Transportation influences urban development. That is why most houses have a garage. There is no such thing as private transport (streets are public). Transportation has been heavily centralized since the New Deal. The bicycle was okay for most people living in cities in the 30s, now it is not because the government has favored the car infrastructure over the last decades. I think we need to start with not letting government develop their big infrastructure projects which are not resilient. Advocating for the use of bicycles might make sense in some places yet bicycle infrastructure is required.

I dunno, I live in what most people would call peak Suburbia and have all sorts of bike trails I didn’t even know existed until I got the electric assisted bike, I can range 5 miles away from my house in any direction without having to be on any major roads, and have a trailer for doing grocery shopping. I went 15 miles away and back one time but took quite awhile. All the grocery stores I frequent are within this range. When it’s warm out, I use my bike for probably 90% of my trips out of the house.

Beg to differ, they're viable for basically all local use cases...

Groceries? Yep. School? Yep. Commuting? Yep. Etc.

They aren't viable for hauling multi-ton loads, or covering long distances, that's about it.

Almost all? I think most car trips could have been bike trips.

What?

A vehicle (presumably a car, since bikes are vehicles too) gets you and your stuff from point A to point B. Bikes do that too, though at a smaller scale.

If your commute or your errands aren't excessively long or require the use of a controlled-access highway, a bike's a perfectly fine alternative. The limiting factors are seasonal road or bike path maintenance and the discipline of other road users.

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