Insurance issues

A few days back my bike and a branch from a nearby tree on the Guertel bike path "collided". The branch got stuck in my chain and blocked it. Nothing bad happened, but I had to fiddle it out and missed a green traffic light. Still, it made me think about my safety.

"Twisted Branches" by TexasEagle

Do you have special bike insurances? Are you insured in case of an accident? Is your bike insured against theft? Overall, do you feel safe and secured when riding a bicycle?

"Hey, your rear light doesn't work..."

I often say that to fellow cyclists who obviously have lights on their bikes but don't want to use them in the night.

Recently I got a very nice answer to that: "Shit, that one too. Thanks a million!"

The guy was really grateful that I told him as he had only recently replaced his front light but not noticed that the one in the back was also broken. Well, how should he? A bicycle does not have a flashing warning lamp in case something is damaged...

I hence encourage everyone who sees a cyclist with a non-working light to tell them. It can be life-saving. Not every cyclist recklessly and purposely cycles around as a bike ninja.

"Yehuda Moon and the Kickstand Cyclery" by Rick Smith

What you can do as a cyclist for your own safety? Check your lights every time you set off in the dark! And make sure you carry spare batteries if you use battery-driven lights.

All the crap they sell...

Last August a young man got killed in Salo (40 km from Turku) because of a crappy front fork. He was cycling to work, and the fork gave in. His head hit the pavement and he died. The fork was like this:

The Swiss approach to cycling

Before Christmas I spend a day in Zürich, Switzerland. To be fair -- I did not go there by bike (but by night train from Vienna) and I did not even cycle there. But I have lived in Zürich for a while in 2008 and commuted by bike every day back then. Thus I'm not a complete greenhorn when I talk about cycling there :).

I could write a lot about Zürich's bike infrastructure because there are many things I like about it. However, I already mentioned a few things I like earlier (see "Commuting in Zürich"), so I'm going to tackle different topics today.

Early morning view from the ETH terrace in Zürich

Winter cycling

This year has been snowy and cold everywhere in Europe. I've heard news of snow in Spain and Italy, and Austria received first snow before Turku, Finland. Actually, we don't always get a good snowy and cold winter here either. A couple of years ago there was no termic winter (temperature drops permanently below zero) here at all, but that was exceptional. I have never experienced such a poor winter before, and it really sucked. However, this year has been delightfully snowy and cold, we received permanent snow cover a few weeks back, earlier than usually (I have to mention that in Turku the statistical average for that is in the Christmas Eve :D). So, considering my little winter cycling experiment, the conditions have been ideal. Apart from the raging blizzard outside as I'm writing this.

In the middle: walking on frozen Kallavesi lake, Kuopio; other images: modifications for the winter

Campaigns against drink-driving

In Austria a lot of alcohol-related accidents happen especially at this time of the year. We have a Christmas market- and hence also a Glühwein and Punsch-drinking tradition (in English this is called mulled wine and glogg as far as I know). So recently we also have a new campaign against drink-driving (in German):

"Alkohol am Steuer: Könnten Sie damit leben?" / "Drink-driving: Could you live with it?"

It's all about first times (walking, car ownership, being promoted etc.) of Stefan and Tobias -- and about the first time drink-driving and it's consequences... I think the question "Could you live with the consequences?" at the end is of course dramatic, but still very realistic. There is a similar spot from Ireland (in English):

"Could you live with the shame?"

In 2002 we had this, well, rather funny spot about drink-driving in Austria which is more directed towards young people who, on the countryside, often heavily depend on cars when they want to go out. It shows three zombies coming out of their graves and talk about their last disco visit: how drunk they were, that one said he could still drive, that the others joined and wanted to drive to another bar etc. It ends with "Und was ist dann eigentlich passiert?" / "And what happened then?" before you can hear cars crashing in the background:

"Drink + Drive = Death"

Do you have campaigns against drink-driving in your country? Do you think such TV spots can make a difference? If so, which ones do you consider most effective? Do you think they have to be shocking in order to show any effect?

