Being home
for fall break requires some adjustment. While driving to pick my little sister
up from school I thought traffic was going slower than usual. I then saw that
one of the lanes had been closed and barriers were put up to create
a protected bike lane. Since then, I’ve found out that this bike lane was
just one of many protected bike lanes created by the city in an effort to get
33% of traffic in the city to travel by means other than cars. My informal polls consisting of
complaining to many of the people I know signal that this law isn’t very
popular in the community.
However, the passage of this law despite its unpopularity makes
some sense given our voting model. Voters make voting decisions based on a
combination of the value (|V2 - V1|) of their vote to them times the
probability of being the deciding vote, and the civic duty and social pressures
they feel to vote. While the social pressures and civic duty are prominent in
large elections, I know I felt very little pressure to vote in the off year
referendum on protected bike lanes — the primary driver to vote was the effect
my vote would have on my life.
The difference to me, a non-biker,
was minimal. My average drive would be increased by 6 seconds by the measure —
if I value my time at $30 an hour, this cost is $0.05 per drive, so if I drive
2,000 times over the course of my living here, the measure costs me around
$100, with no benefit. If one quarter of the eligible population (40,000)
votes, my expected cost is around $100/10,000, or one cent. This is much less
than my costs of voting (it takes 15 minutes, so $7.50). Since my expected
benefit of voting is less than the costs, I don’t vote. Bikers, however, get a
ton of benefit from the measure if it passes — commuting to work every day by
bike is a joy to them worth $30/ride, and not having to buy a car is worth $25,000.
If they have the same number of rides I do, their expected benefit is (30*2,000+25,000)/10,000
or $8.50. If bikers value their time the same as I do, it’s worth voting for
them, as their expected benefits ($8.50) exceed their voting costs ($7.50). Since
our model shows why it’s logical for bikers to vote, and for non-bikers to
abstain, it makes sense how a law that was unpopular with the non-biking
majority was able to pass. So while I’m now burdened with slightly longer car
rides, it may well have been the result of rational voting decisions that led
me to this situation.
2 comments:
I imagine that the bikers would also get utility from knowing that they are preventing pollution, in addition to the joy of riding itself. However, we need to take into account the value of the bikers' time too. Bike rides often take longer than car rides, so by making the decision to bike, the biker is bearing the cost of extra time lost during their commute. This is assuming that these bikers were not able to ride their bike to work before this law was passed. In that case, though, they had to get to work one way or another -- so adding the price of a car that they didn't need to buy to their benefits may not be appropriate. They likely already had a car to drive to work and elsewhere, unless they live in a city with highly accessible public transportation. However, the price of gasoline that they don't have to buy, as well as motor vehicle parking fees, should certainly be added to their benefits.
I also wonder whether anyone who personally doesn't choose to ride a bike would vote for this bill to pass. Perhaps some people get utility out of knowing that their town is more environmentally friendly, even if their own consumer behavior doesn't necessarily help.
Great analysis Jake! As a biker who regularly uses the protected bike lanes it's always good to other thoughts on the measure. I think, though, that there's a key benefit your analysis is missing out on in the action of moving bikers to the side of the road. Think of your travel cost (measured in increments of time) if you're having to drive behind a biker who has no choice but to ride in the regular road lanes because there is no designated lane for them. The speed of every biker varies pretty significantly and most likely every biker in town rides more slowly than a car drives. Even if half of the total population of bikers can keep up with the 15-20 mph of cars driving around town, that still leaves a large number of bikers who simply can't hold the speed limit because of physical limitations. A designated biker lane saves car drivers the problem of having to constantly match slower biker speeds rather than keep to the speed limit. Furthermore, with a large number of international and new students coming into town for university, my guess is that many would prefer a bike over a car, and having a designated biker lane is a much safer option for those riders and the cars driving on the road. A designated biker lane, then, saves a ton time for drivers having to deal with a fluctuating population of students who need alternative means of transportation. Because of this, I'd imagine there's actually great marginal benefit for you as a driver in the passing of this citywide measure to establish more bike lanes.
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