[zachkatz]

Here's a random main street in Denver: https://www.google.com/maps/@39.7322582,-104.9861576,3a,75y,...

Or another one: https://www.google.com/maps/@39.7356145,-104.9873758,3a,75y,...

...or another one: https://www.google.com/maps/@39.7383571,-104.9929042,3a,75y,...

You can click around to pretty much any street in the city, and 100% of the space is dedicated to cars. A complete bike network that enables mass cycling is a dense grid that makes basically every street safe to cycle on: http://www.aviewfromthecyclepath.com/2015/05/the-grid-most-i...

This is what trying looks like (Jersey City's Quick Build Bike Network ): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mC1l8L5aBA

Or this (Inside the New Plan to Make Paris ‘100% Cyclable): https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-10-22/how-paris...

Denver is not even really trying.

[Tempest1981]

Can bikes ride in the dedicated bus lanes? (Shown in the streetview links) I know there's no raised dividers, but they look empty.

[dghlsakjg]

Yes, but those bus lanes shown are also allowed to be used as turning lanes by private cars.

What those busy streets don't show is that there is almost always a calm street one block over and parallel that is frequently a designated bike route (not that the designation means much, but they are better streets for bike riding).

I used to commute by bike in Denver, and it isn't the worst major city in America, but it certainly could be improved, especially in the downtown core where bike lanes exist, but drivers constantly cut across them/parked in them. I normally felt safer using a traffic lane than the bike lane downtown for that reason

[zachkatz]

Maybe legally, but because they don't have barriers protecting people from cars, they lack "Subjective Safety," which is one of the fundamental principles of Dutch cycling network design (and is essential for the average person—as in children and elderly people, not just the brave lycra warrior—to feel comfortable cycling): http://www.aviewfromthecyclepath.com/2008/09/three-types-of-...

[lotsoweiners]

Of course they have most of their space dedicated to cars because that is how people want to get around in Denver. Denver is a sprawling metro with around 50 days of snow per year. I'm all for bike lanes but if you start trying to create traffic congestion by taking away more of the streets from cars you will lose elections because you aren't appealing to the masses.

[wonder_er]

Cars is not how people want to get around in Denver.

Mindlessly repeating this fact does damage to the psychology of every single person that earnestly wishes that they didn't have to drive.

A huge fraction of people dislike driving.

Of course, lots of people have to get around, and most of them don't want to die accidentally, so the systemic pressure creating drivers is immense.

American road networks have been managed in a way that should be labeled criminal.

Urban renewal in the '50s and '60s was used to destroy ethnic neighborhoods for the emotional well-being of politically powerful white people.

The reason everyone drives today is because of the ethnic cleansing (via road networks) being conducted by white people in the '50s.

The roads are already devastatingly congested.

To act like American mobility networks are fair, or reasonable, or functional is something like gaslighting at a population level than anything else.

[chitowneats]

If you're clicking around on random streets in Google Maps, it's clear you have no actual knowledge of the city. It's far less dense than any place you are comparing it to. Paris has been inhabited by city builders for thousands of years. Denver for about 150.

It has such an uphill battle against its historical context as a Western U.S. mining town. Before that, the area was sparsely populated by Native American hunter-gatherers. You're not even pretending to consider the starting point.

Why not compare it to places like Salt Lake City, or Boise? Cities that actually have some similarity to it terms of population and historical development.

I encourage everyone to disregard the comment I'm replying to. It's totally ridiculous. Peak HN big-brain BS.

[toddsiegel]

I live in Denver, near the streets the parent commenter posted, and I agree with those comments.

I do not know why the parent commenter chose those streets, nor what knowledge they have of the city, but if they posted 1000 more links it'd be more of the same.

Denver is not even trying. The landscape is completely dominated by cars, and utterly hostile to humans. The Mayor and City Council pay only lip service to making Denver more bike and pedestrian friendly, but little meaningful work has been done. Money has been spent, and things have been done, but none of it impactful.

