My place of employment had a remarkably successful Bike To Work Week – lots of people rode their bikes in, some every day, some just one day. That is the point of BTWW- for people to take a chance and see of riding a bike works for them. In the end, our organization more than tripled the number of kilometers ridden in BTWW over last year, by creating some fun inside challenges, and a significant beer-based bet between co-workers. It was fun for all, but mostly for those of us who ride in on a regular basis.

As I have written before, my ride to work is really, really good. The bike route is, for the most part, really well designed, safe, and easy to use. However, there is one ongoing issue that I keep complaining about (and I am not alone): the lack of respect for bike routes. With the vanishingly small amount of our regional transportation investment going to bike infrastructure, can we please just acknowledge that bike lanes are for bikes- the one piece of our region’s vast expanses of pavement that are not dedicated to cars and trucks?

Here is what I am talking about, in images. And yes, every single one of these photos was taken this week during my regular bike route to or from work. I wish this was not typical, but this is my daily commute, folks. Actually, this is an abridged sample of my week.

Monday:

I’m not the only one avoiding this guy.

in his defense, how could he possibly have seen the bike lane of no parking sign?

Tuesday:

At least it is a pictogram of a bike under him, not an actual one.

Nice picture of my commuting bike, and a no stopping sign on the bike lane.

Wednesday:

This guy put a cone up, which is nice, in a way.

Note the only construction stuff blocking this bike lane is the warning sign.

Thursday:

Note both of these pics for Thursday are from the way home, as the morning ride was too rainy to photograph. And note this guy is a jerk…

…but not as big a jerk as this guy who honked at me (?) as I passed him.

Friday:

Yes, he was parked. Yes, a completely separated lane.

Note no stopping sign.

I’m not sure  what my point here is, except that I don’t think any of these people were in any kind of risk of receiving a ticket for their illegal vehicle use, while the City of Vancouver police were using BTWW to crack down on people riding bicycles on bike lanes without helmets and Bruce Allen was ranting on the radio about scofflaw bike riders and the out of control bike lane lobby. You would figure people like Bruce would love bike lanes – if only for the free parking.