Advocates of vehicular cycling—such as John Forester, John Franklin and John S. Allen—argue that cycling in accordance to the vehicular rules of the road is the safest and most effective means to use a bicycle for transportation.

Some VC advocates contend that cyclists should only ride vehicularly, believing that non-vehicular cycling is not only less safe, but leads to less societal acceptance of cyclists who do cycle vehicularly.

Some VC advocates oppose segregated cycling facilities like bike lanes because they inhibit and discourage cycling integrated with other vehicular traffic, and because they encourage motorists not to expect bicycles where it is reasonable to expect them and even where they are forced to be. In particular, bike lanes oblige a bicyclist going straight through an intersection to do it from next to the curb, whereas a vehicular cyclist would do it from a through-traffic lane. A right-turning motorist doesn’t expect a motorist in that lane and may thus hit the unseen bicycle. Similarly, bike paths and bike lanes sometimes encourage or require wrong-way riding in places where it was inconvenient to put lanes or paths on both sides of the road. This has two predictable results:

1. head-on collisions between two bicyclists who both think they have the right of way.
2. collisions between left-turning motorists and bicyclists in bike lanes or paths. The motorist has already looked for cars going each way on the side street, and would have seen any cyclist going the right way; but the motorist has not looked at the places where any wrong-way bicyclists will pop up.