Bike lanes are typically seen as being environmentally friendly. But some Bay Area leaders say the one on the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge is causing an increase in pollution.
I’ll bet the lane is there purely to satisfy some requirement for including non-car infrastructure, regardless of whether it makes sense in this particular location. It’s the same way we get fun bike lanes like these:
that photo feels like the bike lanes in my city that literally merge the right lane of car traffic into the bike lane at traffic lights. it’s like they are trying to kill bicycle riders on purpose
Talking with cyclists it’s actually the opposite. It works in the sense that if someone is turning right they will get into the right lane and essentially self block a bicycle from pulling past them on the right side (if a cyclist did that they have a high likelyhood of getting hit as they are pulling into the cars blind spot… Then traffic starts moving and the right turning car just goes and suddenly there could be a bike there).
I’ll bet the lane is there purely to satisfy some requirement for including non-car infrastructure, regardless of whether it makes sense in this particular location. It’s the same way we get fun bike lanes like these:
that photo feels like the bike lanes in my city that literally merge the right lane of car traffic into the bike lane at traffic lights. it’s like they are trying to kill bicycle riders on purpose
Talking with cyclists it’s actually the opposite. It works in the sense that if someone is turning right they will get into the right lane and essentially self block a bicycle from pulling past them on the right side (if a cyclist did that they have a high likelyhood of getting hit as they are pulling into the cars blind spot… Then traffic starts moving and the right turning car just goes and suddenly there could be a bike there).
Sometimes it’s to artificially narrow the lane to slow traffic. That’s what they did here.