Tag: bicycle
-
People’s Pike or People’s Pillar to Post?
How would I like to think of the People’s Pike? I want to see a bicycle path and an adjacent footpath which avoid crossing and turning conflicts, passing under the ramps to the Turnpike and to the proposed West Station, with connections up to the overpasses to get to West Station and beyond, to Packard’s…
-
Honked at again
I was bicycling home from church on a Sunday afternoon recently. The church I attend, First Parish in Waltham, has a parking lot on either side, but also the public school parking lot across the street doesn’t get much use on a Sunday, and handles any overflow. As I rode home, I headed south on…
-
Commonwealth Avenue and the BU campus
The Boston Cyclists Union and Livable Streets are promoting cycle tracks for Commonwealth Avenue. The bicycle industry’s Astroturf advocacy organization, Peoplefor Bikes, is asking people to sign a petition in support of them. Not a good idea. Cycle tracks on Commonwealth Avenue won’t prevent the most common car-bike crashes (crossing and turning collisions, doorings —…
-
I-90 Interchange project announcement
Governor Deval Patrick announces commitment to a major expansion in the I-90 Interchange project, 2:40 PM, September 18, 2014, Beacon Yards, Allston section of Boston, Massachusetts. The abandoned rail yards are now a 22-acre wasteland in the middle of the City of Boston. Funding, 1/3 from the Commonwealth, 1/3 from Harvard University and 1/3 from…
-
Massachusetts low-speed motor vehicle law
It is legal to operate a farm tractor, horsedrawn carriage, construction equipment, bicycle or motorized bicycle (moped) on any public way in the Commonwealth except for limited-access and express state highways. The rules for low-speed motor vehicles are far, far more restrictive, making these unusable for many trips even including short trips. The law is…
-
A British study clarifies the problem with trucks
I thank Bob Shanteau, California traffic engineer and cyclist, for this link. The paper, from the U.K., puts numbers on the problem with bicyclist and pedestrian fatalities in collisions with large trucks. A quote: Lorries are involved in around 4,200 fatal accidents in Europe every year, according to the European Transport Safety Council. In Belgium,…
-
Report on Route 9 reconstruction in Natick
On Sunday, August 24, Natick residents Dick and Jill Miller and I had a look at the Route 9 project, which extends either side of the Oak Street intersection. We drove the length of the project in both directions, and I shot video of it. We parked just west of Oak Street. I walked west…
-
Separate but equal
3:15 PM, Thursday, August 27, 2014: I’m riding home on the stretch of Western Avenue in Brighton a hundred yards or so short of Market Street. I’m riding outside the door zone of parked cars. This stretch is narrow enough that the City of Boston hasn’t even seen fit to install its usual door-zone bike…
-
Massachusetts Motorized Bicycle and “Motorized Scooter” Law — a Mess
[Note — these comments have been rendered partially obsolete by legislation enacted in 2023. Laws for bicycles now apply to electric bicycles with a top assisted speed of 20 mph. Electric bicycles with a top speed of 28 mph (Class 3 as usually defined) are still defined as motorized scooters as of this writing in…
-
Window dressing
I have already described the side skirts on Boston garbage trucks as window dressing. Maybe I should concede a little ground on that, as the cyclist in the most recent right-hook crash merely had severe injuries instead of being killed. [Update, December 2024: I take it back. See photo and explanation below.] To prevent right-hook…