Talk:Segregated cycle facilities

Kenneth D. Cross Study

This is my first attempt at using the talk page...please forgive any errors in formatting as I muddle my way through....

The current section titled Evidence Against states the following, "In the 1970s the California Statewide Bicycle Committee arranged with Kenneth D. Cross for a study of car-bike collisions, expecting that this study would support their arguments on collision prevention. When presented to the Committee in Sacramento on 19 June 1974, Cross's study showed the opposite: only 0.5% of car-bike collisions had occurred between straight-ahead cyclists and overtaking straight-ahead motorists.[37] Cross later had a contract with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to produce an improved study (on a pseudo-random national sample), and the results were much the same.[38]"

In the Kenneth Cross Study, various collisions were categorized. Type 13 is listed as follows (paper here: http://ntl.bts.gov/lib/25000/25400/25439/DOT-HS-803-315.pdf):

"Problem Type 13 (24.6% Fatal; 4.0% Non-Fatal) Problem Type 13 must be considered one of the most important problem types revealed by this study, because it accounted for nearly one-fourth of all fatalities in the sample--three times as many as any other problem type.The distinguishing characteristics of this problem type are (a) the motor vehicle overtook and collided with a bicycle traveling in the same direction as the motor vehicle, and (b) the collisions occurred because the motorist failed to observe the bicyclist until the accident was imminent.The distinguishing characteristic of Problem Type 13 is that the operator of the overtaking motor vehicle failed to observe the bicyclist until the vehicles were in such close proximity that successful evasive action was impossible."

... This is the second paper by Cross which purportedly had the same results as the first paper (per the original wikipedia entry). The excerpt above is from the second paper. Upon reading the results of Type 13, the most dangerous type of car-bike collision resulting in fatality was a result of same direction overtaking.

...

So the section stating that the Cross study proved that same-direction traffic was responsible for "only 0.5% of car-bike collisions had occurred between straight-ahead cyclists and overtaking straight-ahead motorists" is incorrect.

The section linking here: http://www.johnforester.com/Articles/Safety/Cross01.htm was also deleted because the data presented did not match what was summarized on wikipedia nor was it part of the second Cross study. I was unable to find exactly how the numbers here: http://www.johnforester.com/Articles/Safety/Cross01.htm were derived from the Cross study.

Additionally, the percentages on Forester's page do not match the percentages on the Cross study. The problem types on the Forester page do not match the Cross study. ...

Hope this clarifies the reason for deleting the section.

What is the next step?

Edit: Should a page be made for the Kenneth Cross Study, so that it can be linked to?

(Mightybeancounter (talk) 06:22, 26 October 2011 (UTC))

Yes, the 0.5% assertion does not appear to be supported by the cited source. But instead of deleting the section entirely, let's try to rewrite it in a way that is supported by the sources. --Born2cycle (talk) 17:11, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

(Born2cycle](talk) 17:11, 26 October 2011 (UTC))

So the assertion that there is evidence against separated bicycle infrastructure was initially put forth by John Forester, per the original article. I'm unclear on how the section would be rewritten without acknowledging Forester's deletion of the Cross results. Would that need to be explained? I've proposed edits.

The original stated this:

"In the 1970s the California Statewide Bicycle Committee arranged with Kenneth D. Cross for a study of car-bike collisions, expecting that this study would support their arguments on collision prevention. "

"Cross later had a contract with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to produce an improved study (on a pseudo-random national sample), and the results were much the same.[38]"

How do we know that the reason for the study was to support the Committee's arguments? From the Cross paper on the reason for the study, I've found the quote "to determine the causes of bicycle/motor-vehicle accidents and to use data on accident causation to identify potential counter-measure approaches." I propose the following change:

In the 1970s the California Statewide Bicycle Committee arranged with Kenneth D. Cross to determine the various types of bicycle/motor-vehicle accidents and to use the results of the study to determine potential countermeasures.

The original stated this:

When presented to the Committee in Sacramento on 19 June 1974, Cross's study showed that the opposite: only 0.5% of car-bike collisions had occurred between straight-ahead cyclists and overtaking straight-ahead motorists.[37]

My proposed edit will be:

When presented to the Committee in Sacramento on 19 June 1974, Cross's study showed that the most dangerous type of collision was what was categorized as Problem Type 13 consisting of 24.6% fatalities and 4.0% injuries. Cross identified this as one of the most dangerous types of collisions as it accounted for nearly "one-fourth of all fatalities in the sample--three times as many as any other problem type". The defining characteristic of this type of collision "(a) the motor vehicle overtook and collided with a bicycle traveling in the same direction as the motor vehicle, and (b) the collisions occurred because the motorist failed to observe the bicyclist until the accident was imminent."