By the way, what blood alcohol limits do you have in your country? In Austria we have a 0.5‰ drink-drive-limit for car drivers (and basically 0 for beginners). However, this regulation is only written down in the Kfz-Gesetz (law for motorists). Generally, and hence also for cyclists, we have 0.8‰ limit which previously used to be the overall limit (before they lowered it in 1998). If you know German and are interested in details you can continue reading in the "Handbuch Alkohol - Österreich" and the newspaper article "Angetrankelt mit dem Fahrrad unterwegs" (about drink-biking).

Do you ever drink-bike? I really try to avoid that. When I plan to go out I either leave my bike at home or just don't drink at all. I think that a slow reaction can be pretty dangerous if one has to ride between cars. Thus in that sense it also matters where I'm cycling. I don't mind having a beer and cycling back home on a lonesome cycle path in the countryside. Good lighting at night, however, is always essential!

Suburbanization and cycling

Suburban sprawl by David Shankbone 2008

As you may know, I am a geography student, so why not utilize my education? Forgive me if I'm dry, I'll try to be at least informative :)

There are 2 types of suburbanization: British and American. Both mean that people desire to live outside the city center. The British suburbanized in the 19^th century by developing public transit system. The American way was to get to the suburbs by private automobile, which also enables the low density population structure and urban sprawl. Nowadays there the both suburbanization types occur in Europe too. The American type has proved to be particularly detrimental for cycling, because the distances are too long and often the necessary and safe light traffic infrastructure does not exist.

Low density housing in America pretty much destroyed community walkability and light traffic infrastructure, but in those European towns that have managed to invest in cyclist friendly infrastructure the cyclist rates are still very high (Follman 2007). The examples of 20^th century Amsterdam and Copenhagen prove this point but they also show that it is possible to reverse this development and break the connection between suburbanization and lower cycling rates.

In the 1^st half of the 20^th century up to 75% of trips in Amsterdam were done by bike. 75 percent! After the second world war cars took over Amsterdam and the city expanded. This obviously had a massive effect on cycling, and the cycling rate dropped to the all time low of 25% in Amsterdam and 10% in Copenhagen by the 70s. How ever, the city road capacity couldn't handle many cars and the oil crises forced the government to think of measures to decrease oil dependency, so they began aggressively promoting cycling among other things by investing in bicycling infrastructure and enhancing cyclist priority in traffic. They succeeded and nowadays the cities have 35-40% bike trip share. That is impressive! Nowadays the cities are known for their cyclist friendliness and are among the safest cycling cities of the world (Jacobson 2009).

So, usually suburbanization and cycling decline go hand-in-hand, but it does not have to be that way. Suburbanization can also promote cycling if the suburb is not too far, but that would be on the expense of pedestrians or public transit, not cars. It is better to reign in the (mostly the American type) suburbanization a bit by supporting strong city centers and restricting suburban mall-building. E.g Muenster has some positive experiences of that strategy (Pucher and Buehler 2007).

Turku has both American and European type suburbs. Less than half of the households on the closer and denser (British type) suburbs have cars, but 70% of the more distant ones have at least one. The highest cyclist rates coming to the center of the city are from the closer suburb area. Surprisingly the cyclists are not coming to the grid plan center as often as the average cycling rate (11,5% of all trips) suggests. From the more distant “American type” suburbs almost no-one bothers to ride a bike to the center (numbers are from Turku Bustrip self-assessment report 2006, in Finnish).

So, it looks like these suburb theories do fit pretty well on my town. How about you, do you have any theories about the connection of suburbanization and cycling or would you like to share your experience? Is this kinda stuff too boring for you or do you wanna hear more of my academic brain farts?

