As a casual cyclist, I really enjoy videos by @Shifter_Cycling and @NotJustBikes (even if the latter makes me feel jealousy more than anything else!), and was recently inspired by a collaboration between them to compare a North American City with a Dutch city, to see how bike-friendly the two were.
As a daily commuter in Plymouth UK, I’m painfully aware of the dangers and anxiety that road cycling presents, and was curious how my city would compare to the two showcased in the aforementioned channels’ videos.
You should definitely check out the two videos from NJB and Shifter, links are here:
Shifter: https://youtu.be/iFMhiwtBfAU
Not Just Bikes: https://youtu.be/M8F5hXqS-Ac
Chapters:
00:00 The Premise
01:00 The Commute
10:29 The way back is much worse…
15:08 The “””better””” way
22:25 The C H O N K
21 Comments
as someone from the netherlands this looks absolutely horrible. first you cycle through a park designed to be used on foot and almost none of the bicycle lanes are protected. the cars drive realy close to you and sometimes they just end. a cyclist has to drive one the same road as a car. if a car slightly taps you you are knocked to the road and can get heavily injured. even the protected bicycle lanes are bad because of how tiny they are with no room for passing each other. video was good tho
My neighborhod doesnt even have normal sidewalks, let alone a bike path. Although to be fair there is not much traffic
Calgary is in Canada not America, other then that great video
This all looks like crap, you praised some 2 seconds of painted lanes a few times and I think even commented on how its nice there is biking infrastructure from sidewalks and roads that I swear to god had no infrastructure whatsoever, even painted. What was it? A small sign that said "ok, bikes may ride on this sidewalk since its large enough for 4-5 people" with no other indicator. Had to rewatch to see it
No comment as your forced to ride through the side street and have to stop to not be run over by a truck trying to squeeze out of a narrow road. And you still end up that deep in the negatives
Some more fun moments:
"I am going to give a point for not feeling too much like I am going to die. Its the bear minimum, just at the acceptable level of feeling like I am going to die" at 6:05–6:20
Followed by, right at 6:20, the left turn lane that rams cars straight through the cyclists. While he is still praising them for the bicycle death gutter (which I guess they need, the guts of the bicyclist have to go somewhere so it's nice they put in a dedicated gutter for them)
could you do a video like this for exeter?
ive never ridden my bike in a city before but as a mountainbiker roads scare the shit out of me so when i ride in towns i stick to pavements, i know its technically illegal but im not a speed demon and im always careful of pedestrians
i find it to be faster though because i can take a much more direct route, dont have to wait for traffic and due to being on a mountain bike few obsticals stop me
its also just more fun lol, if i was gonna ride on the road id want to have an ebike so i can play pretend motorcycle and be less vulnreble
I would say the cycle lanes as executed on balance made everything worse for everyone.
The critical thing between cars and cycles if they can’t be separated is to keep the cyclist moving if possible. It’s easier for the cyclist AND easier for the cars to deal with something moving at a vaguely similar speed.
I thought that the blue signs where just a suggestion rather than an absolute in the UK but I guess that bridge is so narrow any sensible person would dismount anyway
By law. cars shall give you 1.5 meters of space, new rules in brittain
I think painted bike lanes on an arterial might be worse than nothing! especially if it just dumps you into the road!
must say this type of videos and comments make me unsubscribe very quickly sorry 🙁
Same here. Cycle lanes that start and finish for no reason, some just a few metres long. WHY?
Though Britain used to call Canada and USA "The Americas" it annoys Canadians to be called "American" Calgary is 🇨🇦
NJB added you to their playlist!
WOW, this is probably worst cycling infrastructure I have ever seen. There are many bike lanes, but almost all are dangerous and slow. The only positive exception is the bridge where they reserved one lane out of two for cyclists, but even that ends strangely in the connecting car lane.
Thank you for uploading this video. I must say it's difficult to watch, because of the dangerous situations you're thrown into, and therefore the disregard of human life (on two wheels) by the people who own these roads. I would certainly not hop onto a bike if I was given the choice to either bike on these roads or not. I'm not that eager to end up in hospital, as I don't work there… Now I began to understand why people from the UK are sighing so much in the comment sections of NJB and BicycleDutch.
8:30 Single worst bit of "cycle infrastructure" I've seen in these +1/-2 videos.
It started so nice, but then it only got worse and worse to the point that I was actually fearing for your life by the end 😂😭
Spoiler for this video:
+1 there is a cycle lane
-2 the cycle lane does not last forever
Hi Matt, another Plymothian cyclist here; Plymouth is really poor, particularly around Manadon roundabout and where the lane disappears on Tavistock road. Awful, and scary to most!
I want to thank you for this video but also mention that this video neglects some of the city's best infrastructure that happens to be on this route.
Understandably so; there is very little directions in Plymouth for cyclists but the infrastructure is hidden in plain and pleasant sight: such as the bridge beneath the entire Tavistock road freeway (that links to a fantastic segregated path through streets and a separate pathway)
ztill, ENOURMOUS thanks for making this video Matt. Seeing this video of my frankly miserable shite hole of a city opened my eyes and sent me down the rabbit hole of watching NJB, cycling (which has become one of my favourite thing to do) and informing me, leading me into urbanist activism. I also ended up discovering that I want to dedicate my life's work to trying to fix this car infestation city by city and sharing that joy and peace of a good urban ride with the world.
Stay safe, because sometimes life just ends..