Although the Cross Study has been used by Forester to argue against separated infrastructure, the Cross study proved that the public fear of rear-end collisions caused by same direction traffic was substantiated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mightybeancounter (talk • contribs) 19:35, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I've taken a closer look. The article references the first Cross Study.

Table A of that study shows ten "Accident Types", labeled A-J. Accident Type F is "Motorist Collided With Rear of Cyclist" and is shown to have a relative contribution of 4.17% (of all the car-bike collisions studied, a motorist collided with the rear of the cyclist in 4.17% of them).

This Accident Type is discussed in more detail in a section labeled, "Motorist Collided with Rear of Cyclist". In that section it illustrates the five sub-types of this Accident Type in Figure 10, and notes, "The five sub-types shown in Figure 10 constitute only 4.1 percent of the total accident sample." Each of the five sub-types shown in Figure 10 is accompanied by a percentage indicating the relative contribution of that sub-type to the total 4.1% relative contribution of this Accident Type (the percents in this Figure are 43, 25, 6, 13 and 13, adding up to 100%... 100% of 4.1%).

Of the five sub-types of this Accident Type, one represents those crashes away from intersections in which the cyclist and motorist are both going straight, and the relative contribution of this sub-type is labeled as being 13% of this type. 13% of 4.1 is 0.533% of all car-bike collisions in this study, which seems to substantiate the statement in the article: "Cross's study showed the opposite: only 0.5% of car-bike collisions had occurred between straight-ahead cyclists and overtaking straight-ahead motorists".

The study also refers to the frequency of this type of accident as "occurred extremely infrequently":

Accidents in which the motorist collided with the rear of the bicyclist occur relatively infrequently. The five sub-types shown in Figure 10 constitute only 4.1 percent of the total accident sample. This is surprising since these types of accidents appear most hazardous to the bicyclist. Most bicyclists would predict that many accidents occur when a bicyclist is riding along a heavily trafficked street-with a line of parked cars along the right-hand curb. In fact, this type of accident occurred extremely infrequently in our sample.

The second Cross Study classifies crash types differently, so I don't know if we can glean a comparable figure out of it. It seems that a large proportion of those Type 13 crashes (motorist overtaking; bicyclist not observed) occurred at night with the cyclist having inadequate lighting. In particular, Table 36 shows that while 25.2% of all fatals were of Type 13, 17.4% (or 69% of all of Type 13) occurred at nighttime (9.0% rural nighttime + 8.4% urban nighttime). Daytime Type 13s account for only 7.1% of all fatals. Considering that the total number of fatals is only a fraction of all bike-car crashes, I think that indicates the 0.5% is in the right ballpark per this study too.

In any case, I see nothing here that supports our saying, "the Cross study proved that the public fear of rear-end collisions caused by same direction traffic was substantiated".

By the way, bicyclinginfo.org says that in 2009 there were 630 bicyclist fatalities in the U.S., and 51,000 bicyclist injuries. Even if we include the nighttime crashes involving inadequately lighted cyclists, that means about 25% of those 630 fatalities, or about 158, were Type 13. In other words, if you're an average cyclist and you're in a bike crash, the odds that you'll be killed in a from-behind crash while both you and the motorist are going straight is about 158 out of 51000 or... 0.3%. I think this suggests, especially if poor lighting at night is eliminated as a factor, that concern about other types of crashes, those involving turning and crossing movements, should be given much higher priority. --Born2cycle (talk) 00:37, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

The discussion confounds the two Cross studies, the first done for California, the second for the NHTSA. The first study has collision types designated by letters, the second has collision types designated by numbers. It is inappropriate to compare the data from one study with the conclusions of the other study, which appears to have been done. The entirely incorrect statement is that the first Cross study showed that 38% of car-bike collisions occurred between straight-ahead cyclists and straight-ahead motorists. The correct value, for the first Cross study, is 0.5%, as the commenter immediately before, or the one before that, had concluded. This major error requires correction as rapidly as possible, as the erroneous value has been circulated (which is how it came to my attention). The statement that California government expected that this first Cross study would support their bikeway program being imposed on cyclists is correct. That is why they had Cross make his presentation in a room at the Sacramento airport, where many officials would be present. They were utterly confounded when that study strongly disproved their hopes and all their program, which is why they then hid the study. I was there, and I saved my copy, which is why I could publish it on my website, johnforester.com, where the Wikipedia author found it. How that author concluded 38% for the correct proportion is outside my knowledge. John Forester (talk) 00:58, 19 March 2013 (UTC) John Forester

