I am a driver and am…

I am a driver and am horrified by the potential for bike lanes to be removed. I commute through the city everyday and bike lanes have given me significant peace of mind. Cyclists being forced to join the main roadway is a very scary thought as it is all too easy to clip or turn into cyclists when they are on roads without bike lanes now. I very much do not want to hurt or kill a cyclist who could do easily be protected.

When bike lanes are removed, it will discourage so many people from cycling and many will instead drive, adding far more cars to the roadway, causing further congestion and doubling or tripling the amount of space occupied by one person on the roadway.

Additionally it is abundantly clear that traffic congestion lies in several factors caused by drivers overselves, not bike lanes . The number of cars blocking traffic by stopping where they shouldn’t and causing a bottle neck is beyond frequent. This desperately needs to be policed and enforced. Drivers also seem unaware of basic anti congestion techniques and etiquette that could easily reduce congestion if there was a consistent understanding through drivers.

For example, if everyone is aware of and implements zipper merges, two lanes of a roadway can be used equally approaching a bottle neck with each continuing ahead at an equal rate, rather than a twice as long queue of vehicles approaching the bottle neck, causing some to move right, cut ahead several cars then cut back in, causing a rubber band effect. The current disorderly movement on the road causes frustrations amongst drivers who then make more adjustments trying to move ahead and ultimately causing a ripple of stopping and starting vehicles in its wake.

Please do not remove bike lanes, I’ve never heard of a worse idea.