Biking in Boston

Matthew said:
I'm not entirely sure what you mean.

The Cygolite 360 that I have is the "360 Lumen" version. There are stronger ones, but they may suffer from some of the problems to which you allude. In online reviews, the 360 is regarded as a reasonable "middle ground" between good lighting vs being too bright.

Additionally, there are 6 modes on these kinds of lights: low, high, medium, "Steadyflash", "Daylightning", and super-low.

Steadyflash is a combination of medium intensity steady light with a flash effect that draws attention, and it is the normally recommended mode for night biking on city streets. I don't believe it is blindingly bright and I keep it pointed slightly at the ground anyway, for the purpose of seeing what's on the ground.

The "high" mode might be overly bright -- I haven't tried blinding anyone with it -- but it's largely intended for night biking in quiet areas with no other lights around.

The Daylightning mode flashes at high intensity very briefly, every half-second or so. It's intended to be used for drawing attention only during the day, and not lighting the way. The package warns that it should not be used at night. Indeed, I find it highly distracting at night, as it creates some of that 'strobe effect' if used at night. Is that what you meant?

None of the watch battery powered lights are "too bright": they are only useful for alerting others to your presence, they cannot light the way.
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Maybe I saw something more powerful and disruptive than yours. I see some lights that are strobe-ish, but this one was CRAZY bright. That's nice of them to warn against using certain modes after dark.
 
rode down Western Ave in Cambridge today. Pleasantly surprised the new separated bike path was completely cleared. Was well enough cleared that I think the city did it, not the residents/businesses.

This is in direct contrast to Allston's Western Ave cycle track which probably won't be seen again until April.
 
^ Speaking of "what to call it", Seattle Neighborhood Greenways says a big part of ending the "war on cars" dynamic in favor of a multimodal solution was to change the vocabulary to stress that we're all people who at some point will find ourselves using another mode of transport (even if it is just a person who drives a lot who finds themselves crossing a street or busy parking lot)

Changing the language partly helps just to humanize the other people you share a road with, and partly it helps for people to think of themselves as people first, not to define themselves by their mode.

Calling people "motorist" or "cyclist" locks them into feeling that they should take their mode personally. If I self-define as a "cyclist" i'm going to see the deprivations of my mode as an attack on me. (Until this article, I'd have self-defined as a multi-modalist, which basically means I have no friends ;-).

If you encourage a person to self-define as a "motorist" they're going to hear "war on cars" as a "war on ME". If you self-define as a cyclist you're also going to encourage that "ad hominem" thinking, and maybe not see how sharing the road is a social process, not just a dimensional process of threading a bike between cars.

Chart below, full article at PeopleForBikes.org
safe%20streets%20language.jpg


I also like how "collision" (which sounds preventable, particularly with proper buffering or spacing) can replace "accident" (which suggests there's nothing we can do)
 
How has the Cambridge Street (Allston) bike lane fared during all this snow?
 
chmeeee said:
Design to reconstruct the Arborway and provide bicycle connections from the Jamaicaway to Casey:

http://arborwaymatters.blogspot.com/2015/02/connecting-casey-bike-paths-to-jamaica.html?m=1
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I like it! I wish they actually posted plans that you could look at without a microscope though. With the Casey overpass bike accommodations and this, I can see this corridor becoming an important route in the bike network. The worst stretch would still be the Riverway though. They don't even have a sidewalk on one side.
 
Finch said:
How has the Cambridge Street (Allston) bike lane fared during all this snow?
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There is no more buffered bike lane, nor sidewalk. It's all covered with a giant pile of snow.

MassDOT did show up with a small plow, eventually, to clear the sidewalk on the north side, although it broke down right away. Last I saw, they were getting somewhere with it though. I don't think they're going to do the south side at all.
 
clayville said:
Sorry for the quality of the images on ArborwayMatters (my bad).
Here are links to DCR's public meetings materials site where you can download pdfs of the presentations...