Inline galleries

In it's current version the article has two inline galleries. One in the Segregating cyclists controversy section (five items) and one in the Bikeways that use independent rights-of-way section (12 photos). WP:IG states that One rule of thumb to consider: if, due to its content, such a gallery would only lend itself to a title along the lines of "Gallery" or "Images of [insert article title]", as opposed to a more descriptive title, the gallery should either be revamped or moved to the Commons. From my point of view the two current galleries does very little more than that. The latter gallery basically shows the same, but simply at different locations. The first shows a number of signs and one (relevant) photo of an "ill" parked truck. I don't think that the galleries contribute a lot to neither those sections, which isn't illustrated with one image and therefore I suggest that they are deleted and one image is left in each section. --Heb (talk) 10:56, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Good point. I've started putting them into proper galleries at least, instead of lists of images some of which don't illustrate the sections. A next step would be to trim down the number of images. WP:IG suggests putting the images into Talk so I'll do that if I remove any. Nubeli (talk) 12:24, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

This image would be better in Cycling infrastructure or Bicycle Boulevard rather than here since it doesn't match any of the types:

• 
  This diverter forces motor vehicles to turn, and allows through passage for bicyclists and pedestrians.

Nubeli (talk) 12:34, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Segregated motorcycle facilities

Can the idea of converting segregated cycle facilities to segregated motorcycle facilities be mentioned ? Should be useful if the motorway is converted to a bicycle boulevard as both then complement each other perfectly. 109.130.233.118 (talk) 17:40, 30 May 2014 (UTC)

"On road: cycle track" ?

In this official presentation on road it is a cycle lane, next to roadway a "cycle track".--Ulamm (talk) 22:57, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Yes, the whole point of a cycle track is to separate it from the roadway. The terminology is jumbled here. A sidepath is not a multi use path - a sidepath is a cycle track - it's a path next to but separated from the roadway, like a sidewalk but for bikes. --В²C ☎ 00:40, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

Protected bike lanes/cycle tracks are considered "on-road facilities" as per the previous cite. However, given the terminology jumble, I have tagged them as "on-road/off-road facilites" Burgundavia (✈ take a flight?) 19:25, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

SolaRoad, world's first PV bike path

Calling PV enthusiasts and interested eds, please expand SolaRoad! NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 20:01, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Reorganizing Cycling infrastructure and segregated cycle facilities

This article has gotten so large and seems to have taken on a life of its own in relation to Cycling Infrastructure. It would be better for reading and organization if the sections were broken up into separate pages where it makes sense and add links to the Bikeways section of Cycling Infrastructure which already includes bike paths, bike boulevards, etc.

I have created pages for the controversy, legislation, safety and for bike lanes, cycle tracks and bike paths. I have also merged shared use path page into the bike path page.

There is now more consistency and no one article is sprawling. Since all the main sections exist on their own there is little point to this page. It'll be better to just redirect it to Cycle Infrastructure #Bikeway and add some of the important leftover info there. Nubeli (talk) 07:04, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

@Nubeli: Thank you for the effort you've put in. Can you please use {{Copied}} on the talk page of each new article to ensure correct attribution for the text.  — Scott • talk 10:43, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

Sure, I can do that. Thanks, I didn't know about the copied attribution. Nubeli (talk) 13:20, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

User:Born2cycle reverted this page to the status quo but failed to improve the organization of cycling infrastructure. None of the information on this page was lost; it was all reorganized so it was more consistent with the main Cycling infrastructure. This page has been controversial for awhile and has grown so that it is largely illegible and tries to do too many things. Meanwhile duplicate information was being added elsewhere and in the Cycling infrastructure page which is where things should be categorized.