P.S. Here's a video about the solution to the problems presented by urban sprawl (which is not the same as suburbanization, but closely related to the American type)

The importance of bike racks

According to Christoph Chorherr's blog entry from April 2009 (a Green politician) there are about 1 Million bicycles in Vienna but only 18.000 bike racks available. This is of course far to few and explains

a) why many bikes get stolen (locking the bike frame to a fixed object is essential) and
b) why so many bikes are locked to street lamps, traffic signs, fences etc.

Well, this number is old. Recently I have seen many new bike racks, especially in the city center. The city of Vienna builds bike racks in two different types, both of which are pretty safe if one uses them correctly (see how to secure bicycles).

The most common type of bike racks in Vienna and many European cities.
Do you have such public bike racks too? Or does your city build other ones?

But it's not just the sufficient number of bike racks that is important, it's also the accessibility that plays a key role. I don't mind walking 500m from the bike rack to my destination if I leave my bike for a few hours (e.g. if I go to the cinema, theater, dinner or so), but if I just have to buy a milk or post a letter (which takes less than 5min) I want to be able to park my bike right outside of the shop.

This is something that is certainly missing in Vienna. There are very very few shops with bike racks, even in major shopping streets like Mariahilfer Straße bike racks are rare. There is, however, one positive example that sticks out:

Bike racks at U6 Floridsdorf: subway and train station
and a big shopping mall are right beside the racks, which are even canopied!

Talking about it, other important spots for bike racks are of course public transport stations, especially train and subway stations. Vienna lacks many bike racks in these places as well as in front of schools and universities. But the city builds many new racks these days and is certainly improving, something that I can only appreciate :).

Still, the best and most bike racks ain't help if they are occupied by someone else. So I kindly ask all moped and motorbike riders: please park your vehicles somewhere else and don't block the few racks that are available for safe bike parking.

Thanks in advance.

Kids on bikes

While for the average kid in Vienna it is normal to go to school by public transport, the "wealthy" families chauffeur their kids around in huge cars. I really don't understand this concept of bringing the kids after a certain age, especially in a city with such great public transport and short ways. This way they don't get to learn how to use public transport independently, loose touch to their schoolmates, put on weight because they don't get enough exercise and so on. Obesity becomes a bigger and bigger issue anyhow, so why make it worse?

And it can't be because the parents are worried about their kids' safety as most of them don't mind to block bike lanes, sidewalks and crosswalks directly in front of schools -- making it impossible for pupils to feel safe.

I think a city should be safe enough for kids to ride bikes. And I think parents can achieve that by simply not creating unnecessary car traffic in front of schools. So in fact I think the city already is safe enough, but it's the people that aren't ready for a change. Well, car addiction is certainly not easy to overcome, but they could try to get bike addicted instead. And if they still want to make namby-pambies out of their children, they can bring them by bike too :-).

By the way, kids are allowed to cycle on the sidewalks in Austria till the age of 12. But already at the age of 10 they can do a "bicycle license" which allows them to cycle on the road earlier. That's a great thing because this way the children are taught the traffic rules, hand signals etc. and they also have to pass a practical test. Then they can take responsibility for themselves.

I think mobile autonomy is far too underrated. To make a long story short: relying on someone (or something) else to get to and from places is just no fun. But cycling is :-).

1 out of 100

After I left the peaceful Bike Ride on Friday, reality just again bit me. Am I asking for too much, when I want cycling in Vienna to be relaxed and safe?

Well, I was riding along a very narrow one-way street (of course only narrow and one-way because cars are allowed to park free of charge on both sides of the road). As I heard a car approaching from behind, I already started to watch out for possible gaps to pull in to let it pass as I don't like cars following me and it's also not comfortable for them. But before the car even caught up to me, the lady already pushed the horn continuously and shouted “Get fuckin' out of the way!”. Sorry, but that was it for me. I'm generally giving way to cars if possible, but this time I just couldn't. I pulled back in the middle of the lane, gave her the finger and shouted “I have as much right to drive here as you have”. She continued pushing the horn, shouting from the window, and I got really petrified that she would try to hit me. She simply didn't get that there was not enough room to overtake and that I didn't block her on purpose.