Part 1 - the goals and traffic analysis

Part 2 - examples of many different roundabout styles

Part 3 - the meat of the proposal and higher res versions of plans
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east of the new double circle it should be a mixed-use path - or an off-street two-way bike path with adjacent ped path, not on-street lanes (this is, of course, assuming that DCR would actually plow it in the winter). arborway along that stretch sees virtually no pedestrian traffic - even though there is currently a sidewalk there. On-street lanes often become impassible in the winter - and even with the redesign I still think that stretch is going to remain a speedway - so it would be dangerous after dark (since there's very little lighting there).
 
rinserepeat said:
east of the new double circle it should be a mixed-use path - or an off-street two-way bike path with adjacent ped path, not on-street lanes (this is, of course, assuming that DCR would actually plow it in the winter). arborway along that stretch sees virtually no pedestrian traffic - even though there is currently a sidewalk there. On-street lanes often become impassible in the winter - and even with the redesign I still think that stretch is going to remain a speedway - so it would be dangerous after dark (since there's very little lighting there).
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If you mean the section between Murray Circle and Forest Hills: see page 14 of the Part 3 pdf linked above which shows that the Arboretum side has a two-way off-street bike path proposed, grade-separated from the mainline vehicles by a 4' concrete buffer. The one-way bike path on the "Arborway Hillside" side (the residential side up the hill) is also grade-separated and buffered by 1.5'. Unclear to me how they would hook that up with the Casey Arborway portion towards South Street (which isn't grade separated or physically buffered), or how these grade separations connect to Casey generally.
 
Matthew said:
There is no more buffered bike lane, nor sidewalk. It's all covered with a giant pile of snow.

MassDOT did show up with a small plow, eventually, to clear the sidewalk on the north side, although it broke down right away. Last I saw, they were getting somewhere with it though. I don't think they're going to do the south side at all.
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Sorry, but roads have to take precedence over sidewalks and bike lanes

Roads not only carry commuters, in cars and buses and things in trucks -- but most importantly -- roads carry Emergency Vehicles!
 
whighlander said:
Sorry, but roads have to take precedence over sidewalks and bike lanes

Roads not only carry commuters, in cars and buses and things in trucks -- but most importantly -- roads carry Emergency Vehicles!
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Sidewalks are how everyone who uses transit (and how many who drive cars) completes their trip--and how every EMT gets those last few feet to your door (or how your stretcher gets hauled out)

Bike lanes, well, like any lane, they're subject to being snowed under. Let's make sure those brave cyclists who remain get the "real user" respect they're entitled to now that they're back on the "main road" Every cyclist you share the road with is moving a higher ratio of person/asphalt than any car. When they reach critical mass, they're a huge help in moving people.
 
whighlander said:
Sorry, but roads have to take precedence over sidewalks and bike lanes

Roads not only carry commuters, in cars and buses and things in trucks -- but most importantly -- roads carry Emergency Vehicles!
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Then we should ban driving because cars are blocking the emergency vehicles from getting around
 
whighlander said:
Sorry, but roads have to take precedence over sidewalks and bike lanes

Roads not only carry commuters, in cars and buses and things in trucks -- but most importantly -- roads carry Emergency Vehicles!
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I was reporting matter-of-fact, not saying that they should clear the bike lane or that I expected them to. I do expect MassDOT to clear that sidewalk though, it is a critical link for that community, and it is a legal requirement.

But yes, roads are important, and whenever personal vehicles block emergency vehicles, then the personal vehicles should be restricted.

If the city actually cared about emergency vehicle response then we'd see bans on parking enforced, and we'd see many roads dedicated to emergency vehicles only, during a snow emergency.

But of course, motorists are disingenuous. They only care about emergency vehicles when it is convenient for themselves. Whenever emergency vehicle access would preclude or inconvenience motorists, suddenly it's not so important to them...
 
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