I still don't think that this page should exist on its own--many other people on this talk page have said similar things. I think it should be redirected to some section under Cycling infrastructure. But in the meanwhile I will attempt to at least prevent duplicate information in Wikipedia and make sure people are clear that lots of the sections on this page now have their own pages. Nubeli (talk) 15:10, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

"Segregated cycle facilities" is a distinct subtopic of "cycling infrastructure" and is certainly big enough to warrant an article. For example, bicycle parking facilities are "cycling infrastructure", but are not "segregated cycle facilities". Travel lanes, especially when marked with sharrows, are "cycling infrastructure" but are not "segregated cycle facilities". Segregated facilities are mostly comprised of bike paths, cycle tracks, protected bike lanes, and, to some extent, traditional bike lanes. There is plenty of material on these topics. It makes no sense to move specific details about segregated infrastructure from this more specialized article to the more general Cycling infrastructure. That's not to say that there is no room for improvement here! --В²C ☎ 16:15, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

I argue that the very categorization "segregated cycle facility" was mostly an ideological choice by some people on Wikipedia that no longer makes sense given the variety and subtly of cycling infrastructure. This binary division is not being used in the majority of jurisdictions who divide it up into 3 or 4 different categories according to my research.

This article creates awkward choices which make a mess of the organization of the larger category of cycling infrastructure and make little sense to the average person visiting these pages. According to this artificial division a bike lane with a solid white line is considered "segregated" whereas an "advisory bike lane" with a dotted white line is considered "integrated". What a pointless division.

So, again I argue that this article is just a shell to prop up a particular point of view and there is little point in it existing on its own. Nubeli (talk) 13:39, 8 July 2015 (UTC)

Terminology is indeed confusing in this field. I think it's fair to say that there isn't a universally agreed set of terms and the same facilities would often be described differently in different jurisdictions. But "segregated cycle facilities" or "protected cycle facilities" are certainly terms that we find in the literature, and they describe spaces legally used by people on bikes, but not by people in cars. They have also been the subject of debate. None of this implies that we must have an article with this title, but it certainly makes it reasonable. I look forward to improvements to the article from both of you. Richard Keatinge (talk) 14:36, 8 July 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback Richard. I think it's best then for us to follow as closely to how the major agencies and jurisdictions categorize cycling infrastructure. None of them make such a clean break between "segregated" and "integrated" such as suggested by this article. Rather they talk about degrees of separation, about the context, and the combination of features to consider that will make streets more cycling-friendly. Cities are using a combination of all the tools in the toolbox to make streets safer, even within a single bike route which might incorporate bike lanes, cycle tracks, dotted lines which motor vehicles can cross and so on. By dividing bikeways into a separate article along an arbitrary dividing line, the ability to reference such things is largely lost. No categorization will be perfect, but it's better to present it all upfront to the reader in one article and be open about the blurry lines.

Here's a result of my investigation into the major guides available in English:

Sustrans Handbook for Cycle-friendly Design http://www.sustrans.org.uk/sites/default/files/file_content_type/sustrans_handbook_for_cycle-friendly_design_11_04_14.pdf - References to "segregated" fall into two uses: segregated in the sense of cycle tracks that are physically separated from motorized traffic; and on paths where cyclists are separated from pedestrians. To focus on the word "segregated" would mean having to divide some bike paths into those that are "segregated" and lump them with segregated roadways. This division is mostly useless and confusing to the average person. Bike lanes with painted lines are not referenced in Sustrans as being segregated.

NACTO Urban Bikeway Design Guide http://nacto.org/publication/urban-bikeway-design-guide/ - Describes bike lanes, cycle tracks, bike boulevards but doesn't categorize into separated or unseparated. In regards to bike lanes it describes them as being for "preferential or exclusive use of bicyclists" which would mean they are both "segregated" and "integrated" depending on the context. Cycle tracks are "physically separated from motor traffic" according to NACTO. According to NACTO we could lump cycle tracks into "segregated" but we couldn't make a decision about bike lanes.

California DOT http://www.dot.ca.gov/hq/oppd/hdm/pdf/chp1000.pdf - Talks about on-street and off-street bikeways. Bike paths are in a separate right of way. Bike lanes are simply described as striped lanes. And bike routes are described as shared routes.

City of Portland Bike plan for 2030 http://nacto.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/City-of-Portland-2010-2030-Plan.pdf - Divides their bike facility type into five: trails; separated in-roadways - bike lanes, buffered bike lanes, cycle tracks; bicycle boulevards / advisory bike lanes; enhanced shared roadways; and signed connections. Portland lumps cycle tracks with bike lanes but differentiates them from trails because they are on the roadway. Where the facility is—in-roadway or not—and the volume of traffic of the street is given as primary importance as whether it is separated in some way.

