of engineers from trying. This setup is normally great on a proper road, when you have higher speeds and not a lot of entrance and exits that overlap with the bike path. The thing is that on a lot of residential streets if you need a protected bike lane because there’s too much through traffic going very fast there’s a bigger problem. Since it’s a human habitat the last thing you want is lots of car traffic moving quickly through the area. Basically the street should be safe enough to begin with for all nodes to mingle.

We have this in Columbus on a southbound one way road that used to be 3 lanes traffic / 2 lanes parking (4 lanes traffic / 1 lane parking in rush hour) and it's terrible! Now it's 2 lanes traffic all the time on a major thoroughfare, 2 lanes parking, and one 2 way bike path that takes the west side of the street lane. So now traffic is always bad, it's incredibly hard to park in the parking lanes. Cars often sit on the bike lane. If you are crossing this street, you not only have to look in the car direction, but also try to get in a quick look the other way before you cross the bike lane, of which the view is often obscured by parked cars in the parking lane. Basically it's much more suckage for cars, and the bike lane is so dangerous that I'd never use it. Of yeah, and if you want to turn right off of this road at any light, you can't go when the light turns green. You have to wait for a green turn arrow. That a lot of people run, making it more dangerous for that bike lane. What they should have done is: take the 5 lanes and make it like this from west most lane to east: Lane 1 - Bike lane, proper barrier. Lane 2, 3, 4 - traffic. Lane 5 parking. It wouldn't be perfect as the crossing issues are still there for the bikes, but it gets rid of the visual impediments of the west parking lane making the lane safer. It also frees up the traffic some, which relieves some congestion, and may make it safer from a frustration POV. Also, with only one lane of parking, people parking will only congest 1 of 3 lanes as they park, instead of killing 1 of 2 lanes. Making the traffic lights "smart", aka detecting users of the bike lanes without them having to sit at the intersection would help a lot as the right turn lanes would get a green by default unless the bike lane was in use.

@@buildthelanes Having parked cars between the road and bikelane is the standard setup for streets and roads in Europe. I think sight engineers in the USA need new manuals. ;)

@@Robbedem yes i dont haev a problem with it but this is usually why they get rejected, however these european lanes typically dont haev as many driveways conflicting with the bike lanes too adn smaller cars

@@buildthelanes European houses are often build next to eachother without spacing (row housing). And those can all have a driveway. (per two driveways next to eachother and than a bit of space for one or two cars to park on the street). Municipalities/cities will restrict the height you are allowed to have something against the pavement to 1m, to allow vision of the road.

What we have here at first looks much wider, primarily because it's not a parking lane, but physically on-street-parking. In the first step you need to clearly separate that by replacing the white line with a (low) curb and pavement behind, similar color to the sidewalk) and even question, if you really need two parking lanes, when each household already has 4 to 6 parking spots. Also this section has to be wide enough to actually fit the cars and a buffer towards the moving traffic (dooring). Second you add two _narrow_ advisory lanes (these look like full 2 m). These are not made to have cyclists side by side or overtaking each other on the lane! Their color depends on how wide the remaining middle is: If two passenger cars car drive there, then leave them black (German concept). If not, make them red and tell drivers to only swipe over if there's oncoming traffic (Dutch concept).

There is an equation that engineers use to calculate sight distance to your left and right and they conclude that there isn’t enough space between the driveway and protected bike lane to prevent collision. They don’t consider that the equation starts becoming less applicable when a car is crawling forward at 5 mph and simply brainlessly use the equation without thinking about what it represents. However. It also isn’t a Good idea to have a protected bike lanes intersect with lots of driveways and adjacent streets due to all the conflict. If they decide that the local and staying function is the priority on Mira mesa instead of through traffic. Then the entire street width of mira mesa should be made safe enough for mixing.

@@buildthelanes But the conflicts are still there when the bikelane is near the car lane. Unless people go from their driveway to park their car on the street and back again? ;) And it's worse, because now all the parked cars are a potential conflict as well.

yes a friend of mine lives there

As an engineer, you always have to keep in mind users are absolute idiots and anything that a chimpanzee cant use is too complex.

@@TheSuperappelflap In some cases, yes, but in others, it's absolutely the designer's fault for not understanding basic human psychology. You can't fix a fundamentally bad road design by putting up a little sign telling drivers to behave differently than the road design suggests. Have you ever heard of a "Norman door"? It's a door with a Pull handle that says "Push". Traffic engineers build a f***ton of Norman doors.

@@TheRealE.B. Ive never heard of that term but yeah i see a lot of those doors. In fact there are barely any doors in my country that dont have handles or doorknobs on both sides. Is that common in America?

Also when you compute 30 KPH to MPH it's 19 MPH. This whole design would be safer with that in force. Of course people would claim it's a ticket trap and in fact the cops would be operating as if it were. They'd also stick it to the cyclists if only for spite or laughs. Barneys will be Barneys. Also if the Dutch street was truly copied, it actually would of been an improvement, in spite of the imperfectness.

yes, the original setup had the classic bike lanes along the car travel lane

If we can make a slow street where you can have safe mixing occur 100%. But a “bike advisory lane” is a fundamental misinterpretation of what the Dutch have. It doesn’t exist here

I’m glad that you value the opinion of 2 officials who’ve never created a successful ETW before more than the design criteria of a country that’s been doing it for more than 30 years. Sounds about North American 😂. “The 2 officials of corrupt company A have determined in an interview that company A is not at fault for corruption”. You’re doing exactly what the video talks about. Blaming the public for YOUR crappy design because you never understood it from the country that you tried copying it from. But I’m glad you got some juicy contracts along the way from San Diego

Your comment is exactly right. And Mayor Todd Gloria was so embarrassed by the public outcry over this very modest Mira Mesa bike lane project that he immediately ordered the bike lanes removed. The real problem, though, is that despite all the hoopla about reducing carbon emissions by encouraging cycling, San Diego has done very little to add to cycling infrastructure. With a few exceptions, fragmented, disconnected paint-only bike lanes is all the city has managed to provide. Even those half-hearted measures provoke an outcry by a motoring public that doesn’t want to lose vehicle lanes or on-street parking.

Lange Nieuwstraat is a gray path. Meaning it is not either a GOW or an ETW. I said it is SUPPOSED to function like a shared space because it’s classified as an ETW. But it’s not and those red lanes are functioning exactly like official bike paths. This is exactly why Lange Nieuwstraten has so many problems.

And it is streets like Lange nieuwstraat that gives American designers the idea that official bike lanes on an access street are an appropriate solution to slow down traffic. I’m going to produce another video to explain edge striping more and why they do it in The Netherlands