I rode my bike down the protected bicycle lane on Telegraph Avenue in downtown Oakland the other day. It was not as pleasant as I’d hoped, but still way better than what it was like riding a bicycle on Telegraph Avenue before the lanes were installed. Back then, it felt like riding next to cars on a highway, with some obstacles in between. Traffic speeds are slower now, but there are still a lot of obstacles. Most of the obstacles were at driveways and intersections, and were mostly drivers who were trying to drive their cars somewhere. When the bike lanes ended downtown though, the painted bike lane became an auxiliary parking lot for cars. This was frustrating, as the parked cars render those bike lanes useless. I guess one could argue that they were already useless to start, since […]
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Cars parked in the bike lane. It’s dangerous, but surprisingly not illegal.
The other night, I was riding home from UC Berkeley with my kid. We rode through a bad stretch of Dana Street, where the bike lane is on the left side. It’s a one-way street with heavy car traffic. As usual (unfortunately), someone was parked in the bike lane, blocking us. We scanned for traffic behind us, looking for an opening in traffic. We found a break in traffic, and tried to go around as fast as possible. More cars arrived as we started to go around. The driver blocking the lane was playing on their phone while idling their car. Oblivious or ignorant to the problems they were causing. Perhaps they were waiting to pick somebody up? It’s unsettling to watch your child ride while surrounded by moving cars. You already feel vulnerable, and your child looks even more […]
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