In the 10 years I have lived in my house in central Denver, I cannot think of a single project, within a mile radius, that the city has planned and completed[1] that has made me feel safer as a cyclist, or pedestrian[2]. And I live in the densest part of the city, where these projects should be happening.

We even have a Vision Zero program, which is a joke. With the exception of the pandemic, traffic deaths continue to rise.

> Since Vision Zero was implemented in 2017, traffic fatalities have increased every year, except 2020, which saw a significant decrease due to stay-at-home orders and people working remotely. In 2021, traffic fatalities reached an all-time high with 84 deaths, surpassing Denver’s 2019 record high of 71 people.

This includes pedestrian deaths.

Source: https://denverite.com/2023/02/17/denvers-getting-money-to-st...

And road safety aside, bike theft is out of control in Denver. I only take my bike to do errands if I know I lock it up where lots of eyes will be on it, during daylight hours.

That all said, I am happy if the incentive program is paying off. Let's see. Maybe the city got it right. I remain skeptical, for now, given how hostile these streets are.

[1] - During the pandemic they closed 80% of the roads in Cheesman Park and have not reopened them. I am glad the city has stuck with it since it has completely transformed the feel of the place. I truly love it, more than I did before. But they did not plan this. It was a fortunate accident.

[2] - For context, my wife and I share one car, and otherwise we walk or I bike. My wife does not bike. She is afraid to, and I do not blame her.

[chitowneats]

That's a terrible part of Denver. I agree. Rome wasn't built in a day.

Why would you ever lock your bike outside anywhere in the U.S.? NYC is no better. It's actually worse out East in my experience. That's a separate issue. One exacerbated by the naive views of liberal voters.

You live in the remnants of the Wild West. Millions of poor Central Americans are pouring across the border and setting up shop in your backyard. What do you expect? You are never going to get European city living unless you move to Europe.

[ultrarunner]

I suspect the comment you encourage others to disregard is pointing toward intentions and the implementation of design. What about the age of a city dictates that there is a point it must choose to dedicate 100% of available space to cars? Amsterdam wasn't as navigable by bicycle only 20 years ago.

I live in Phoenix, which is even more sprawled than Denver. I have a grocery store less than a mile from my house, and a bike path almost all the way there. Unfortunately, that path leads through an unlit and flooded underpass, through a flooded drainage canal, then ends with a stretch of grass and a guardrail to a 6-lane 55 mph road. They're so close, but there has to be an intention to complete the job. So far the powers that be intend only to serve cars. I hope that continues to improve in Denver (and elsewhere!) but sprawl and age aren't great excuses for clear choices.

[chitowneats]

Yet another person who's never been to any part of Denver outside downtown. The bikeability of Phoenix is atrocious. The two cities are not even comparable in this regard. Denver, like most places in the U.S., discovered bikeability in the last couple of decades. Meanwhile, Phoenix has maintained or even exacerbated the status quo. Denver has invested tens of millions into becoming a denser, more bikeable locale. It also elects politicians who campaign on and further this goal. The same cannot be said for Phoenix.

[PpEY4fu85hkQpn]

Tens of millions?

You're gonna have to educate me on the projects you're talking about. It's taken them 7 years to put a bike lane down Broadway and it isn't even gonna be that fantastic.

The safe streets program created some wonderful spaces and routes, so of course they dismantled them for no reason.

Cap Hill, the most densely populated area of the city has no north-south bike route that I would ever dream of taking my children on. The East-west route on 11th is a death trap that cuts in and out in order to maintain a few car storage spaces.

The crown jewel, the I-25 for bikes in Denver, the Cherry Creek Trail requires users to play frogger across Speer, a 4 lane highway, in order to access much of it.

We can go on and on with these.

DOTI is an organization that is 100% dedicated to moving cars, every bike and pedestrian project is implemented with the first goal being to not inconvenience drivers.

That being said, you are right that it's light years ahead of Phoenix.

[zachkatz]

I visited Denver, excited to see all of the supposed new cycling infrastructure, and aside from like, a handful of bike lanes here and there, I didn't feel comfortable biking around the city. Would prefer not to bike in six lanes of high-speed traffic.