People along the road already started looking and some came out of a bar. I don't know whether they recognized the hysterical lady behind the steering wheel or thought that I'm just a stupid cyclist blocking traffic (the “real” traffic of course, the one with cars).

When the road got a little wider (already after 20m anyway) she accelerated immediately, overtook me and cut me off. Apparently she didn't notice that I had slowed down cause there was a junction where we had to give way to the rest of the traffic. She ignored a pedestrian waiting at a crosswalk and nearly crashed into the car coming from the right. So now that guy started honking at her... In fact there is a ban on honking in Vienna, but nobody really gives a shit. Very annoying and yet another needless sound source from motorized traffic.

Honestly, what's wrong with some people? How is it possible that such maniacs are entitled to drive a car and thereby threaten other people? I know, only something like 1 out of 100 persons behaves like that when trapped in a car, but it's still too much.

Unfortunately, such experiences get me steamed up. I need to calm down. I can live with the honking itself by simply ignoring it. But as soon as somebody starts bawling at me, I'm close to lose my poise. Cycling in this city already requires a high frustration tolerance and such incidents are just the last straw. How do you handle such a situation?

"Honk for bikes" by Dave O

A revolutionary bike light

Yesterday I checked out the website of the Citybiker bike shop in Vienna for new bikes. But what actually drew my attention was this:


Deadly, eh? ;-)

Check out the MonkeyLectric light on their website. The Citybiker sells it for 70€.

Sidewalk cycling and bicycle infrastructure

I never cycle on sidewalks. Not only because I'm not allowed to. Even more, because I think it's way to dangerous. Firstly, it is dangerous for pedestrians cause cyclists are much faster than them. The speed of cars on the road is much closer to the one of cyclists than the pedestrians' speed is (<5 km/h). But it's also more likely for cyclists to get hit by cars. Why, you ask? Well, car drivers don't expect cyclists on sidewalks and easily overlook them when they turn. And even if everybody would watch out, sometimes it would still be impossible to see each other (e.g. if there is a line of parked cars in between). Turning cars are a threat, no matter if they come from ahead or behind. You can only avoid such accidents if you ride really slow and completely stop at each intersection. But that's not very energy efficient and slow. So why cycle on a sidewalk in the first place? Just don't do it. On the road you are much more visible to car drivers - hence safer - and also much faster :-).

Well, as I already mentioned, in Austria we are not allowed to cycle on the sidewalk. But we have bike paths (one-way or both ways) on sidewalks. And there are also a lot of so-called "combined foot and bike paths" that are for both pedestrians and cyclists (either separated by a line or not). And some of this constructions are just as dangerous as cycling on sidewalks. Unfortunately I'm forced to use them (if one has a road bike s/he doesn't have to cycle there, but I don't have one). Sometimes they are an advantage, e.g. if it is a short cut that I couldn't use otherwise, but they are a huge disadvantage and risk if they are just built to keep the road bicycle-free.



Combined foot and bike paths: The left picture clearly shows a short cut. One has to ride slow and watch out for pedestrians, but it might be an advantage. It's in Linz, where many combined foot and bike paths exist. The right picture shows a combined foot and bike path in Vienna (just the little bit where my bike stands). What you don't see is that cars have 4 lanes in each direction! And cyclists have to share a space with pedestrians that's even so small, that two pedestrians can't get by very well. The tragedy about it: due to our traffic regulations I have to use this combined foot and bike path and can't cycle on the car lanes! And this is an arterial road in the middle of Vienna (Gürtel at Volksoper, for those who know it). It's a real shame to call something like that a bike path and add it to the ~1000km of bike lanes in Vienna that the city council is so proud of. I don't know who plans bike paths like this, but it surely wasn't a cyclist.

