Study: Bike Lanes Improve Road Safety

A study of temporary bike lanes installed at an intersection in Asbury Park, New Jersey shows that both painted and delineated bike lanes (those separated with bollards) slow drivers and reduce the risk of collisions with people on bikes.

As Maylin Tu explains in Next City, “For the experiment, researchers temporarily removed nine parking spaces to create 6-foot wide bike lanes with a 3-foot buffer between bike and car travel lanes. Car travel lanes were reduced by at least one foot each, a decrease that has been shown to reduce crashes. In addition, the bike lanes created a sharper turning radius for drivers turning right, another intervention that might force drivers to slow down.”

Delineated lanes made the biggest impact. “For vehicles turning right, top speeds were reduced by 28% and average speeds by 21%. Paint-only bike lanes slowed driver speeds by up to 14% and drivers going straight slowed down by up to 8%.”

The study notes that pop-up, temporary bike lanes like the ones used in the research can help cities understand how bike lanes can improve road safety before making more permanent changes, but “In order to achieve Vision Zero initiatives, planners and policy makers should focus efforts on delineated bike lanes, not merely painted lanes.”