Misunderstandings about road use and cycling
1 - Actually the first well paved well maintained roads in the continental US and eselwhere were implemented upon advocacy from bicycling groups.
The bicycle has every right to be on the street as the driver does.
2- You see this a lot after accidents where a driver cuts off a rider and either hits them direct or causes them to crash. The driver says "why didn't the bike just stop?" The short answer is, the bicyclist is under no obligation to stop for your illegal turn. Right of way doesn't dissappear when the other vehicle is a bicycle. The more in depth answer includes the fact that in many cases the cyclist slamming on his brakes has a harder time stopping than a driver at comparable speed, for the cyclist not only has to worry about stopping in time but also about going over the handlebars or skidding out. A car has a higher top speed, and yes, it's easier to stop from 30 than 70mph, but the driver is not going 70mph in traffic so the misconception that it is "easier" for the cyclist to stop is false and patantly dangerous.
3 -- The bicyclist, when riding, is the operator of a vehcile. He is required to obey the same laws as cars, trucks, etc. The lack of an engine does not mean the bicylcist is a pedestrian. Convention has resulted in slower moving traffic in the US keeping to the right, therefore, cyclists often ride to the right hand side of motor vehicles if the motor vehicles are faster, but they are vehciel traffic.
4 -- Although the bicyclist often rides to the right of cars he is goign to be in the lane at some point -- if the shoulder narrows, he is making a turn, goign through an intersection, or avoiding hazartds such as broken glass, rough pavement, or potholes and cracks in the street.
5 -- Most people who do not bike think that bicyclists should not be on main streets or should only be on roads with bike lane markings. Others think that the cyclist should only be in the bike lane. This is not true and riding as if it were would be dangerous. A few localities do give cyclists tickets if they do not use a marked bike lane but this is generally understood to be a dangerous practice as the bike lanes themselves are often the scenes of fatal crashes, being filled with debris, illegally parked cars or trucks, and often being too far to the right for the cyclist to interact safely with other traffic on the roads. The cyclist has every right to use any road, with the legal exception of certain highways, and even there the law allows cyclists to use the highway if it is the only direct route...
6 - Just like drivers, some bicyclists do run red lights. However, the person who observes "bicyclists run red lights" is usually talkign about a cyclist who stops for the light and waits for it to turn. When it becomes clear the sensors of the light do not know he is there, the cyclist will go through the light (having stopped and waited) after makign sure no one is coming the other way, as the light's misreading of the road situation is giving a green light to traffic comign the other direction. This is not "running" the light, it is dealing with an inefficient and ineffective traffic light in the only safe way possible -- much safer than sittign int he street at an intersection until a car comes along to trigger the light. Some states are even changing their laws to allow motorcycles to proceed in the same fashion if the lights do not sense them. If the light will not pick up a huge Harley it will certainly not sense a bicycle. Drivers who make this observation are misinformed, and if they ask "well, why can;t I do that too?" the answer to tell them is that the light will sense their car. The reason the cyclists will sometimes have to treat the lights as stopsigns is because their vehicle is not picked up by the light. This is no unfair advantage being taken by cyclists over drivers, but rather, a method of dealign with a decided disadvantage at while automated traffic signals sometimes leave cyclists.
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