It depends on the local culture. You've gotta be pretty dedicated to ride a bike in the metro near me on some streets, because the layout isn't very friendly to bikers.
Those that do seem to rarely obey traffic laws- the number of near-miss incidents alone caused by bicyclists who run red lights or weave in and out of lanes, up onto sidewalks, then back down into traffic is too damn high, to borrow a meme.
The city would be a whole lot better off somewhere in the middle- more room for dedicated biking, and more enforcement of safe behavior.
It's not just the roads either, unfortunately. There's a shared walking and bicycling path that runs around a lake in the city. It's fairly popular, but I've never been more than twice because I find walking there is unpleasant. You can only get nearly clipped by bikers flying past, not staying in their lane, just so many times.
To be quite honest, it is very useful for cyclists to behave this way when they have to constantly fight traffic because it makes drivers give them a wider berth. You don't know what that bike's about to do, so you stay the fuck away instead of blazing by too close.
On the other hand, people who can't bother to get a bell for their bike and zoom past pedestrians are dickheads.
Honestly no bike belongs mixing with pedestrians any more than any other vehicle bell or no bell. A pedestrian is meandering along at 1-3MPH a bike is comparatively racing at 10-20.
Even at only 10MPH you are closing on a slow walker by at least 13 feet per second. If they notice you 60 feet behind they have less than 5 seconds to react. If they don't notice you and you don't maneuver you'll hit them. If you maneuver and they also try to get out of the way you might still hit them.
I've had multiple bikes zip by with very little space where a slight step to the side would have let to disaster. Honestly anyone caught biking on the sidewalk ought to have their equipment impounded and sold.
If you ride on a sidewalk, it's harder for cars which approach from side streets, alleys and driveways to see you.
Doubly so if you ride opposite to the traffic direction, thinking that it's okay because you're off the road; drivers don't expect something to be coming down the sidewalk at 20-30km/h from the wrong direction, where less of their attention is focused.
It's legal in only half the country and its stupid everywhere.
"The overall crash rate for cyclists was 0.29 per 1000 cycled kilometres and 6.1 per 1000 cycled hours. The crash rate for cyclists riding on pedestrian paths was 26.4 per 1000 h, which was considerably greater than other road environments. For example, the risk was 8.8 on shared pedestrian and bicycle paths, 5.8 on cycle lanes and 4.7 on roads."
I understand it may be preferable from the cyclists perspective to injure a pedestrian rather than risk getting hit by a car but your unilaterally risking them to procure a benefit for your self. Morally you are fucking them.
Furthermore some are more vulnerable to serious or permanent injury than others and they don't have an option not to be on a sidewalk especially in the city.
If you have access to a car and are cycling for your health or to achieve a warm fuzzy for saving the earth and hypothetical and mostly fictional people while actually risking, injuring, or killing existing people because actually biking on the street is too dangerous you should probably bike on the street like an adult or turn the key in your car.
> The crash rate for cyclists riding on pedestrian paths was 26.4 per 1000 h
I'm amazed that whoever cooked up this figure is sure it isn't 26.3 or 26.5.
(I suspect that riding on the sidewalk is unsafe, at least serious riding by grownups; not four-year-olds on kid bikes. I just don't believe there is any way to obtain this sort of figure.)
I don't agree that you should intentionally endanger the safety and lives of others to get some extra elbow room.
The most important thing you can do on a road (aside from situational awareness) is be predictable- that others have an idea of what you're going to do.
If you're behaving erratically or crossing into pedestrian crosswalks so it doesn't look quite so much like you're running a red light, you're seriously increasing the odds of colliding with a vehicle or person.
Those that do seem to rarely obey traffic laws- the number of near-miss incidents alone caused by bicyclists who run red lights or weave in and out of lanes, up onto sidewalks, then back down into traffic is too damn high, to borrow a meme.
The city would be a whole lot better off somewhere in the middle- more room for dedicated biking, and more enforcement of safe behavior.
It's not just the roads either, unfortunately. There's a shared walking and bicycling path that runs around a lake in the city. It's fairly popular, but I've never been more than twice because I find walking there is unpleasant. You can only get nearly clipped by bikers flying past, not staying in their lane, just so many times.