Canada

Problem is its a nuanced thing that only some folks have the sense to make a proper call. When there is no vehicle cross traffic at all. It kinda makes sense. I remember a guy though who would go through on reds for a very busy street in afternoon rush and it was quite annoying. I mean by the time the drivers get all pissed he is well away while me and the others stopped at the light are there as targets of it.

As a Dutch citizen: NO, stop at red!

This whole discussion is a distraction. The real solution is to have proper cycling infrastructure. You don't need to reinterpret road signs if bikes have their own signs in their own protected lanes and protected crossings.

Permission to exercise discretion does not mean cyclists will blindly roll through danger. No one is more aware of the risk of cycling in traffic than cyclists. Riding defensively is a necessary state of mind. A rule change will have no effect on that.

You gotta ask "Why do we need traffic lights?". The answer is "because of motor vehicles", so I don't think cyclists should be disadvantaged by something that is not required because of them.

Drivers will criticize cyclists while drivers themselves rarely stop for a right turn on red and rarely make a full stop at a stop sign

As someone that has been living in Montreal for the past four years, which locale this article brings up numerous times, and biking about 350/365 days a year, I have to highlight a couple things to readers not from Montreal, or maybe even from the other side of the pond:

• Canada doesn't know what yield signs are. Stop signs are on every corner, which are mostly handled as if they were yield signs, but maybe not even that. And this applies to all traffic, not just cyclists.
• Canada also doesn't know what "right has the right of way" is. In some European countries if you come to an intersection without a light, a yield or stop sign, you simply give way to the vehicle approaching from the right.
• The individual boroughs have a lot of disconnect between each other on how traffic is handled. While they are trying to have a unified approach, there's a lot of Balkanization.
• Much of the infra is dated. A remainder of design from the 60s and 70s that had patchwork applied to make it more livable. Things like green wave, automated traffic control or elevated pedestrian crossings and bicycle lanes at intersections are unheard of. Most lights are just set to a fixed cycle and have been operating like the same way for years.
• Intersections, especially with new developments, will have very sharp corners with narrow sidewalk, with greatly reduced visibility.

So that said, I rarely ever see the NYC courier style red-light skips between columns of cars by cyclists. Whenever I see that happen, it's trashy people that seem to have little regard for anything, even their own lives.
I do see cyclists regularly doing Idaho stops at full stop intersections, but it's the same as cars. I think this is a traffic design issue and not an issue with driving culture or cyclists in general. Stop signs are simply a bad design, and this has been elaborated on many times.

I also see a lot of people ride on the e-bike bixi fleet recklessly. They provide far too much speed assist with minimal effort. The same goes with the electric motor bikes with a throttle that somehow pass as e-bike just because they also have the option for pedal assist. However this is not a problem with the vehicles themselves, but rather the lack of education and handling. In most western European nations children are taught how to bike in traffic and adhere to traffic rules at an early age. I can attest to this as I have grown up in Germany, and in grade 4 elementary we had to get our Fahrrad Führerschein, which was basically an attestation of having a course completed, for children.

Basically (in a city below 50km/hr):

If a car runs a red light, the life at risk is someone else's.

If a bike runs a red light, the life at risk is their own.

So there is a difference.

Furthermore, the efficiency of cycling depends on maintaining speed.

That's some pretty specious logic. I would use less fuel if I didn't foolishly waste it stopping at red lights too.

Nah, I didn't get to be a 67 year old cyclist by doing dumb things in downtown rush hour traffic. In any case, starting from all those intersections when the light turned green was great training for the velodrome. I was a mediocre track cyclist, but my standing start was pretty good, due to getting out of the saddle and getting up to speed as fast as possible every single commute.

The key is being predictable. As long as the law says cyclists have to stop and they don’t, they are being unpredictable, and put themselves at greater risk.

And the driver who inadvertently hits a non-stopping cyclist - someone who is already much smaller and less likely to be noticed in the first place - gets to spend the rest of their lives dealing with having hit (possibly maimed or killed) said cyclist.

It’s a bad idea. Idaho should never be cited as an example.

@otters_raft
Idaho stop!

As a Vancouverite, this is the state of things anyway. All stop signs are yield signs. All yield signs- actually there are no yield signs.

This was a dumb title OP.

Literally everyone in this thread didn't read the article, didn't comprehend what the Idaho stop rules are, and is just in here nonsensically bitching about cyclists getting run over thinking this rule will allow them to blow through all intersections willy nilly.

Replace most of these:

With those:

In Québec, cyclists always say that driving laws do not apply to them, they never stop at STOP sign or a red lights, are on the road or the sidewalk instead of the cycle lanes, etc.

They are very dangerous as they respect nothing especially in suburbia. In Montreal sometimes they stop!!!!!!! because it's stop or die, mainly.

I think the lawmakers here are maybe not considering all of the consequences.

Yes a bike won't be able to cause as much damage to another biker or a vehicle if they don't stop at a stop sign and then hit one.

Especially when compared to a vehicle hitting another vehicle.

But those aren't the only two things at a stop sign or intersection. There are also pedestrians crossing the street, often with aight telling them that it is safe to do so. People with disabilities like blindness, people with children, etc.

What happens if there is a line of vehicles to the left of the bike lane blocking the view of the cyclist and they keep going straight since it's a three way intersection, no road on the right so no vehicles to even worry about, and then a mother with a baby in a carriage steps out from in front of the vehicle at the front?

Sure a bike won't do as much damage as a vehicle, but it can still certainly do a lot of damage in the right circumstances.

Well.. if you don't want the bicycles to slow or stop on traffic lights, another ridiculous idea is to time the traffic light changes to the average speed of cyclists instead of cars.
If the old days they time the traffic light to cars so cars doesn't have to stop at every traffic lights. Maybe now its the cyclists' turn.
This way, you can keep the traffic rules equal and drivers who do not want to stop at intersection can drive as fast as the cyclist.
If you think cyclists will be too slow to reach the next traffic light, you can arrange the interval to use double the speed of cyclists, so the lights turn right in the middle between the two lights.
Then the Question will be, what is the average speed of cyclists on the streets?