Check out this promotion video for Kickstarter funding, shot in Germany, or maybe Austria or Switzerland. The streets look German, and part of the narration is in German with English subtitles:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNs0ZQ_wzAc
The video shows three bicyclists. One of them is portrayed as a racer, and rides at speed on city streets. Here are three stills from the video:
At 0:31, our racer is riding in the door zone of parked cars, at high speed. It looks like he’s riding on the left side of the street but it’s the right side, where doors are more likely to open — driver’s side. The image is flipped: numbers on license plates are backwards, and the drivetrain is on the left side of the bicycle.
Bicyclist riding in door zone in flipped image
In the video, you’ll also see that he has just made made a left turn from the right side of a street where he also was riding in the door zone.
(This isn’t the only flipped clip in the video. Can you find the others? Weird!)
At 1.03 in the video, the racer is shown riding in the door zone, opposite the direction of traffic on a one-way street. Contraflow travel is legal on some quiet streets in residential areas in Germany, but then, this doesn’t look like that kind of street, and why ride in the door zone?
Bicyclists riding opposite traffic
And at 2:13, our racer is shown making a right-hand turn into the door zone opposite the flow of traffic, at speed.
Wrong way
Northern European countries are often praised for including education about safe bicycling in the public schools. The popularity of bicycling in northern European countries is also supposed to improve cycling conduct there, through peer pressure. This video doesn’t fit that model. Can anyone explain why not?
My hypothesis: because many streets in Germany have bike lanes that encourage edge-riding or other infrastructure such as sidepaths (many of which are just marked sidewalks) that promote the concept of separation. When I lived in Germany, I remember specifically reading somewhere that legally, bicyclists belonged on the roadways (as opposed to on sidewalks). But it seemed that the marked infrastructure communicated just the opposite. It always struck me as a kind of a “left-hand isn’t aware of what the right is doing” situation.
As a humorous aside, I almost automatically entered “42” for six x 9 – too much Douglas Adams. 🙂
What I find odd is that a bicyclist who rides at racing speed doesn’t get it about road-edge hazards, crossing and turning conflicts etc. My picture of northern European biyclists has been — slow, utilitarian. This guy doesn’t fit into that pattern at all.
Racing cyclists, including 55-year-old wannabes, subscribe to the culture of speed. They’re fast, therefore smart. They make the same mistakes for decades, but since cycling is essentially safe, even when done badly, they can call it experience.
I think it is very simple. They are trying to sell folding bikes to a wide range of users including the speed set. Motor vehicle ads distort car driving in the same way. The bottom line is SELL; they don’t give a thought to safety.
Many (all?) of the shots are from Brussels. I spent a day & a half there this summer (no biking though I did ride in Paris & other parts of France) & in general saw better behavior than shown in the video. I expect they just want to show that their folding bike isn’t just a slow utility bike. The botanic garden has an amazing growth of poison ivy.
Ms. L. I think pegs it. I am reminded of car commercials with the proviso “Professional driver on closed course.” Nothing makes a bike seem more exciting than watching a cyclist defy danger unscathed.
It’s all shot in Vienna. The video shows some well known sites of Vienna and the car’s license plates have a W for Wien, which is Vienna in German. So not Northern European.
Hmm, not Germany, but Germanic. Or maybe Ger-depressive 🙂
You wonder: “The popularity of bicycling in northern European countries is also supposed to improve cycling conduct there, through peer pressure. This video doesn’t fit that model. Can anyone explain why not?” Maybe the people who made the video are inexperienced and clueless about safe riding practices. One video may not represent the common behavior of cyclists. Or maybe I am misunderstanding your question. The reverse is true here in NYC where a colleague stops at every red light, even when it is safe to continue, though the popular practice is to run that light.
Certainly the people are clueless! I’m not sure why — that’s the question. The responses comparing the video with car ads do ring a bell with me. I cringe at ads showing cars being driven at high speeds on urban streets, because there are a few people who crazy enough to take that as a model. Same with these bicyclists, only most motorists do know better, while many if not most bicyclists at least here in the USA don’t.