A lot of accidents between cyclists and cars/trucks in the city happen on bike paths and bike path crossings because cyclists are not visible to car drivers there, but still feel safe (although they aren't). In addition, most car drivers don't shoulder check, what makes it even more risky. For truck drivers it's even more difficult to see you since they can only use their mirrors - never ever stop right beside a truck at an intersection! Last year many cyclists have died this way - overran by a turning secondary car/truck on a bike path (crossing).

Don't get me wrong. I do like bike paths out of the town, but generally not in the town itself because there are way to many dangerous junctions. Ok, it's not a natural law that they are dangerous, but due to bad traffic planning, dense housing and illegal parking a lot of them are. In the city I prefer sufficiently wide (!) bike lanes on the road because there I'm visible to car drivers and much safer. Or even better, low speed limits and many restricted areas (30 km/h zones, residential streets and such) with no bike lanes at all. And a few bike paths beside busy and important roads with a lot of (heavy) motor traffic. Appropriate bicycle infrastructure meets the hierarchy of the road.

Another bad example of a bike path in both (!) directions. How small might it be? 1-1.2 meters? Do you think that two cyclists can pass each other? Compare it to the car lanes next to it and form an opinion yourself. There are 4 of them in each direction - the location is close to the previous picture. At this particular spot you can even see 5 lanes. Well, space has to be saved somewhere, doesn't it? I just don't get why they built a bike path there in the first place. To get the road bicycle-free I suppose.. Also note that cyclists and turning car drivers have to be really careful at this bike path crossing to not interfere with each other. Such designs bear extra potential for conflicts rather than avoiding them.

If you want to see some good examples of bike paths you must go to Copenhagen or Amsterdam etc. Maybe I sound a little bit to pessimistic - but in Vienna there are hardly any. But ok, I will take some pictures of well-designed bicycle infrastructure in the future too, I promise ;-).

Positioning on the road

Where am I supposed to cycle? Actually, this question is not so easy to answer. Our "Straßenverkehrsordnung" (austrian road traffic regulations) says that it's not allowed to cycle on sidewalks, that one has to use a bike lane/path if there's one and furthermore this, §7(1):

"Der Lenker eines Fahrzeuges hat, sofern sich aus diesem Bundesgesetz nichts anderes ergibt, so weit rechts zu fahren, wie ihm dies unter Bedachtnahme auf die Leichtigkeit und Flüssigkeit des Verkehrs zumutbar und dies ohne Gefährdung, Behinderung oder Belästigung anderer Straßenbenützer, ohne eigene Gefährdung und ohne Beschädigung von Sachen möglich ist. [...]"

which translates to "The driver of a vehicle must, if not stated otherwise, drive as far on the right as it is possible concerning ease and liquidity of traffic but without endangering, constraining or harassing other road users, without putting oneself in danger and without damaging things." Ok, I'm a bad translator, but well, I guess you get what it's about.

The thing is, most beginners mistake this regulation with "you have to drive as far right as possible to let cars pass easily". And that is really dangerous. Why? This is what I'm going to explain in this post. So I don't tell you, what distance you have to keep from the right edge or where you have to ride on a bike path. The thing is: You have to feel safe! Where would you ride if there was no other road user around? That's where you should be riding anytime, even if there are a hundred honking car drivers around you. Of course, the busier the road, the more careful you have to ride (shoulder check etc.), but it shouldn't change anything about your position. And, even more important, don't overestimate the lines that divide the bike lane from the rest of the road. I'm not telling you to ignore the traffic rules, but you should be able to tell when a bike lane is actually more dangerous for you than the rest of the road (e.g. if it is only half a meter wide and directly beside a line of parked cars).

I'm now going to make you feel unsafe in order that you can estimate the dangers on the road better - and to find a good position for yourself :-). Plus, if you are self-confident enough to take the space you need, also car drivers will respect that.

