Most adults cycling today learned as children to stay away from traffic and wear a helmet. That's it.

They weren't taught to ride in traffic according to the rules of the road.

They grow up with a fear of traffic and an un-natural prediliction to demand bike lanes and trust in foam and plastic to get them safely to and from.

They feel thousands of miles of bikelanes is the only way to keep cyclists safe. Their fear-of-traffic will likely never leave them and we can't afford bikelanes for every place that cylists need to go: to work, school, errands or doctor's appts.

They insist that all these 'bike facilities' will encourage more people to bike, validating the great expense, but studies have shown that bikelanes don't create more cyclists.

There is not much we can do for these people with fear of traffic, but we can do something for the kids coming up.....

It's called Cycling Education and the best thing municipal and provincial government could do would be to invest in Bike-Ed in primary schools. Hawaii has such a program and it is doing well.

These kids will grow up knowing their place on the road and riding with confidence.

A child's first bike is their first car. The bonus is when they are old enough to drive they will understand and be tolerant of cyclists, they will not demand expensive infrastructure and they will be better drivers.

The cost? Probably a lot less than bikelanes when on-going maintenance is factored in. And motorists and residents won't object as their roads will not be narrowed with bikelane striping For comments and questions please go to: http://trikebum.webs.com/