NYC Street Design Manual http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/nycdot-streetdesignmanual-interior-lores.pdf - Bike lanes are a "portion of a roadway that has been designated by striping, signs, and pavement markings for the preferential or exclusive use of bicyclists. Also known as a Class 2 bike lane. Physical separation of bike lanes is desirable..." This language is similar to NACTO; the same issue with trying to categorize bike lanes. NYC doesn't reference cycle tracks, instead describes them as bike paths: "A path intended for the use of bicycles that is physically separated from motorized vehicle traffic by an open space or barrier and either within the roadway or within an independent right-of-way. Also known as a Class 1 bike lane." And the third category is "bike route" which includes "shared lane" and "signed route".

The argument for a separate article just on segregation is weak and mostly unsupported in the references. If this article remained, we'd need to start splitting bike lanes into solid and dotted lines (even though there are many examples of bike lanes that use both over their length). And we'd need to split bike paths into those that share the path with pedestrians and those that are exclusive. Such as approach would add little to the knowledge of those who are visiting Wikipedia and would mostly only serve to buttress the opinions of those who like hold to a binary approach to cycling infrastructure. Opinions that are mostly unsupported by the references. Nubeli (talk) 21:46, 8 July 2015 (UTC)

I'd like to respond to User:Born2cycle who said "Context determines whether it also means no peds. Peds are allowed in many of the facilities covered in this article, and that's the context that matters here, not one particular source." in his edit summary. This is why I find this whole article problematic. You need to back up your assertions. In the manuals and guidelines I've looked through, the term "segregated cycle facility" doesn't come up at all. So the next best guide for us is to look at how the references are using the term "segregated". And from what I can find, the term segregated (and separated) is used in both senses: segregating cyclists from motorized traffic and segregating cyclists from pedestrians. The bikeways which do allow sharing with pedestrians or sharing with motorized traffic are already covered in Cycling infrastructure. Thus I'm going to edit this to make it clearer. Nubeli (talk) 23:58, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

A quick google search shows countless sources using the term "segregated" in the context of cycling facilities without meaning pedestrians are prohibited on those facilities. It would be [1], [2], [3]. It would be incorrect and confusing to say otherwise. It's just an umbrella term for facilities that are segregated from motor traffic. That includes cycle paths and cycle lanes upon which pedestrians are often not prohibited. Not sure why you're so adamant about saying it means no pedestrians when it that's only true for certain cycle tracks that have an adjacent sidewalk, and even then pedestrians freely walk across the cycle track. Cycling facilities from which pedestrians are prohibited are quite rare in practice and the term is certainly not exclusive to just those. --В²C ☎ 00:57, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

• Invited here by a post at WikiProject Cycling. Is the reorganization finished? This article is now really short and seems to cover the same topics as

1. Cycling_infrastructure#Bikeways and
2. Cycling_infrastructure#Bikeway types

• Also Segregated cycle facility redirects there instead of here. Have you considered merging _all_ the material from Segregated cycle facilities to Cycling infrastructure, leaving the first as a redirect?
• Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 12:27, 10 July 2015 (UTC)
  • Segregated cycle facilities are a subset/subtopic of Cycling infrastructure. There was no discussion about this reorganization on this talk page. I think it introduced at least as many problems as it addressed. The topic needs to be covered separately as it always has been, for good reason. When bikeways are segregated from motor traffic, they have unique qualities and issues that does not apply to integrated infrastructure. --В²C ☎ 17:28, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

I agree with Hroðulf that we redirect this page to Cycling infrastructure. The very small amount of remaining material can easily be covered under Cycling infrastructure. There is no evident agreement on what segregated actually means; a cycle route could end up being a combination of different features. And one organization calls painted lines as "segregated" while others don't. It's more coherent to include that in the broader category. Nubeli (talk) 20:04, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

As Hroðulf mentioned, this article is really short. There is now nothing in it that isn't already covered in cycling infrastructure where all the different types of bikeways and facilities are listed, including a reference to the different categorization used in terms of segregation. I think it is fairly reasonable then to make this page redirect to Cycling_infrastructure#Segregation. Nubeli (talk) 16:32, 19 July 2015 (UTC)