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Cyclists Are Faster Than Cars And Motorbikes in Cities and Towns, Study Says (forbes.com)
Smartphone data from riders and drivers schlepping meals for restaurant-to-home courier service Deliveroo shows that bicycles are faster than cars and motorized two-wheelers. From a news writeup, which sources its data from Deliveroo, a UK-headquartered food delivery company with more than 30,000 riders and drivers in 13 countries: That bicyclists are faster in cities will come as no surprise to bicycle advocates who have staged so-called "commuter races" for many years. However, these races -- organized to highlight the swiftness of urban cycling -- are usually staged in locations and at hours skewed towards bicycle riders. The Deliveroo stats are significant because they have been extracted from millions of actual journeys. And it's all thanks to Frank.
Frank is the name Deliveroo gives its routing algorithm (the name was chosen for the Danny DeVito character in the TV series "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.") Delivering millions of simultaneous orders from thousands of restaurants to hungry consumers within 30 minutes using roving self-employed couriers equipped with smartphones is a complex vehicle routing problem: consumers want piping hot food; restaurants want meals picked up when cooked; riders -- paid per drop -- want multiple deliveries per hour, and Deliveroo needs to make money. The algorithm team employs data scientists with PhDs in computer vision, computer science, operations research, cognitive neuroscience, econometrics, machine learning, and physics.
Frank is the name Deliveroo gives its routing algorithm (the name was chosen for the Danny DeVito character in the TV series "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.") Delivering millions of simultaneous orders from thousands of restaurants to hungry consumers within 30 minutes using roving self-employed couriers equipped with smartphones is a complex vehicle routing problem: consumers want piping hot food; restaurants want meals picked up when cooked; riders -- paid per drop -- want multiple deliveries per hour, and Deliveroo needs to make money. The algorithm team employs data scientists with PhDs in computer vision, computer science, operations research, cognitive neuroscience, econometrics, machine learning, and physics.
Speaking as someone who has done it biking through NYC traffic is not for the faint of heart. Make sure your legs are in good shape as well because not all that city has been well and truly flattened the way the Dutch started doing when it was New Amsterdam.
Then there is the whole utility thing. You aren't going to carrying a weeks groceries for a family of 3 or 4 back on bicycle. Yeah it can be done but who the hell wants to. Finally there is that whole matter of inclement weather.
I'm of mixed feelings about this.
It depends on where the stop signs are.
If I'm out in real traffic, I honor traffic signals just like motor vehicles. I actually annoy some people in motor vehicles at stoplights because when the light turns green I can clean an intersection before the car out front puts away their mobile phone and steps on the gas. In fact one of my biggest annoyances as a cyclist is when people are overly courteous to me. I'm planning my next move based on people driving normally, slowing down and being overly cautious of me screws up my planning - cars not using their turn signals is one of my biggest annoyances, because I'm going to adjust my speed according to what the motor vehicles around me are signaling before crossing that next intersection where I and the traffic I'm riding along with have the right-or-way.
As for residential areas. Many stop signs in residential areas are there not to regulate the intersection as much as they are to keep motor vehicles slowed down to safe speeds. If I'm in a residential area and I can see there's no traffic at that next stop sign, damned straight I'm blowing right through it like it's not even there. It takes me a lot more distance for me to achieve cruising speed than it does a motor vehicle - stop signs are a bigger deal to me. If there's traffic I'm going to treat it like I'm in a motor vehicle, but damned straight I'm blowing through it in a quiet residential area.
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To hell with my karma.
Yep, cyclists frequently break traffic laws, which helps them go faster through congested traffic. But, after having bicycle commuted for several years, rude cycling is not the major factor in reduced commute times. Taking up less space and moving continuously while cars idle is what saves the time. I've crossed intersections, waiting for green lights, with scores of pedestrians and other cyclists, all crossing at the same time. Parallel asynchronous flows work with pedestrians and cyclists, not so much with cars, especially in dense cities. And car drivers typically break just as many traffic laws as cyclists, just different laws: speeding, changing lanes in an intersection, driving distracted/talking on cell phones, using bike lanes as turn lanes, etc. Pot, meet kettle.
Every election cycle healthcare becomes an issue, and increasingly CO2 & global warming, energy independence, and global conflicts over energy. Here's an idea: Chip humans and log their blood pressure and heart rate. In order to get any health insurance, your log must show some reasonable level of aerobic exercise - 4 to 6 hours per week, for starters. You are too busy, too important, and don't have the time for this? Fine, pay for your own healthcare. All of it, including vision and dental. No exercise for 1 week - probation. No exercise for 1 month, no coverage, for anything. Probationary coverage resumes the first day you can show a week's worth of exercise, which can be done in half a day. Full coverage after a consistent month of reasonable exercise. A brisk walk per day is plenty good enough. For many, using stairs instead of the elevator would do it. If you exercise, healthcare should be very prompt and comprehensive. The real goal is to get fat, lazy people off their ass and moving around in something other than an SUV.
Is this socialist, bordering on fascist? Yep. But trying to get universal healthcare for a population that doesn't care about their own health is pulling money out of my pocket to keep some twinkie eating lard-ass alive for a few extra years, and that's just as wrong. Forcing society to pay for the elderly and handicapped is great, but if your choices make you handicapped, then that's on you, not me.
I'll take the rude cyclists anywhere, any day, over the lazy, whiny, entitled little bitches. You know who you are.
"Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the future of the human race." - H. G. Wells
"...most drivers willingly speed whenever they can..."
This is completely untrue. Most drivers ignore speed limits when they are unreasonable and most drivers have a very good sense for what reasonable speeds are. It has been well known for decades that speeding is the result of too low posted speed limits and that those limits are set for that very reason, at least in the US. Most drivers obey speed limits when they are reasonable.
"...they willingly break the law whenever they can get away with it."
This sounds more like a statement about you, not about the behavior of most drivers. I break traffic laws when they are unreasonable or produce a bad result but observe them otherwise even when no one is around. It has nothing to do with whether I can "get away with it", it has to do with always doing the right thing so I get it right when it matters.
Many cyclists show utter disregard for traffic laws. It is common within the cycling community to explicitly claim that traffic laws cannot be enforced on cyclists because they have an inherent "right to the road" that somehow doesn't apply to everyone else. Bicycles are unlicensed and cyclists think that means traffic laws don't apply.
As an e-bike commuter, I witness deliberate bad behavior among other cyclists most every day. With drivers it's always laziness and inattention, not contempt for the law.
Let me get this straight. You say that it is untrue that drivers don't willingly speed and don't break the law, and contend that drivers don't have contempt for the law. Yet your reasoning for this is that they break the law and ignore speed limits when they think they know better (thus have contempt for the law).
Your reasons merely show that the grandparent was completely correct. So cyclists do deliberate bad behavior while drivers virtuously correct bad traffic laws.