Originally published December 12, 2008 in the Fremont Argus Newspaper

I read with interest your article, Memorial Ride, Argus December 12, 2008 and offer my comments.  There is no shortage of faulty bicycle facilities due mostly to lack of bicycle transportation engineering knowledge and direct cycling experience by the designers of these facilities.  You and I pay for these inadequately designed systems in the form of deaths, injuries, delays getting to your destination, higher emergency service expense, higher medical insurance premiums, and lost wages.  The big problem is that the best solutions are counterintuitive and contrary to what many of us are taught.

Cycling education in its most basic form is the learning of new behaviors and with adults the unlearning of outdated and harmful habits.  Unfortunately, eliminating bad habits is the most difficult to do and comes mostly with education followed by repetition and coaching over many weeks.  The alternative is to learn through trial and error which takes years to achieve and guarantees painful lessons through crashing and falling.  There is only one cyclist education program that meets this goal--the League of American Bicyclists' Smart Cycling program. The public thinks that if one learns how to balance and operate the brakes and gears, that's all they need to cycle safely.  Few people are even willing to spend an hour to learn even the fundamentals of cycling.  They think that there is nothing to learn and that they are all "above average bicyclists".

It is a myth that the most common bike-car crash is being hit from the rear. This is known as "fear from the rear".  Several studies show that over ninety-five out of 100 crashes are caused by things in front of you, or coming towards you from the front or sides.  The well trained bicyclist following good positioning knows this and focuses on what coming up in front, with awareness of what's behind.  This is exactly what you do when you drive a car.

Transportation in the U.S. has historically been based upon integration, meaning motorists and cyclists share the same road, follow the same rules, and have the same rights.  This is the law in all fifty states.  I remember this as "Cyclists fare best when they act and are treated as drivers of vehicles".

The concept of separation produces a superior and inferior class of transportation, with cyclists being treated as inferior.  There are severe adverse side effects of this as proven in Europe and parts of the US that have tried it: pedestrian methods resulting in cyclists being in unexpected and dangerous places, encouraging unpredictable movements on the roadway, and discouraging safe road skills.  It encourages violation of traffic laws.  Some bike lanes encourage hazardous passing on right, and filtering (by moving up on the right side of a line of stopped or slow-moving motor vehicles).  Even more dangerous are the multi-use paths where no traffic rules exist, and the crash rates are the highest per mile of travel.

For the last 120 years knowledgeable cyclists have been using the Roadway Integration Principle because it works.  It gets them to their destination in the most direct route, it gives you the right to use those roads to travel, and you follow the same traffic rules which provides safe predictable movements.  The basic rules of the road in all states  are consistent with Roadway Integration Principle.

Wynn Kageyama
League Cycling Instructor
Cycling Education Chair, Freemont Freewheelers Bicycle Club