• Opening car doors: Whenever you pass a parked car, be aware that there might be somebody inside, driver or passenger, that wants to get out of the car the minute you pass by. And unfortunately, some people don't check if it's safe to open the door before they do so. And even if you manage to swerve around, there might just be another car overtaking you that can't.
• Empty parking spots: If you don't stay in your track, cars will overtake you and cut you off. Have you ever seen a car following wiggly lines when they want to drive straight on? Don't swerve in and out of the parking lane!
• Pedestrians: Some pedestrians don't look before they cross a road, especially when they "hear" that no car is around. If you can't observe the road edge well (e.g. because of parked cars, bushes, walls etc.), stay away from it.
• Tram rails: There are two options where you can ride - right of the right rail or in between. With rails it is even more difficult or dangerous to swerve, especially when they are wet. That's because it is not so easy to cross them, i.e. much easier to fall off.
• Manholes, potholes, speed bumps etc.: Well, they are not that dangerous, but certainly uncomfortable if you hit them.
  
• One-way and small streets: It mostly happens in one-way streets and on bike lanes that cars squeeze by letting hardly any space for you. If you don't feel safe in such a situation cause the road is not wide enough, don't allow it and ride in the middle of the lane. They might honk, but be aware that it's not your fault. In the end it's the width of their fat cars that prevents them from overtaking and not your small bike.
  

There's one basic rule that you can apply if you're on a road without bike lane and don't know where to cycle: don't ride further right then the right wheel of the car in front of you is. And stick to your track.

If you feel comfortable to undertake (that is overtake cars on the right that had to stop at a red light) you can do this with less distance because you're the only vehicle that is moving. But you should still be aware of the dangers above (maybe a passenger wants to get out of a standing car at the very moment).


A taxi half parked on the bike lane. Can you see whether somebody wants to get out? Maybe there is a child or dog behind the cab that wants to cross the road? Might that little bump cause trouble and do you have to reduce speed? Isn't that bike lane to small and too close to parked cars to ride safely? Well, a bike lane isn't safe just because it's a bike lane. You have ride safely yourself.

Would you want to use this bike lane against a one-way street? In such situations I mostly get off my bike and walk on the sidewalk - or don't use this route at all. I certainly can't cycle safely inside of the marked bike lane. Without parked cars it wouldn't be a problem though.

Tram lines: On the street in the left picture I cycle on the small concrete bit in between the right rail and the cobblestones or in the right half in between the rails. On the second street I definitely ride in between the rails.















There's a long list of situations and how to deal with them on "How to not get hit by cars". It also contains some tips about positioning on the road -- e.g. "ride further left" is mentioned in nearly every situation. Apart from that, the most important "tool" for a cyclist imho is a shoulder check. Never forget that.

Hm, I think I wrote quite a lot now, maybe too much. Was it helpful? Can you add something that's important to you?

Cycling the world wide web

There are many things on my mind, I want to talk about. But because today was supposed to be the day of the appearance of the 44th issue of the citycycling magazine, I wanted to devote this post to all the cyclists in the UK. Unfortunately, they lost track of time there, so the magazine won't appear today but on Sunday :-(. Good for you maybe, if you didn't know it before - now you gained some time to catch up on the back issues 1 to 43 :-). If that's too much for you at once but you still want to find out about the things they talk about, you should check out the article archive.
Meanwhile I will impatiently wait for Sunday. The citycycling magazine really is that good! They have so many topics, even bicycle poems. I've listed some of my favourite articles here:

• how to fall off
  
• i don't like cycle bells
• the dangers of cycling
• the importance of being cyclist
• are cyclists saints?
• how to deal with bad drivers
• the number game, e.g. nostalgic figures and obesity
• poetry, e.g. about abandoned bikes and rain
  
• and many many more

While talking about bicycle culture in the UK, you should definitely do a few awareness tests. I think they are a great idea to make people watch out for cyclists.