Quite a lot of research has…

Quite a lot of research has been done in this area and it shows exactly the opposite of what you are saying: protected bike lanes promote cycling, providing an alternate means of travel, thereby reducing gridlock. Additionally, businesses benefit more from pedestrian and cycle traffic than from cars on the street -- studies find that segregated bike lanes increase commercial activity. This has been demonstrated many times over, all over the world. All of the folks who specialize in these areas, be it city planning, civil engineering, or economics, all draw their conclusions from data: bike lanes are good for traffic and good for businesses.

As a consequence which I have not seen you talk about, countries and states that invest more in public cycling infrastructure see immense economic savings on healthcare expenditures, because folks are able to engage in regular exercise in ways that are part of their day to day. Surely for a fiscally conservative government this is a benefit.

See these high level summaries:
https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/4/18/mr-go
https://rapidtransition.org/stories/reducing-roads-can-cause-traffic-to…