BicycleDutch
9 HN recommenders · recommended in 18 months, 2013–2022
6:30 · 1.2M views · Oct 9, 2011
A short BicycleDutch video on how the Netherlands got its cycling infrastructure, including the 1970s protests and the shift away from car-centric planning. The channel later published an updated version.
HN uses it as the standard short answer to whether car-dominated cities can become bike-friendly, since the Dutch had to fight for it.
19 comments from Hacker News
The obsession with helmets in many countries is born of an idea that violence on the roads is inevitable. It's a bit like responding to knife or gun crime by saying everyone should wear kevlar vests, problem solved! Rather than insisting that knives and guns are not used in public spaces. Some people have real problems grasping this. Cars are seen as inherently dangerous, pedestrians and everyone else should (ideally) stay off the roads, and nobody should challenge our "right" to drive where and when we like. But driving is still a choice, albeit coerced since there are so few alternatives, and that choice has profound implications for others. Why should I wear protective clothing because you choose to drive a vehicle which puts me in danger? In the Netherlands, to respond to your point, they have largely eliminated motoring-related danger for cyclists. If anyone is interested in the development of Dutch cycling infrastructure, this is an excellent video: this video (How the Dutch got their cycle paths, 6m 29s) David Hembrow has an informative blog about all things cycling in Holland: [LINK]
Those "antifragile" solutions have been used to great effect in Netherlands where they have built a massive cycling, walking, and transit infrastructure. They were able to build this infrastructure due to a popular protest movement, 'Stop de Kindermoord' (Stop the Child Murder) which was in reaction to exactly the problem we face in the US of deaths and injury caused by motorists. There is a great video about the protest movement and the transformation of dutch infrastructure here: this video
Yes, definitely a big problem in the UK too. Although I think support for cycling is perhaps more cross-party than in the US, at least in the political elite. Both the Conservative PM and Mayor of London are nominally pro-bike, also The Times (centre-right paper for those from outside the UK) ran a major campaign on cycle safety, after one of their journalists was killed: [LINK] Although certainly their freedom to do something serious about the issue is restricted by the anti-metropolitan, anti-liberal vroom vroom demographic. > If cycling is to ever become safe, cities need to start embracing the bike like they do in the Netherlands, but it's no easy task. On that topic, this mini-documentary is worthwhile looking at: this video
I encourage you to watch [this video.]( this video ) No one believed they had enough space in the Netherlands either. Turns out they did, with some creative engineering, time, money, and sheer force of will. It's not easy. It takes a long time. But with a steady hand and the ability to cut through lobby interests, it can be done. Note that they didn't need to knock down many buildings in the NL. They did things like reducing 3-4 lanes to 2; making roads and footpaths narrower; reclaiming roads and re-routing vehicle traffic elsewhere; and of course better utilising a lot of wasted curbside land. Plus lots of redrawing of city plans to ensure future building and renovations incorporated the vision.
Riding a bike does not have to be as dangerous as it is in most places in the United States. Here[1] is an interesting video on how the Dutch got their bicycle paths. From the intro: "The Netherlands has the world's largest number of cyclists, but it is also the safest place in the world to cycle. That is largely because of the perfect cycling infrastructure that can be found throughout the country. How did the Dutch get this network of high quality cycle paths?" [1] - this video