The Great Big Not in Our Back Yard Bike Blog Roundup

We've covered the strange love-hate relationship some places have with bike infrastucture before but it seemed to be all over the place this week. Like Portland, for example where despite the benefits of bike corrals, a business group manages to scupper the street seats programme. In Maryland, businesses celebrate the reopening of a towpath - and thousands ride a converted railway line in New Zealand - but a similar project in the States is blocked by the owners of a historic station building. Back in the UK, NI Greenways considers a new greenway but Newcastle cyclists fail to have a meeting of minds with their elders. LA Streetsblog proves green bike lanes needn't ruin your film industry while Bath Council finds a bike postal service saves it money. New York is trying to lure Seattle's cyclists away - perhaps with their new bike share scheme although some locals aren't on board (and two weeks in Queens leaves one Oxford cyclist distinctly unimpressed). While there's no such thing as free parking there are many different ways to repurpose it for bikes - or, for readers in the UK, the other way round which is a little odd when bikes are outselling cars by two to one.

Perhaps that's why (bike) businesses are booming in Edinburgh and bike kickstarter projects seem to be everywhere from Carlton's book to a low-cost bike counting device. In Scotland you can help fund POP by buying a t-shirt - while in San Diego, a brewery proposes the ultimate win-win funding proposal.

When it comes to countering the Nimbys, the Green Lanes project looks at how support for bike lanes in Chicago is built up neighbourhood by neighbourhood, while Transitized considers a participatory budgeting exercise and Baltimore asks the community what they'd like to see - Ely Cycle Campaign is interested to see the results of a similar survey in the UK and Chicargo wonders when 'advocates' will stop telling parents what they need (and maybe listen to them instead?). Perhaps it's all a question of the chicken and the egg but if we're waiting for rising cycling numbers to bring about a revolution we've got a long wait coming. Even in Cambridge, which is miles ahead of the rest of the UK the figures don't look brilliant (although beware the perils of the small sample)

From Not in My Backyard to not from our backyard - a Dutch-style turbo roundabout is to be trialled in the UK (but sadly with only shared-use crossings for bikes) while Copenhagenize produces a bike provision planning guide that even UK transport officials should be able to understand. Meanwhile it looks as if the Poles have got hold of a UK design manual while CROW-ize Vienna worries Austria might follow suit. Both Bicycle Dutch and Cycling without a Helmet consider their respective rides to the pool, with rather different results, while Rachel Aldred considers Sweden and Denmark and why bicycle superhighways don't offer free ice cream (or even pogo rescue servies). Cycling Christchurch wonders if they need a cyclovia while London Cyclist considers cycling in El Salvador. Somewhat less exotically, the Portland to Portland riders warm up with a jaunt down to Bristol and Countercyclical gets lost in Milton Keynes.

Meanwhile the proposals kept coming, good and bad. In the City, the plans for Aldgate are not up to scratch and road narrowing schemes continue to make things worse - although plans to close the Olympic Park bike routes at night have at least been reversed. The Alternative DfT is impressed by Gilligan despite itself but still feels quietways should be secondary routes not primary ones. A new bike and pedestrian route in Southwark is actually not bad (adjusted for being in the UK) while Kennington People on Bikes admires some new visions for Vauxhall. CycleSpace continues to look at how industrial wastelands can be made into bikable cities while New Cycling considers improvements in Jesmond. Tim Beasley considers Birmingham's bid for the Cycle City Ambition fund while Manchester cyclists welcome some revamped junctions and Dundee council considers a £154k cycling investment. The Innertube map considers life in Edinburgh's fast lane - its off-road cycle network, while even Dutch cyclists prefer comfortable routes to fast ones along busy roads. Zen Biker Maniac finds some slightly mixed messages on a bike route in Inverness, while in Hillsborough a 20 mph zone is undermined by having through traffic routed through it. Away from the UK, Flying Pigeon finds some signs have finally been put up to tell people where they are on a bike trail while Lets Go Ride a Bike tries out one of Chicago's new separated lanes, One Speed Go checks out a new canal path and Washington neighbourhoods will now find it easier to convert to 20mph limits.

It was another busy week in campaigning with the shortlists for the London Cycling Campaign awards announced. The All Party Parliamentary Cycling Group calls for tougher penalties, more investment and lower speeds but Chris Boardman worries that it will all still come to naught. When it comes to the other Parliament, Phil Ward will be pedalling on Parliament (and has set the manifesto to music) and so will Darkerside while WisoB won't (but that doesn't mean you shouldn't). The stepmother of a cyclist killed in Edinburgh last year recalls a day filled with emotion. Elsewhere in Edinburgh, after nine years of campaigning, could the end be in sight for the battle for better access to the Forth Bridge? Over in the US, Bike Portland considers what it will take to become the first 'diamond level' cycling city in the US, Delaware cyclists organise a legislators' ride and People for Bike plan a Bike Hackathon while the Bike League decides it needs to define its terms. And what do you do when you've biked to work on bike to work day? Attend the bike home from work Party of course.

We'd hoped to have a week without needing to warn people to be safe around lorries but with a Boris Bike user is left critical by a tipper truck it's time for more than half-baked measures - and it wasn't just in London, with another cyclist injured in Aberdeen - and a Romford journalist suffers a narrow escape. Lorries and people are strictly segregated for safety in the UK but only on building sites - once on the road it's everyone for themselves and we're not sure this t-shirt will do much to help. Meanwhile Transport for all considers the menace of floating bus stops (and the buses themselves can be a bit of a menace). And in the Netherlands? Well, they're building 'forgiving bike roads' to cut down on single-bike accidents (or riding into bollards, presumably)

In Scotland a campaign for strict liability brings out the usual rentaquotes with cyclists branded arrogant, perhaps because nasty road conditions breed inconsiderate behaviour. We should enforce the laws we have - and change the ones we don't like, while Cambridge Cyclist considers the other rules of the road - the ones that actually get applied. Chafe City considers the strange case of a city sued because its bike lanes were too wide while Downfader wonders why YouTube takes down a video that shows 'shocking and disgusting content', but the driver assaulting the cyclist in the footage barely gets a talking to. Elsewher a cyclist mourns her stolen bike of 50 years while Karl McCracken does the right thing over a potentially hot bike.

The Invisible Visible man considers whether lack of information is behind most road conflict - perhaps something this Portland researcher could consider in her study on multi-modal road rage (or "Monday" as it's otherwise known) - and it turns out the 'war on the motorist' is nothing new. Transport for London is to start modelling how cyclists and pedestrians behave - as are the Dutch while Muenchenierung looks at how using games can actually change behaviour. Like Eskimoes and snow, the Dutch have multiple words for cyclists (well, two, anyway).

As Dutch kids prepare for their practical cycling exam, Manc Bike Mummy considers dead bikes and other barriers to cycling to school, while the Ranty Highwayman considers how expanding primary schools (and their catchment areas) could undo gains in active travel.

With so many interesting bike bloggers based in Boston, the unfolding events there have been on the minds of many - even from afar. Bike Safe Boston considers the descent from joy to tragedy, hijacking memories of the pre-marathon midnight ride.

And finally - although it's not in fact a blog, this urgent recall notice was too good to miss - while we finish with Jeremy Clarkson not just on a bike ... but a recumbent

We'll be back next week with more bloggage, once we've unboggled our minds from that image