Around 83 percent of Americans live in urban areas, and in many parts of the country traffic is worse than it has ever been. For the sake of convenience and reducing traffic, it would be in all of our best interest to promote the legalization of motorcycle lane-splitting in every single state. Adding protected bike lanes certainly wouldn’t hurt, either. If people are given options for quickly and easily reducing the amount of time they sit in traffic, they will take them. At the same time, fewer cars on the road will reduce traffic for drivers, too. It’s just that simple.
In a recent race-across Los Angeles comparison between cycling, e-scootering, driving a car, and riding a motorcycle from the Common Tread XP team, it was obvious from the outset that the motorbikes would win. The Los Angeles metro area is cut up into tiny pieces by its vast web of highways and interchanges, so it would have been really hard for a bicycle or e-scooter to win this speed competition. In reality it was always down to car versus motorcycle, and the car can’t lane-split through traffic jams.
This is an entertaining video in the vein of the old “Top Gear” transit vs car episodes, and it’s still worth watching even if you know the outcome. What really blew me away was just how much quicker the bikes were than the car. Why would you voluntarily throw away that much time sitting in traffic if you live in the city? This should be all the motivation you need to go take the Motorcycle Safety Foundation course and get your license to ride immediately. Time is money, baby!