How might San Francisco cyclists implement a DIY bike plan? Would we simply take a lane on Market Street at rush hour and hold it, from now on? Might we paint lines or caution signs or whatever right onto the street surface on our own? Might we agree among ourselves how best to organize certain routes, and then simply show up en masse on those routes and use them as if they were already ours, already striped, already sharrowed, already officially the way we need them to be?

If city government will not or cannot advance cycling in San Francisco, then it is up to us to do whatever is necessary to protect our safety, our city, and our environment.

it is bizarre that the city that gave birth to such a movement has languished, while a city as backassward as new york has made headway.

if one person dies because of unbuffered bike lanes or something similar, the blood is on this tard’s hands. instead of waiting for a corrupt government to start working for it’s constituents, maybe it’s constituents should work around it. after all, what is san francisco without a sense of protest?

San Francisco is famous for local advocates using the environmental review guidelines as a tool to bleed developers dry while they hold onto a property waiting for the onerous and extensive environmental review process to happen.

You’d be lucky to have a draft EIR in a year. It costs millions to have government prepare a filing like this, and for changes to their entire city nonetheless.

Banging pots and pans is all well and good - I would instead focus on quick legal changes that will allow bicycle projects to degrade automobile throughput without triggering this phoney baloney “review”.

For instance, redefine “transportation” in your local code to include bicycle riding. Redefine streets to include travel by means other than private cars, and name bicycling in that definition. Request standards in your General Plan that allow an engineer to reduce speeds, and volumes, of automobiles in exchange for more transit, bicycle, and pedestrian traffic.

All of this nonsense speaks to a larger problem. Bikes and biking as a brand (in a PR/marketing sense) are in trouble.

Politicians don’t feel they have enough cover to act boldly on bikes’ behalf; bureaucrats are mired in red tape; advocacy groups are not able to show a strong, united front; the media is just plan reading the whole situation incorrectly (due in part because politicians and advocates are not doing their jobs) and focusing too much on conflict and antagonism (what else is new).

It’s very frustrating because now is the time to shine for the bike movement.

hopefully things will get better.

the bike movement needs a new brand strategy.