Hang on...hang on.

Why spend billions building new roads and paths for bicycles to go on anyway?

Our roads are considered to be dangerous, but that is because they have been designed tto be dangerous, on purpose, by engineers and politicians, as much as by the vehicle industry and vehicle drivers.

There is no overarching 'law' that says vehicles 'own' the roads, nor is there one that says that the current speed limits are set in stone.

There would be no need for any bike lanes if vehicles went slower. There is no need to drive as fast as we do on most roads within city and town environments, except habit.

30 kph is fine across vast tracts of Europe, indeed Oxford in the UK is about to become a massive 20mph zone too (about 30kph).

On motorways in the UK, where people speed constantly, up to and beyond 100 mph in my experience, they have sections where vehicles are timed over a set distance, and if the average is too high...a fine.

Whacko! A bit like trucks suffer here in NSW. But, what happens is interesting.

Now only travelling at a mere 70 mph, the cars space out, driving improves, it all becomes almost a human scale again.

By all means, lets have electirc bikes, remembering the coal fired powerstations behind them of course, but let's start to reduce our road speeds, and fuel consumption, road crash trauma, insurance risks and costs,and improve train, tram-bus and footpaths too.

Bicycles no more belong on pedestrian footpaths, than do 4wds belong anywhere but the NT and other similar godforsaken places.